The Houston Astros were one of several teams in 2005 that were written off early in the season - but later rallied to contend for the postseason. The Astros appeared to be spent after their run in 2004, which came up short - too old to go for it again. But they caught fire in June, and snagged the wild card, led by three starting pitchers who had outstanding seasons. They beat the Braves in the division series, then the favoured Cardinals in the NLCS to win the pennant in team history.

        Clemens toyed with the idea of retirement before the season, but instead came back to make 32 starts. In nine of those starts, the Astros scored zero runs - Clemens was 0-4 with five no-decisions in those games, about as good a record as you can possibly have with zero run support. It was that kind of season; the Astros didn't give Roger much support, but the Rocket also posted the lowest ERA of his great career.
        There was talk early in the summer of the Astros trading Clemens to a contender, but Clemens made it clear that he didn't want to leave Houston. Amazingly, the Astros caught fire and became contenders themselves. Though his team won the pennant, his own season didn't end as well as Clemens would have hoped. By October, his 42-year-old groin muscles had turned quit on him, and he wasn't able to deliver in the postseason. But while the team floundered in June with a 20-34 record, it was the Rocket who kept them afloat.
        The NL Cy Young vote was the only one that you couldn't get wrong this year. I mean, you could, if you voted for any member of the Reds, but no one did; Clemens, Chris Carpenter and Dontrelle Willis received all of the first-place votes. The writers chose to vote for wins, picking Carpenter as the winner and Willis as runner-up. But even though he won only 13 games, Clemens' awesome performance all season in the face of anemic support should have garnered him another award.
        On September 13, Carpenter won his 13th straight decision; he was 20-4 with a 2.21 ERA, and was cruising towards the Cy Young Award. But he hit the wall and was hammered in his last four starts of the season. He still won the award, because (1) his numbers were still worthy of consideration, (2) voters hate changing their minds once they are made up, and (3) the games were meaningless, as the Cardinals had already clinched the division.
        Willis threw more innings than Clemens and had a better ERA than Carpenter. He led the league in wins, complete games and shutouts, and was also impressive with the bat in his hands, batting a healthy .261 (compared to Carpenter's anemic .065 average). On the other hand, Willis had the advantage of pitching in cavernous Pro Player Stadium.
        (I should also note that, up until this season I have not considered a pitcher's performance at the plate when choosing the Mathewson Award. And I'm not going to start now; certainly, I believe that the Marlins should pay Willis extra dough for his batting prowess, but I don't want to think about it. I love pitching statistics; just looking at them and trying to analyze them is one thing that I still really love about this game. With apologies to Willis, Bob Gibson, Don Newcombe and the other great hitting pitchers, I'm going to keep this award all about pitching.)
        But keeping on the topic of hitting... Clemens batted .207, not bad for a 42-year-old pitcher. Clemens spent the first 20 years of his career in the American League, where he never had to bat. Some commentators complained that he had an unfair advantage, in that he could pitch inside without having to worry about retaliation. They were wrong; Clemens' skill as a hitter makes him even tougher to beat in the NL. And nobody has thrown a ball under his chin, reinforcing the truism that hitting the opposing pitcher is really stupid.
        In his early 30's crafty left-hander Andy Pettitte became increasingly injury-prone - but at the same time, his strikeout rate rose to astonishing levels, peaking in 2004 with 8.57 K/9. Pettitte had made an adjustment that made him a better pitcher than ever; in 2005, he was healthy and had the best year of his career. And though he may only have been the third-best pitcher on the staff, Roy Oswalt again won 20 games, and made two great starts in the NLCS, including the clincher in Game Six that sent Houston to the World Series.