2023 Astros Minor League Thread

In his first week at McCormick field, Clifford hit more HRs (3) than he did in his 25 games for Fayetteville (2). It's gonna be a fun season.

 

I guess it’s time to tap the brakes a bit on the Shay Whitcomb bandwagon. .665 ops with 37% k rate in May so far. I still like him as a prospect but his April obviously doesn’t look like the sustained breakout I hoped it was.

 

Man, he has a lot of bat speed. It's a violent swing.

 

Yea I'm just not sure he's able to make adjustments. A lot of raw talent but he needs to mature in his approach. Scouting reports say he sells out for home runs, we need him to be ok with the singles and doubles and hitting mistakes for homers

 

So...when does Gilbert realistically move to AAA?

A lot of scouts say there is more high end talent at AA and I think we all agree AA is really the make or break level. So do we keep him there longer or do we move him if he shows he's mastered AA?

 

I really don’t see a reason to move him up to AAA this season. He is either ready for the majors or will be fine finishing out the season in AA and starting in AAA next year. That said, I could see an unlikely situation where the big league team is stacked with OF (Meyers, Brantley, McCormick, Tucker, and Alvarez all healthy and playing very well) and Gilbert has absolutely mashed over 400+ AA pa, and there’s other guys who need time in Corpus (Melton, Barefoot, Brewer, Daniels, Clifford, Hamilton, Corona). In that scenario it probably makes sense to move Gilbert up after 400 pa or so, which would be late July timeframe.

 

I do not believe he ever moves to AAA. He goes directly to MLB from AA. Altuve says he is ready now and I can not think of anyone whose judgement I trust more. We should be aggressively shopping Meyers and or McCormick and get that boy to Houston at the break.

 

I wish Altuve would’ve called out by name the other guys who he was impressed by. CC is really stacked with guys that have big league approaches, specifically Gilbert, Barber, Loperfido, Wagner.

 

Gilbert's emergence gives us the ability to trade Meyers or McCormick... and also survive the potential scenario of Brantley's return not being successful.

 

Bryce Harper Swing, Speed, Strong Arm

 

I wonder if he'll wind up with hand problems with such a powerful swing?

 

ONLY IF DUSTY WILL PLAY HIM

 

Love Gilbert, but he has ~150 minor league ABs and we’re ready to just trade away cheap MLB outfielders to bring him up.

 

I think they should capitalize on McCormick or Meyers good starts and trade one of them away.

They are too similar and there is too much OF talent behind them to let their value slip away while Dusty sits one or the other on the bench everyday.

I don't agree to bringing up Gilbert though. Let him win ROY next year and bring another premium draft pick into the system.

Play either Chas or Jake regularly in CF and trade the other. Let Dubon be his 2-3 games per month backup. There are still plenty of players who can cover LF including Diaz.

 

I thought Diaz was playing first

 

For the record, Gilbert making the team out of 2024 Spring Training is super aggressive. Gilbert would have only played one full year in the minors.

Having said that, if the Astros have a run of OF injuries in 2023 ...

 

It would be less aggressive than Bregman who played second half of draft season and then called up July 25th of the following season.

 

They brought up Correa quickly as well. It is possible, but not probable in Gilbert’s case. Also no reason to bring him up if Dusty won’t play him.