Updates on two injured Houston Astros relievers don’t look positive

The Houston Astros entered spring training feeling good about themselves.

Not only did they make some pretty unexpected improvements to their team during the offseason, but they also made sure to keep their franchise legend Jose Altuve under contract until the day he decides to hang up his cleats.

Really, the only thing with a question mark was Alex Bregman’s future entering his contract year.

That quickly changed when Justin Verlander and Jose Urquidy started the season on the injured list and the Astros completely fell apart with their inexperienced rotation.

They’ve had slow starts before, but this seemed like something completely different.

Houston has put themselves in a hole so big that it would almost be historic to make the playoffs based on how sub-.500 they are, but this team is full of established stars with championship pedigree.

However, it appears they could face an uphill battle for the rest of the year based on new information regarding their injured starters Urquidy and Cristian Javier.

On Wednesday, manager Joe Espada said both players were “getting advice from other doctors” after being examined Monday and undergoing imaging Tuesday. Testing and imaging results have not yet been made public.

Urquidy and Javier are both sidelined with right forearm discomfort.

Given that they want to get a second opinion, it appears that not everything those tests showed was positive and there is a chance the Astros could be without both starters for an extended period of time.

Urquidy has missed the entire season so far with the right forearm issue. It looked like he was about to return before something flared up, prompting further examinations.

This is also what happened with Javier.

After scheduling a bullpen session, he was unable to pitch due to discomfort, causing Houston to move him to the injured list.

If this saga turns for the worst, the Astros will lose two of their established arms in their rotation, once again having to rely on inexperienced pitchers alongside Verlander and Framber Valdez.