[Official] Astros Off Season Thread

Here’s an excerpt from Chandler Rome in his latest athletic article


Are other trades in the offing?
That Pressly is being dangled in trade talks prompts wonder whether either Framber Valdez or Kyle Tucker could join him. Both players are projected to make more than $15 million in their final year of arbitration eligibility and nothing Brown said on Tuesday made it seem like Houston is hellbent on extending either.

“I don’t think we’re going to be in the business of giving multiple seven-year deals or multiple eight-year deals, but if there’s an opportunity to sign a guy that we feel is going to be good for six or seven years, I think (owner Jim Crane) would do it,” Brown said.

Tucker, who will turn 28 in January, will command the exact sort of deal Crane swears off. Making either him or Valdez available would elicit the sort of return Houston needs to replenish its farm system. Pressly’s salary, age and suspect 2024 will not yield anywhere near the same prospect haul.

Perception is important, though. Trading either Valdez or Tucker could signal that Houston is headed for a rebuild. Whether Crane could handle that is a question one league source raised this week. This is the same owner who has famously boasted the team’s championship window will never close under his watch.

Dealing either Valdez or Tucker should not prevent the Astros from contending in 2025, though it would make the task more difficult.

 

Chandler has the exact wrong point if view on this

Not bringing back Bregman, signing short term stop gap veterans or letting less than premium prospects take over, and then letting Framber and Tucker walk is exactly what's going to close the window.

The type of return either of those guys would yield is exactly what allows the window to remain open. Maybe 2025 is a down one ( like 2023 and 2024) but there is still enough talent to challenge for the division and 2026 would be a damn sight better

 

Basically i see a few main approaches to filling the necessary voids. They might need to salary dump Pressly to make it happen.

Resign Bregman, sign Walker- run it back with a few other smaller tweaks.

Resign Bregman or sign Walker, re sign Kikuchi, trade Framber to address other offensive holes.

The least appealing option IMO, trade Framber to address a hole, resign Kikuchi and hope for a bounceback from Chaz or prospect breakout while making a bunch of smaller/platoon signings to mitigate the holes without major offensive signing.

It's hard for me to see a scenario in which we trade Tucker and improve the team this season, but maybe they can swing some kind of 2 for 1 trade to get lesser but team controlled players. Tucker may have a history of failing in October, but we no longer have the luxury of "just" planning for october, we have to get there first.

 

I think Goldschmidt is much more likely than Walker. He doesn't have a loss of draft pick attached to signing him and will be a much lesser commitment.

If they can sign Goldschmidt and Bregman and bring in a regular starter in either LF or CF then the team should be better than 2024.

I would love for them to resign Kikuchi but the only way the money is there is if they make calls trade.

Tucker makes no sense for 2025, but all the sense in the world Long term.

Framber is who I would trade, but only if the team gets a real MLB starter in return ( not a prospect or reclamation). He doesn't need to be a TOR, but also not a question mark.

If Framber brings back 2 young vontrollablebpueces - a starting OF and MOR-BOR SP and maybe a lottery ticket prospect then trade him.

If not, then trading Pressly and Caratini is the only way they can afford Kikuchi.

 

If the Astros "fill" 1B with 37 year old coming off the worst season of his career they deserve what happens. Maybe they can pair him as the platoon partner with Singleton, but even that's risky given his age and Singletons lack of track record/awful defense.

As long as they make other significant additions you may be able to get away with it, but I haven't seen many other "significant" players on the market. Even Robert has a sketchy track record.

 

The poor man’s offseason: Goldschmidt, Heaney, Conforto, Urshela; trade away Caratini, McCormick, and Pressly

2B Altuve
RF Tucker
DH Alvarez
C Diaz
1B Goldschmidt
LF Conforto
SS Pena
3B Urshela
CF Meyers
Bench: Dubon, Salazar, Singleton, Trammell
Rotation: Framber, Brown, Blanco, Heaney, Garcia, Arrighetti
Bullpen: Hader, Abreu, Scott, Ort, Dubin, Whitley, McCullers/Montero

Thats probably a 87 win team with more upside than downside.

 

I agree that Goldschmidt is a risk, but on a 1 year deal at a salary $15M or less I think it's worth it.

I would definitely plan on giving him 1-2 days off per week. It could be Singleton or maybe Whitcomb. Play the matchup game.

But he had a 116 wRC+ after July 1st and 120 wRC+ in the 2nd half.

Worth the risk on a 1 yr deal.

 

That's sounds an awful lot like our reasoning for being optimistic about Abreu heading into last season.

 

Yikes. Goldy and his .716 OPS hitting 5th. I like Conforto. Urshela is as bad as Meyers with the bat. That lineup is worse than what we ran out these this year.

 

I'd try to swing a trade for Andrew Vaughn.
Former top ranked prospect..hasn't put it together for the White Sox. I'd take my chances on him putting it together, and, if not, he's a good bat against lefties at least.

 

Would carry some risk for sure. The lineup would likely be the best in the league against lefties, but unless Goldy really came back to life or another lesser hitter had a big breakout against righties, it would be a very average lineup against righties.

 

Don’t know if any of these guys have legit MLB talent- but for the sake of them being Cubans they are #AstroWatch status