Acquiring amateur talent and developing them is literally how all of this success happened in the first place. Why are you acting like it's some new direction. If that stops happening we will fall off, just like we were concerned about in 2019 looking forward.
I am not worried. I think the Astros are in great shape. Altuve isn’t going anywhere; age will eventually come for him but he is looking like he’ll be good into his late 30s. They essentially have to replace 4 key players by 2026: Bregman, Tucker, Framber, and Javier. They have excellent depth on their farm in the OF and so I consider it a good bet that by 2026 they’ll have developed another OF to replace Tuck. Same on the pitching side; in that regard, keeping their pitching coach/dev staff will be the bigger issue. So really they have to find one unexpected star to replace Bregman while keeping the pipeline of complementary players going. Factor in that they should have plenty of money to spend, and this franchise’s future is arguably as bright as any outside the teams with unlimited money (NYY, NYM, LAD) and on par with the best run well funded teams (Atlanta, St. Louis, maybe Toronto).
Being cheap when it came to amateur talent is what caused the Astros to bottom out. The loss of draft picks, picking late in the draft, and trading away prospects over the last 7 years has definitely made it potentially devastating long-term. Instead, we've continued to thrive due to great international signings and somehow a trade that could supplant Andersen for Bagwell as the biggest trade heist in team history.
It really can’t be overstated the impact Yordan Alvarez has had on the franchise’s trajectory. Not only getting him for less than nothing but then being able to extend him for half of what he’s worth. He’s a good enough player to take a team from middling to in the mix or from in the mix to true contender by himself.
Even with picking lower and losing 2 early picks those years, they're still signing the vast majority of their draft picks... something that didn't happen at the end of the Drayton era and was single-handedly responsible for the bottoming out of things. Signing picks is crucial. The depth created for potential trades is key... and inevitably they've found ways to get guys signed that many thought wouldn't happen, hence why they slipped to later in the draft. Its been 4 years now since the last mega-prospect trade (Greinke). That's about enough time for them to replenish the potential tradeable prospects should another major trade be needed. Frankly, they haven't had to shore up any single major deficiency despite the loss of key individuals, mainly due to the farm still being able to produce viable replacements, excluding the young latin pitchers that all developed together.
Framing it as dedicated to letting talent leave is a weird way of saying the Astros under Luhnow acquired and developed way too much talent for them ever to be able to afford once the players reached free agency. On trying to extend young talent, the Astros are well behind the Braves, but I'd guess having Alvarez locked up for a while puts the Astros in the upper group of teams. After 2025, the Astros do not look as good as the have the past 6 years, but probably better than most teams. I expect the Astros will priotize winning in 2023-2025 over winning after 2025. This isn't to say the Astros should have drafting and developing as a priority, it is only to say there is a good chance the Astros are going to be more aggressive with trading prospects for MLB help over the next three years if they have injury/age issues.
I am anxious to see how much of a shot Yainer Diaz is given this spring at catcher. One way I could see them handling that position is to give him a real chance and let him catch 25 of the first 40 games of the season. That lets them see if he is a legit option while preserving Maldy for the 2nd half. If Diaz were able to meet his offensive projection (.325 wOBA) while being a viable defensive catcher, he’s a star player. For reference, only 10 catchers posted a wOBA over .325 last season (min 250 pa), and they were all worth at least 2.4 fwar, with 8 of the 10 worth at least 3.8 fwar.
Astros 2027 Roster 1st J Melton Pre Arb 2nd W Wagner Pre Arb SS J Pena 3rd Arb 3rd J Williams 1st Arb C K Lee 3rd Arb DH Y Alvarez* 1 year left LF D Gilbert 1st Aeb CF K Gomez Pre Arb RF L Baez Pre Arb
I have moved on from Diaz as a catcher. His defense does not warrant starter innings behind the dish. If Diaz's bat plays as well as it appears it will I think he plays at 1st base/ DH starting in 2024 so he can get starter plate appearances.
While not making a comment on any of the projections, I love the forces of looking 4 years ahead over the ALL- IN this year mentality. Dynasty thinking is GREAT.
I’ve heard he is disinterested in being a catcher, but I have not heard that he is bad defensively. The reports I heard that he does not want to put the work in to call games. How much did he play catcher last year in the minors? Was he easy to steal on? I don’t know whether he is bad at catcher or just doesn’t want to play it. I can’t believe a player would rather stay in the minors another year or 2 to change positions, especially because he could potentially make a lot more money if he turns into a top hitting catcher.
I tend to think his chances of being a great hitter go down as laziness in his character is revealed. I hope it's not true, but it seems pervasive. One of the comments you always hear from a new player on the Astros is how hard they work on preparation.
I think this could be interesting topic in a year or 2 if the Astros don't get a couple of good extensions or a couple of dudes from the farm to really hit. I'd say that the Astros appearing to be really strong for the next three years is really weird considering they've been so great the last 6.
50 games in the minors. 24 SB and 12 CS in AA 30 SB and 2 CS in AAA. From Clay Davenport Stats - 4 runs worth as a AA and AAA catcher while Lee was + 10. Minor league defensive stats usually aren't very relieable except in the extremes. That is a pretty extreme difference.
The fact that we are talking about replacing Javier after 2025 is bullshit and I guess that is what has me sort of pissed off about acting so miserly after ownership has talked such a big game about how they are ready and willing to open up the checkbook. You just send that guy an 8 year (that's only a 5 year FA contract people) 150M offer and say I've got an ace for a decade minus the year and a half he misses for tommy john (because they all seem to) for less than 20M a year. Life is good. But they never seem to do that. The only guy I think that ever signed a reasonably fair offer to buy out his arb and some FA was Bregman at 5/100 with 3 of those 5 being arbitration years. The Yordan thing was even more slanted to the team at 6/115. I guess that's the Astros extension point, but you look at what the Braves are doing and you say- hey- where are our 10/200 offers for guys getting to arbitration and where are our 8/80 type offers for guys finishing up their first year? If it was me Pena is getting offered 100M (10 years) this offseason, Tucker is getting offered 250M (11 years) this offseason and Javier is getting offered 150M (8 years) this offseason and Framber is getting offered 100M (6 years) this offseason. All those guys are worth it. That's generational money for all of them. That's a fair enough offer that you'd expect 2 or 3 of them to take the guarantee and the guy that doesn't you know what's going on and have in mind that he might be a guy you trade. Altuve would get another 3/75 from me and Bregman would get an 8/200 from me. Neither of those guys hurt your cap situation (Altuve's probably helps it since they are both making big bucks now. If everyone signed those deals our cap situation would go up about 50M this year and we'd be about 22M over the Luxury tax. Literally, the only hole you'd have on your entire roster to fill for the next 6 or 7 years would be 1B after 3 years and Catcher after next year, and maybe CF after 4 or 5 years. Next year you let Brantley, Stanek and Maton walk and you are under the cap again, re-setting, without any of those guys being important pieces on title winning teams. Then- all your focus becomes on finding a young, cheap, good catcher and you have more or less your entire farm system as a resource to make that happen the next 12-24 months. That would be my ideal scenario. That's obviously not all going to happen. But son of a b**** I'd like to see at least 1 of those type of extensions offered up instead of again going into the season with 28M unspent after entering last season with something like 40M unspent.
Because that is really really really hard what we had to do, it doesn't often work out well for the team doing it (see basically every other tanking team other than Houston since 2013 still shitty and/or stuck in tanks) and our market is big enough that we should be able to pay most of the gems that we have found and developed provided they are reasonable in their asks and we get around to them early enough in their career. But we aren't doing that and that makes me nervous/bums me out. If we still aren't going to do that then I really really really want to bring in the absolute best draft/sign/develop guy we can- which looks like what Crane is doing which makes me happy I guess, if that's the path we are dedicated to taking.
I don’t view his disinterest as much of a good reason to abandon the idea of him catching. Frankly, if he has the talent to catch, it’s stupid for him not to. A guy posting a .325 wOBA at 1B is middling, 1-2 win player (think Ji-Man Choi, Rowdy Tellez, Seth Brown types). That same hitter who can play catcher is a star. If the front office thinks he can be a mlb catcher they need to sit him down and explain the difference between a guy who gets a $100M contract as one of the 10 best catchers in baseball and a guy who bounces around the league as a fringey 1B.
