HOUSTON (AP) — Through 20 games, the Houston Astros have managed just six wins and are in last place in the AL West.
Their pitching staff trails only Colorado with a 5.24 ERA and big-money new closer Josh Hader has given up the same number of earned runs in 10 games as he did in 61 last year.
Despite this, these veteran Astros, who have reached the AL Championship Series seven consecutive times, have no doubt they’ll turn things around.
“If there’s a team that can do it, it’s this team,” shortstop Jeremy Peña said.
First-year manager Joe Espada, who was hired in January to replace the retired Dusty Baker, discussed his team’s early struggles.
“It’s not ideal,” he said. “It’s not what we expected, to come out of the shoot playing this type of baseball. But you know what, this is where we’re at and we’ve got to pick it up and play better. That’s just the bottom line.”
Many of Houston’s problems have stemmed from a poor performance by a rotation that has been decimated by injuries. Ace Justin Verlander and fellow starter José Urquidy haven’t pitched this season because of injuries and lefty Framber Valdez made just two starts before landing on the injured list with a sore elbow.
Ronel Blanco, who threw a no-hitter in his season debut April 1, has pitched well and is 2-0 with a 0.86 ERA in three starts this season. Cristian Javier is also off to a good start, going 2-0 with a 1.54 ERA in four starts, but the team has won just two games not started by those two pitchers.
However, Espada wouldn’t blame the rotation for Houston’s current position.
“It’s been a little bit of a roller coaster how we've played overall,” he said. “One day we get good starting pitching, some days we don’t. The middle relief has been better and sometimes it hasn’t been. So, we’ve just got to put it all together and then play more as a team. And once we start doing that, we’ll be in good shape.”
The good news for the Astros is that Verlander will make his season debut Friday night when they open a series at Washington and Valdez should return soon after him.
“Framber and Justin have been a great part of our success in the last few years,” second baseman Jose Altuve said. “So, it’s always good to have those two guys back helping the team. We trust them and I think it’s going to be good.”
Hader signed a five-year, $95 million contract this offseason to give the Astros a shutdown 7-8-9 combination at the back end of their bullpen with Bryan Abreu and Ryan Pressly. But the five-time All-Star is off to a bumpy start.
He allowed four runs in the ninth inning of a 6-1 loss to the Braves on Monday night and has yielded eight earned runs this season after giving up the same number in 56 1/3 innings for San Diego last year.
He was much better Wednesday when he struck out the side in the ninth before the Astros fell to Atlanta in 10 innings for their third straight loss.
Houston’s offense, led by Altuve, Yordan Alvarez and Kyle Tucker, ranks third in the majors with a .268 batting average and is tied for third with 24 homers this season. But the Astros have struggled with runners in scoring position and often failed to get a big hit in close games.
While many of Houston’s hitters have thrived this season, one notable exception is first baseman José Abreu. The 37-year-old, who is in the second year of a three-year, $58.5 million contract, is hitting 0.78 with just one extra-base hit in 16 games, raising questions about why he remains in the lineup every day.
To make matters worse, his error on a routine ground ball in the eighth inning Wednesday helped the Braves tie the game before they won in extra innings.
Espada brushed off criticism of Abreu and said he knows the 2020 AL MVP can break out of his early slump.
“Because (of) history,” Espada said. “The back of his baseball card. He can do it.”
Though things haven’t gone well for the Astros so far, everyone insists there’s no panic in this team which won its second World Series in 2022.
Altuve added that he doesn’t have to say anything to his teammates during this tough time.
“I think they’ve played enough baseball to know how to control themselves and how to come back to the plan we have, which is winning games,” he said.
The clubhouse was quiet and somber Wednesday after the Astros suffered their third series sweep of the season and second at home. While not panicking about the slow start, this team, which has won at least 90 games in each of the last three seasons, is certainly not happy with its record.
“We need to do everything better,” third baseman Alex Bregman said. “I feel like we’re in a lot of games, but we just haven’t found a way to win them. And good teams find a way to win games. So we need to find a way to win games.”
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Houston Astros' Jose Altuve walks off the field after striking out in the sixth inning during a baseball game against the Kansas City Royals Tuesday, April 9, 2024, in Kansas City, Mo. (AP Photo/Ed Zurga)
Atlanta Braves runner Adam Duvall, right, scores in front of umpire Tony Randazzo, center, and Houston Astros pitcher Josh Hader on an RBI single by teammate Orlando Arcia during the ninth inning of a baseball game Monday, April 15, 2024, in Houston. (AP Photo/Michael Wyke)
WASHINGTON (AP) — The last thing standing between Ashnaelle Bijoux and her college dream is the FAFSA form — a financial aid application that's supposed to help students go to college, but is blocking her instead. She has tried to submit it over and over. Every time, it fails to go through.
“I feel overwhelmed and stressed out,” said Bijoux, 19. She came close to tears the last time she tried the form. “I feel like I'm being held back."
Normally a time of celebration for high school seniors, this spring has been marred by the federal government's botched rollout of the new FAFSA application. By May 1, students usually know where they're headed to college in the fall. This year, most still haven't received financial aid offers. Three months before the start of fall classes, many don't know where they're going to college, or how they're going to pay for it.
“We’re asking them to make probably one of the biggest financial decisions — and decisions that will have the biggest implications on their lives going forward — without all of the information,” said Justin Draeger, president and CEO of the National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators.
The FAFSA, or Free Application for Federal Student Aid, went through a massive overhaul that was supposed to make it simpler and shorter. But a series of blunders by the Education Department made it harder than ever, delaying college decisions by months and raising fears that hundreds of thousands of students will forgo college entirely.
Across the United States, the number of students who have successfully submitted the FAFSA is down 29% from this time last year, and it’s even worse at schools with more low-income students, according to the National College Attainment Network.
The group's CEO, Kim Cook, warned members of Congress this month about a potentially “catastrophic” drop in college enrollments that would make the decreases of the pandemic seem mild.
For Bijoux, of Norwich, Connecticut, the FAFSA problems threaten to undermine the promise of higher education.
To her, college is a chance to seize the opportunities that weren't available to her mother, who immigrated from Haiti to the U.S. as an adult. Bijoux hopes to become a therapist and set a positive example for her three younger brothers.
If her FAFSA goes through, she should be eligible for enough financial aid to help with the $ 13,000-a-year tuition at Southern Connecticut State University. If not, she might go to a local community college, but even that would require loans if she can't complete the FAFSA.
“That’s why it hurts, because it’s like you work so hard to go somewhere and do something and make something of yourself,” Bijoux said. “I thought I would start at a four-year (college) and then work hard continuously, like I’ve been doing basically my whole life. But that’s not the case.”
The updated FAFSA form has one section filled out by students and another by their parents. But when Bijoux finishes her part, nothing shows up on her mom's online account. She keeps trying, but nothing seems to change.
Similar problems have been reported across the country, along with numerous other bugs that the Education Department has scrambled to fix. Families who call for customer service have faced long wait times or say the call center hung up on them.
It “drains all the momentum” from families working to send their children to college, especially those navigating the process for the first time, said Anne Zinn, a counselor at Norwich Free Academy, where Bijoux goes to school.
“I can only say so many times, ‘Just be patient, just be patient,’ before they throw their hands up and they’re like, ‘Why am I doing this? I’m just gonna go get a job,'" she said.
The rollout has attracted bipartisan criticism in Congress, and it's being investigated at the request of Republicans. Last week, Richard Cordray, the federal student loan chief who oversaw the FAFSA update, announced he's stepping down at the end of June.
For colleges, too, the delays pose a major threat.
Enrollment decreases like those being projected now could put many small colleges out of business, or necessitate deep cuts in staff. Some colleges are pushing for emergency relief just to stay afloat, said Angel Pérez, CEO of the National Association for College Admission Counseling.
“If they don’t get checks from the federal government to basically get them through next year, they will not survive,” Pérez said.
The FAFSA has been the linchpin of student financial aid for decades. It's used to determine eligibility for the federal Pell grant, a scholarship for low-income students, and it's required to receive federal student loans. Colleges and states also use FAFSA to distribute their own scholarships.
FAFSA had long been maligned for being tedious, difficult and intimidating to families without college experience. Congress passed legislation in 2020 meant to simplify the form. The Education Department was ordered to reduce the number of questions from more than 100 to about 40, and change the formula to expand aid to more students.
Problems started piling up as soon as the new form went online in December, already months overdue.
The first applications were incorrectly processed using an outdated calculation for inflation. Later, a federal contractor miscalculated a different formula on more than 200,000 applications. Each mistake added to delays, leaving students waiting longer to hear anything about financial aid.
Even more worrisome is a misstep that blocked students from finishing the form if they have a parent without a Social Security number. Advocates say the system locked out hundreds of thousands of students who are U.S. citizens or permanent residents but whose parents are not.
The Education Department on Tuesday said it's giving those parents a new way to enter their tax information manually. But as recently as this week, some students said they were still blocked from submitting the form.
Federal education officials say they're addressing lingering bugs but making progress. More than 8 million student applications have now been processed and sent to colleges, the agency said, and new applications are being processed within three days.
Still, the wait is far from over. It usually takes weeks for schools to prepare financial aid offers. Some colleges have extended decision deadlines to give students more time to weigh their options. But some stuck to May 1, forcing students to choose a college — and make a nonrefundable payment to hold their spot — without knowing all their scholarship options.
In West Virginia, Gov. Jim Justice on Tuesday declared a state of emergency that allows students to receive state scholarships without having their FAFSA processed by the federal government. West Virginia has the lowest number of college graduates in the nation, and the state’s high school FAFSA completion rates are currently down nearly 40%, said Justice, a Republican.
"Really and truly, a lot of kids are sitting on the sidelines ... wondering, ‘Am I going to be able to go to college?’ ” he said during a news briefing.
In Baltimore, Camryn Carter is waiting to find out if he'll get a full ride to the University of Maryland or face tens of thousands of dollars in student loans.
A top student and captain of his baseball and wrestling teams, Carter sees college as a step up in life. He thinks back to the times in the grocery store line when he had to put items back on the shelf because his mom couldn't afford the bill. A college degree would give him the stability he didn't always have, the 18-year-old said.
But when he looks at tuition, it's intimidating. Along with Maryland, he's also considering McDaniel College, a private school in Maryland. If he enrolls there, he expects to borrow almost $30,000 a year.
“I try to make the best decisions now so I can have a good future,” he said. “I'm a little nervous that things won't work out. But I'm faithful.”
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Leah Willingham contributed reporting from Charleston, West Virginia.
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Ashnaelle Bijoux poses on campus, Saturday, April 27, 2024, at Norwich Free Academy in Norwich, Conn. Bijoux, a senior at NFA, has been unable to complete the FAFSA form due to a glitch with the form. Without the form and the financial aid it brings, Bijoux won't be able to pursue her goal of going to Southern Connecticut State University to become a therapist. (AP Photo/Jessica Hill)
Ashnaelle Bijoux poses on campus, Saturday, April 27, 2024, at Norwich Free Academy in Norwich, Conn. Bijoux, a senior at NFA, has been unable to complete the FAFSA form due to a glitch with the form. Without the form and the financial aid it brings, Bijoux won't be able to pursue her goal of going to Southern Connecticut State University to become a therapist. (AP Photo/Jessica Hill)
Ashnaelle Bijoux poses on campus, Saturday, April 27, 2024, at Norwich Free Academy in Norwich, Conn. Bijoux, a senior at NFA, has been unable to complete the FAFSA form due to a glitch with the form. Without the form and the financial aid it brings, Bijoux won't be able to pursue her goal of going to Southern Connecticut State University to become a therapist. (AP Photo/Jessica Hill)
Ashnaelle Bijoux poses on campus, Saturday, April 27, 2024, at Norwich Free Academy in Norwich, Conn. Bijoux, a senior at NFA, has been unable to complete the FAFSA form due to a glitch with the form. Without the form and the financial aid it brings, Bijoux won't be able to pursue her goal of going to Southern Connecticut State University to become a therapist. (AP Photo/Jessica Hill)
