Helping Houston Recover

 

- Jerry Crasnick

While Hurricane Harvey was inflicting catastrophic damage on Houston and surrounding areas in late August, the city’s baseball team was busy empathizing from afar. Major League Baseball moved a scheduled series between the Astros and Rangers from Minute Maid Park to the Tropicana Dome in St. Petersburg, Fla., and Houston lost two of the three games before average crowds of 4,331 people in a climate-controlled bubble.

When the flood waters finally began to recede and the Astros returned to a ravaged city, they got a slight reprieve. A day off was built into the schedule on Friday, Sept. 1, to help the area begin to get up and running again, and the Houston players took advantage of the window to interact with the community before a doubleheader against the Mets on Saturday.

Joe Musgrove and Chris Devenski, two Astros relievers, hit the ground running. At 6 a.m., they drove to BBVA Compass Stadium, home of the Houston Dynamo soccer team, and helped load palates of supplies designated for local communities in need. After taking a break for lunch, they joined 14 other teammates at the George R. Brown Convention Center, where they met with families who had been displaced by the flood waters.