Never really done one of these before but here goes nothing: 1. sign verlander 2. Trade Chas, Spencer, Melton --> Pablo Lopez 3. Trade Yainer and Jake (and a AA prospect) to Marlins --> Cabrera and Bender [might not want Yainer with Ramirez, but go with it] 4. Sign Victor C 5. Sign Cease SP1 Brown SP2 Lopez SP3 Cease SP4 Verlander SP5 Cabrera SP6 Javier SP7/Pen McCullers/France Pen Hader, Abreu, Bender, Okert, King C Caratini/Salazar 1B Walker/Paredes 2B Matthews/Paredes SS Pena 3B Correa/Paredes LF Yordan/Altuve CF Cole RF Cam DH Altuve/Yordan/Correa/Paredes/Walker Bench: Urias, Dubon, Resting from above I'm sure it blows the salaries up . . . but they are going into a lock out. Do it now, pick up the pieces later. That's my MLBtheSHOW move.
I said i haven't done this before (LOL). I'd probably would slot into AAA/Long Relief. He should have a chance to prove he can be a starter, but I like him long relieve midseason. Sousa should be there. I'm clearly interested in amassing pitching with the assumption a handful are down. Probably assuming that either you trade for lopez or sign cease . . . both seem very unlikely. So that opens up the staff a bit.
Love it if Cole and Smith pan out. Otherwise there’s significant risk in the lineup. But that pitching staff is money. The salaries aren’t unmanageable. The marlins trade is not very realistic.
Which teams might be interested in Houston’s potential trade chips: Pena: Yankees, Blue Jays, Brewers, Tigers, Braves Diaz: Phillies, Padres Walker: Yankees, Red Sox, Diamondbacks Paredes: Red Sox, Blue Jays, Tigers, Diamondbacks, Braves Meyers: Yankees, Phillies, Mets Sanchez: Giants, Phillies, Royals Dubon/Urias: Braves, Tigers, Angels
Astros get: SP Freddy Peralta IF Cooper Pratt Brewers get: SS Jeremy Pena $3M https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2025/10/brewers-expected-to-consider-trading-freddy-peralta.html
Latest hypothetical offseason: 40 man Out: Diaz, Walker, Pena, Meyers, McCormick, Sanchez, Dubon, Trammell, Garcia, Ort, Rooney, DeLosSantos, VanWey, France 40 man In: Victor Caratini, James McCann, Cedric Mullins, Luis Arraez, Merrill Kelly, Drew Rasmussen, Miguel Ullola, Alimber Santa, Jose Fleury Added to farm: 2 MLB Top 100 prospects, 2 Org Top 10 prospects, 3 Org Top 30 prospects CF Mullins* 3B Paredes DH Alvarez SS Correa 2B Altuve 1B Arraez* RF Smith LF Cole C Caratini* Bench: Urias, McCann*, Dezenzo, Whitcomb SP: Brown, Rasmussen*, Kelly*, Javier, Arrighetti, Alexander, Pearson, McCullers RP: Hader, Abreu, Okert, King, Sousa Optioned: Blubaugh, Gordon, Murray, Ullola, Santa, Fleury, Salazar, Melton, Corona, Leon, Matthews 60-day IL: Blanco, Walter, Wesneski That gets the payroll ~$10M under the CBT, with a deep rotation, a more balanced higher ceiling offense, and a drastically improved farm system. The risks are they trade away 3 high ceiling veterans in Pena, Meyers, and Diaz, and the infield defense gets downgraded. But overall I think an offseason like this would make Dana Brown look genius.
Just don’t see Correa moving back to short. I don’t think they move Pena and Paredes goes to first. Nook said they are willing to move on from Diaz which I think is a mistake, but if that is what it takes to upgrade the pitching staff or minor leagues I guess it has merit. I trust Dana big time.
Because there would presumably be 5 SP ahead of him on the depth chart (Brown, Rasmussen, Kelly, Javier, and Arrighetti), and the bullpen would be filled out with deserving players without options, and Blubaugh is more valuable as an optioned SP than as a low leverage/multi-inning RP in the majors. Of course, more likely there would be a ST injury that opened a spot for him in the rotation.
On the one hand you are almost certainly correct about Pena/Correa/SS. However, I don’t think we should read anything into what happened after Correa was traded; his comments were just what any player would say as they want to look like a good teammate and embrace change they can’t control. Correa was a solid defensive SS before he was traded and can almost certainly handle the position for another year. If a team overwhelms the Astros for Pena, they should do it, especially considering they have a ready replacement for Correa at 3B in Paredes.
He looked way too good to be sent back down to the minors. IMO Arrighetti hasn’t even earned a spot in the rotation over him the way they both pitched. Regardless, I see them going with a 6 man rotation if they really add multiple SPs.
