Bullpen Appreciation Post
How good has the Astros bullpen been? Let's measure the ways...
I have no problem admitting when I was wrong and while time will tell the final story of the 2025 Astros bullpen, 40 games into the season one could argue they’ve been the story of the season so far, at least in a positive sense.
I was critical of the Astros' penny-pinching ways and decision to man their bullpen with youngsters, unproven rookies, castoffs and hangers-on.
So far, I’ve been wrong.
After getting just one-third of an inning from starter Lance McCullers, Jr. on Saturday, the Astros got just 2.1 innings from Ryan Gusto Monday night as he gave up 7 runs to the Kansas City Royals.
The bullpen followed with 6.2 shutout innings as Houston battled to get back in the game.
Of course, the Astros didn’t win, but the bullpen gave them a chance to.
Below is what the bullpen has done in 2025.
Opp = Opportunities (not innings).
EI = Easy Inning, which is 10 pitches or less in a complete inning.
SDI = Shut Down Inning, holding opponent scoreless in a complete inning immediately after the Astros score.
IO = In Order, retiring the side in order (no matter how many pitches it takes.
For example, Bryan Abreu has had an easy inning 6.3% of the time, a shut-down inning in every opportunity and has retired the side in order in 18.8% of the time.
Several things stand out in the table below:
Abreu, Josh Hader and Steven Okert have 100% shut-down rates.
Gusto (as a reliever) has 3 easy innings in 9 opportunities.
Okert has been fantastic, with 3 easy innings, 100% shut-down rate and retiring the side in order in 11 of 20 chances.
Hader has been largely drama-free with an IO% of 43.8%.
Abreu is full of drama as his IO% is only 18.8%, men are always on base and it’s a matter of time before it costs him.
I don’t have any comparison data to know how these compare to the other bullpens around the league, but my sense is they would rank highly in most categories as the Astros are 3rd in bullpen ERA (2.80), tops in FIP (3.03), 6th in xFIP (3.74) and 3rd in fWAR (2.2).
One note: The bullpen BABIP is the sixth lowest in the league (.266), 23 points below league average, so regression is possible.
That shouldn’t take away just how good this group has been to date, though.
xWins
The loss on Monday dropped the Astros to an expected win total of 87.
As a reminder, I generally update this chart every day the Astros play, whether I have a full post or not. It can be found on the top menu under “Astros Expected Wins” on the front page.
As always, thanks for reading.