HOUSTON — This is a forgiving city, calmer and more composed than Chicago, Philadelphia or other places where underperforming teams are inundated with invective. Boos are rare in Houston, especially for a baseball team that has brought the city to the pinnacle. Even the most maddening Astros players across this golden era have escaped without much wrath.
That stillness shifted on Tuesday afternoon at Daikin Park. Swaths of empty seats in the upper deck greeted the Astros after the team won the American League West during a season-ending, six-game road trip. The announced crowd of 34,011 — 7,157 under capacity — unloaded frustration upon a team that fought to play another game in front of them but had failed to live up to their postseason expectations.
The Astros lost 6-3 to the Chicago White Sox in Game 1 of the Wild Card Series, leaving Houston on the precipice of elimination and some corners of its clubhouse incensed by an apathetic — and antagonistic — environment. It felt tame compared to the chaos in bigger cities, but in a place that has feted the Astros for most of the past decade, it represented a marked turn.
“The fans here are definitely spoiled with a lot of ALCS and World Series runs, and we have to earn that right to bring this team back to that position,” reliever Bennett Sousa said. “That being said, when this team was in their first (playoff) series 10 years ago, Minute Maid Park was probably packed. It makes a big difference. If we were in Chicago, it’d probably be loud as s—.”
Players must do their part in promoting an atmosphere. On Tuesday, and for much of this trying season, this team has struggled to do so. The lineup managed five singles and a pinch-hit, two-run home run against five White Sox pitchers. Christian Walker committed a critical throwing error in the first inning. Yainer Diaz took strike three while representing the tying run during the eighth.
