The young Houston Astros starter has seemingly put early struggles behind him

The Houston Astros entered the season knowing they would lose two of their projected starting pitchers.

Justin Verlander and Jose Urquidy started the year on the injured list after the ace arrived to camp late and the veteran right side suffered a forearm injury.

At the time, this seemed like something the Astros could overcome since Hunter Brown looked extremely solid early in 2023 in his rookie season, but that turned out not to be the case as their rotation became one of the worst in all of baseball.

Brown was one of the main reasons.

In his first six starts of the year, he was 0-4 with a staggering 9.78 ERA.

There were calls to send him to Triple-A to work on things like they did with their other youngster JP France, but because of all of Houston’s injury issues, that option wasn’t an option. truly a reality.

Instead, they allowed the 25-year-old to work on some things against Major League hitters, something that can always go wrong when things don’t work out.

However, things improved in the month of May, finishing his five starts with a 3.98 ERA with his last two being considered quality.

Brown was unlucky in his outing against the Los Angeles Angels, being credited with the loss despite only two hits and two earned runs on a fifth-inning home run.

Tuesday’s start was his best of the year as he allowed just one earned run in six innings pitched while striking out a season-high nine batters against the Seattle Mariners, leading the AL West.

This is a good sign for the Astros, as they are counting on Brown to be a quality arm on their pitching staff. When Luis Garcia and Lance McCullers Jr. return later in the season, it will be interesting to see what they do with the second-year player, as they could move him to the bullpen.

For now, all he can do is continue to try to succeed on the mound, which is what happened to him in his last two outings.