HOUSTON -- Astros manager Joe Espada spoke to his players Wednesday, attempting to tamp down the emotions after his team was booed by the home crowd during their Game 1 loss to the Chicago White Sox on Tuesday.
Several Astros players complained about the small crowd as well as the boos, which were audible as early as the second inning of the 6-3 loss.
"I understand both sides," Espada said before Game 2 of the American League Wild Card series against Chicago. "There's frustration. Our players and the fans have the right to ... show their emotions, and I get it. But one thing I do know is that our players love our fans. We respect our fans. We need our fans. We need the energy from our fans. We feed off that."
The announced attendance for Game 1 was 34,011, far from a sellout for the afternoon contest.
The Astros trailed 3-0 when the first in a series of boos began for the team with the worst record (81-81) ever to win a division.
"The fans here are definitely spoiled with a lot of ALCS and World Series runs, and we have to earn that right to bring this team back to that position," Astros reliever Bennett Sousa told The Athletic after Tuesday's loss. "That being said, when this team was in their first [playoff] series 10 years ago, Minute Maid Park was probably packed. It makes a big difference. If we were in Chicago, it'd probably be loud as s---."
Bennett later added: "... I'm not going to lie to you, I was pretty pissed off in the dugout when I came in, about the boos. This team has laid a lot on the line to be in this position to give the fans a playoff game -- a playoff series. We want their support."
Espada himself got booed leaving the dugout when things were going bad for his team -- as did several relievers who struggled.
"We are competitors, and we want to win every pitch, every inning," Espada said. "We want our fans to be proud of us. I've been here for almost a decade and I get it. I get booed too, right? But that's part of it. And I love our fans."
Espada's message to his players was to move on. The Astros are on the brink of elimination in the best-of-three series but have ace Hunter Brown on the mound for Game 2. He and his catcher believe he has the ability to hold off the boos with a good performance.
"I feel like we're going to control what we can control," catcher Yainer Diaz said Wednesday. "We're going to focus on the stuff that we can control. I think the positive stuff is something that we're going to look at, and then the negatives we're just going to leave that aside."
Added Espada: "What I do tell the players is just to show their respect, show that they're on our side. But again, we compete and sometimes that stuff happens. We'll put that on the back burner and we'll get ready to play today."