{"id":665546,"date":"2026-05-12T07:30:13","date_gmt":"2026-05-12T07:30:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/665546\/"},"modified":"2026-05-12T07:30:13","modified_gmt":"2026-05-12T07:30:13","slug":"astros-notes-imai-pearson-pena-meyers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/665546\/","title":{"rendered":"Astros Notes: Imai, Pearson, Pe\u00f1a, Meyers"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Astros will activate\u00a0Tatsuya Imai<\/a> from the injured list tomorrow. Houston lists him as the probable starter against Bryan Woo<\/a> in the second game of a four-game set against the Mariners. They\u2019ll need to option a pitcher as the corresponding move.<\/p>\n

Imai returns after a month-long absence due to what the team called arm fatigue. The righty has had a difficult start to his MLB career, struggling in two of his first three appearances. He walked 11 hitters over his first 8 2\/3 innings and failed to complete three innings twice. Imai\u2019s pair of minor league rehab starts haven\u2019t done much to assuage the command concerns, as he has issued another eight walks in five frames.<\/p>\n

The Astros will likely go back to a six-man rotation. Spencer Arrighetti<\/a> and\u00a0Peter Lambert<\/a> have stepped up in depth roles since Houston lost Hunter Brown<\/a> and Cristian Javier<\/a> to shoulder injuries. Mike Burrows<\/a> has pitched well in his past three times out after a rocky start to the year. The Astros will continue giving Imai starts to try to get him on track after signing him to a three-year free agent contract.<\/p>\n

Lance McCullers Jr.<\/a> has continued to struggle.\u00a0Kai-Wei Teng<\/a> and\u00a0Cody Bolton<\/a> are candidates for the sixth starter spot, while\u00a0Ryan Weiss<\/a> and\u00a0Jason Alexander<\/a> could be back up in the second half of May after recently being optioned.<\/p>\n

Nate Pearson<\/a> was expected to be in that conversation when he signed a one-year free agent deal early in the offseason. Pearson was held up by offseason elbow surgery and has been on the injured list all season. He\u2019s on a rehab assignment and will need to secure a spot on the MLB roster or be placed on waivers because he\u2019s out of options.<\/p>\n

The Astros announced on Monday that they\u2019re now viewing Pearson as a reliever (relayed by Chandler Rome of The Athletic<\/a>). Pearson walked multiple hitters in each of his first three rehab appearances before tossing a perfect inning for Triple-A Sugar Land on Saturday. He\u2019s averaging 96.4 mph on his four-seam fastball. Houston has been without\u00a0Josh Hader<\/a> all season and placed\u00a0Bennett Sousa<\/a> back on the injured list over the weekend with elbow inflammation.<\/p>\n

Hader began a rehab stint last week and could be back when first eligible on May 24. The Astros could get a pair of key position players back in the next couple weeks as well.\u00a0Jeremy Pe\u00f1a<\/a> should begin a rehab assignment at Double-A Corpus Christi tomorrow, while Jake Meyers<\/a> is likely to begin his own rehab stint this week (via Brian McTaggart of MLB.com<\/a>). The series of injuries have contributed to a dismal first month and a half of the season. Houston dropped to a season-low 10 games below .500 with tonight\u2019s loss, tying the Angels for the worst record in the American League at 16-26.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Astros will activate\u00a0Tatsuya Imai from the injured list tomorrow. Houston lists him as the probable starter against…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":665547,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[558],"tags":[64,63,305925,162867,33574,591,52836,85,159512],"class_list":["post-665546","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mlb","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-bennett-sousa","tag-jake-meyers","tag-jeremy-pena","tag-mlb","tag-nate-pearson","tag-sports","tag-tatsuya-imai"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/665546","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=665546"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/665546\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/665547"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=665546"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=665546"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=665546"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}