Not sure why I keep seeing posts saying that Correa is old. He just turned 31. Still plenty of prime years left, still productive, and plays an excellent 3B. I look to trade Walker and move Paredes to 1B. Sign a TOR pitcher. Fire the medical staff. Really not sure why this hasn't already happened. Too many "oh, it's worse than we thought 2 months ago" situations. Release McCullers. Just having him around at this point is bad juju. Eat the rest of his deal and let him go. Work on Pena extension. He probably won't sign one but, at some point, you have to keep your best players around. I feel like he's only going to improve on this season.
I think the team should just hold on to Walker. He needs to be a #6 hitter but its probably 50/50 that he produces positive value (2.5 WAR) next year. He had 1.1 fWAR in 64 games after ASB. He still provides good defense. The team simply can't afford to give up any prospect capital or take on lost salary to get rid of a guy who is 50/50 to have positive value. He is also one of the few guys with 30 HR game power on this roster - too many line drive/ground ball hitters. Also, Altuve needs to take 1-2 games off every week. Yordan and Correa have scary injury history/risk. Having Walker as your 6th or 7th best hitter means that when days off and injuries happen, he's your 3rd or 4th best hitter instead of it being Jesus Sanchez or Jake Meyers. There are plenty of games in a 162 game season for all the infielders currently on the roster. As soon as you trade away one because you have nowhere to play him, you will need to bring up Taylor Jones when the injuries hit.
Put Cole in CF if you can live with .230 and a good amount of walks with 35 hrs and 35 steals with Meyers level defense in CF.
You've gotta trade Walker to clear up money for a SP1. Move Parades to 1B if injuries hit then use Urias or whoever the utility IF is in addition to playing Diaz some at 1B and letting whoever the backup C is play. Then go out and trade for an OF bat that's a high contact hitter. Even if you have to give up Matthews/Melton Ullola etc.... to get these deals done. BTW, Dezenzo would make a really good backup 1B/OF. These are moves that can be made without hurting the farm system too badly.
Something that makes too much sense to ignore, put together a package trade for Wilson Contreras / Sonny Gray. Read some articles about both considering the possibility of waiving NTC’s. Contreras offers depth at 1B & C. Could use a reliable SP STL is in a rebuild… they could use prospects or proven OF depth. Would it be possible / impossible due to financial reasons?
I don't think you can clear enough money. Trading him will require either including prospect(s) that they can't afford to lose or keeping enough $$ that you really aren't saving enough to be impactful for a TOR guy. I still think the benefit/relief that can come from a trade is not worth losing him and having to replace him with a AAA guy WHEN injuries hit. They can save just as much money by non-tendering guys like Chas, Urias, Sanchez, De Los Santos, etc and replacing them with pre-arb guys. $4- 6M at a time adds up.
I wonder if this was a case of the medical staff really being that clueless? Or the Astros just, for some reason, constantly being tight lipped with the media about the severity of their injuries? I honestly don't know. @Nook ?
It is both. The Astros have for years been hush about the severity of injuries, look at Michael Brantley for example. Brown doesn't like to come out and give information on key injuries - they just don't think it benefits the team. Having said that, I can tell you that they were genuinely surprised about Alvarez' hand. I asked an ortho I know about it, and he said that it is really easy to miss a hairline fracture in a hand - and it is also possible it developed after his initial trauma, and wouldn't be an issue until real stress like hitting a baseball took place. I think that we need to remember that the Astros had terrible luck injury-wise this season, but we have also had average to good luck a number of times the last 7-8 years. The Astros are also not the only team with a lot of high end pitching injuries the last 5 years - the Rays, Dodgers and Yankees have as well. At this point it is just part of the game. This isn't all on the medical guys --- some of it is philosophical too, and even if we accept that the Astros are causing MORE pitching injuries because of their philosophy, I am not so sure the Astros would change it based on the overall success they have had developing pitching. Also - remember, last year before the season started (2024) Brown made an interesting comment, he said that in baseball in this era, every single team needs to assume on of their top end starters will be out for the year. He made the comment when discussing why he wanted another good starter. This is also consistent with what I heard from early on in 2025, the Astros #1 want wasn't a hitter - it was another starting pitcher. This was before so many injuries too.
Org needs to take a hard look at off season conditioning program, medical staff, hitting coaches, pitching coaches, manager, and low producing players. Why are our players so fragile? The org seems incompetent in selecting players, especially at first base. Walker has the worst body language of any player I have ever seen on the Astros. Literally looks like he doesn't care. Passionless players are demotivating. Team has a "dull" personality. Who seems fired up? Going thru the motions when you are paid ridiculous amounts of money is unacceptable.
Did you watch any of Bagwell and Biggios career? If you did then you’d know either would be a good comparison to Walker. If you weren’t go find them on YT striking out during the 2005 WS or any game really. They carried themselves the same way Walker does. Has nothing to do with caring or passion. If anything it’s old school but certainly not passionless.
Agreed, I think this is what they’re thinking. I hope to hell they’re not promising him the 4 spot. I’d be surprised if they move him or are even able to make it make sense.
I would largely stand pat. Ullola could be a stud out of nowhere. Javier showed enough flashes to me of coming back. We have so many arms now at the back end of the rotation we should be above average in the 4 and 5 spots. The lineup has depth and will be fine. I'm good with parades getting 1B reps in spring to get Walker more days off. Really the only areas we could possibly need might be CF upgrade or #2 starter. We may have answers in both internally so let's make a deal at the deadline if it isn't working. Walker does have some pop and play defense, he's mediocre overall. I wouldn't be desperate to replace him. The roster has plenty of talent. The talent just needs to play. I do see them moving some dead weight for some low level farm restock... could mean Dubon and Sanchez on the block.. possibly urias instead of Dubon...
Maybe he won't as an Astro, but he did have the reputation the last couple spots he was at. His OPS in the second half was .800 and over 150 games he was on pace for 37 homers 110 rbi and he didn't have good BABIP luck. His strikeouts still annoy me, but I can live with him if he is down in the line up with his production in the second half.
He was awful in key at bats down the stretch over and over again. He was a bad player this year offensively.
The problem I see with keeping walker is where the hell is Paredes going to play? I’m totally against trading Pena and Correa is entrenched at third base. Alvarez has to be DH. Cole deserves his chance so either myers needs to go or altuve has to play second so Cole pla Where does Paredes play in your scenario? It would have to be at 2nd base and Altuve would go to left. Cole would either have to be benched or Myers. I think the best scenario is moving Walker and a middling prospect and eating about half his salary, moving Paredes to 1b, Altuve to 2b, Cole to LF. Myers in CF and batting 9.
