The Astros played a game only five years ago that nobody watched. A Monday afternoon game against the Angels drew a television rating of 0.0. They were the fallen franchise that nobody heard crash. Houston lost 92 games that year, which happened to be an improvement over the previous three seasons of 111, 107 and 106 losses.
Just three years later, Houston won the World Series, a credit to the remarkable turnaround engineered by general manager Jeff Luhnow. And Wednesday, just before the clock ran out on the trade deadline, the Astros planted another flag–not another championship, not yet anyway, but a bold statement everybody from the Bronx to Las Vegas could not miss.