2026 Astros Minor League Thread

Fangraphs Top 100 is out. Houston does not have a prospect on the list. AL West shook out with:

LA 2
Ath 2
TEX 5
Sea 7

 

In the chat for this list, the FG prospect guys mentioned that Kevin Alvarez was in the mix to be on the Top 100, one of only 3-4 DSL guys to be considered. Another comment was “Alvarez the combo of body projection and bat control is exciting, his bat speed is way below average right now. Slow enough I wanna see it improve before we stuff him, he has less obvious bodily whip than the Made/Josuar guys…”

https://blogs.fangraphs.com/2026-top-100-prospects-chat/

I think Alvarez, Ethan Frey, and Xavier Neyens are all probably sitting in the 101-150 range on most prospect writers’ lists, so any of those 3 that have a breakout season will be on midseason Top100 lists. Less likely but other guys to watch would be Ryan Forcucci and Anthony Huezo.

 

Brice Matthews is #58 and Ethan Pecko is #99 on Fangraphs ZIPS Top 100 list.

I think Matthews’ ZIPS projections are pretty reasonable. They call for 17 HR and 24 SB with 10%bb and 35%k for 1.9 war; that paints him as a guy with a lot of value due to power and speed but limited by strikeouts.

ZIPS is also pretty fond of Zach Cole (1.8 fwar, 97 wRC+), Joey Loperfido (1.7 fwar, 100 wRC+), and NRI Riley Unroe (1.4 fwar, 97 wRC+).

ZIPS paints Pecko as either a solid #4 SP or a very good setup man.

 

Frey and Alvarez are the two position players on my do not trade list. Frey can play 1B too, he's a fine athlete. Alvarez has such a pretty swing from the clips I've watched.

 

Not a Matthews fan and would put him in a package to get a LHB/OF. I know Dana feels differently than I do.

 

Houston should really not be trading anyone from the lower levels of their system. They need to stop the talent bleed. Trading Jaworsky and Valencia last deadline was not that smart imho. Trade guys like Sullivan, Baez, Bush, Spence, Dezenzo, Hicks, etc from the upper levels if you need to nut hang on to the guys in the lower levels to rebuild the farm system and give yourself a chance to keep the window open.

 

Huezo is a very interesting prospect.

He low key had a very positive season last year.

I will be curious to see how aggressive they are with him this season.

 

Why did he have one AB for Sugar land last season? That's kind of weird, right?

 

That I don't know. I vaguely remember them calling him up very late as a fill in for a game or two.

 

My thinking about reasonable goals for the Astros minor league system in 2026:

Field a competent OF

This one isn't entirely on the prospects. Jake Meyers is a high floor low ceiling option in CF. Yordan and possibly one of the infielders will get some undetermined amount of time in LF. Cam Smith isn't a rookie, but is unproven. He joins a relatively sizable group of promising, yet unestablished players vying for a spot that includes Zachs Cole and Dezenzo, Joey Loperfido, Taylor Trammel, and Brice Matthews. Shay Whitcomb is somehow still in the organization. I wouldn't be surprised if they add more players (besides Cavan Biggio) between now and opening day. As the roster is currently constructed, the most obvious opportunity for the farm system to contribute to the 2026 Astros is developing 1 or 2 of those guys into average or better players. Cam Smith developing into a star could alter the trajectory of the franchise for the next few years.

Develop a top 100 prospect hitter

Whether to facilitate a trade for an impact player or be foundational to the next core, the Astros need to develop some hitters. The most obvious candidates here are Neyens and Frey. Kevin Alvarez is probably still a year away from that sort of conversation. Walker Janek's defensive value might get him there if his bat takes an unexpected leap forward in AA next season. Otherwise, the options start looking thin. Perhaps Albert Fermin having a monster debut or a big step forward from a toolsy youngster like Anthony Huezo, Caden Powell, or German Ramirez gets you there. Jase Mitchell is a dark horse, but he also seems more like a 2027 guy at the earliest.

Develop a setup arm in the pen

A quick scan of the top relievers over the past ~5 years shows that the Astros have been pretty adept at finding interesting relievers from other organizations, but Bryan Abreu was the only one I saw in the top 100 that the Astros actually signed and developed themselves. The next best relievers the Astros signed as amateurs were Cionel Perez and Jose Cisneros. With Abreu (and Okert) hitting FA after this season, it would behoove the Astros to find an internal replacement. There's not exactly any slam dunk options in the system. Blubaugh, Pecko, Mayer, and Ullola will probably be given opportunities to start until they're out of options. Alimber Santa and Michael Knorr were both unselected in the rule 5 draft. Hudson Leach is probably the best bet, but has little track record of throwing strikes. Other electric arms I think the Astros are willing to push as pure relievers if they have the command/secondaries to succeed include Ramsey David, Wilmy Sanchez, Brett Gillis, and Alex Santos. I do wonder if any of the 2nd tier of upper level starting pitching prospects (Nezuh, Hicks, Tredwell, Fleury) might hit an extra gear in the pen. Julio Rodriguez coming back from a PED suspension could be a dark horse.

Keep the pitching development going

Each of the last 3 years, an unhearlded pitcher way outperformed their draft slot to capture the Astros MiLB pitcher of the year award. AJ Blubaugh and Ethan Pecko are legitimate options to start MLB games this year, and Bryce Mayer might join them. Anderson Brito went from a 10K signing to the Burrows deal in 2 years. Twine Palmer was traded for a MLB player a year after being a 19th round pick. So who is next? My shots in the dark would be Juan Fraide and Gabel Pentecost looking much better a year from now. The 2024 draft was heavy on small school pitching, many of whomever dealt with injury last season, so I'm hoping to see at least one of those guys take a step forward. A lot of eyes are going to be on Ryan Forcucci this season. The names aren't as important as continuing to develop depth to help the big league squad and facilitate trades.

Determine who can hit in the lower minors

The AA position player roster looks pretty sparse. Joseph Sullivan, Lucas Spence, and Will Bush are worth following. Hopefully Luis Baez isn't as bad as he was last season. Janek made the list of potential top 100 prospects based on defense and hope. The 2025 draft class was heavy in college OFs that could finish their first full season for the Hooks. While Frey was clearly the standout, every 2025 draftee that got into games was average or better except Monistere. Juan Sierra had a nice season in the FCL. Luis Rives and Cesar Hernandez were big bonus signees that showed signs of life. Ochoa had a freak accident last year. Kenni Gomez has had fans in the past. There's around a dozen or so OFs that look like they deserve playing time across the A ball levels to start next season, and sorting out which (if any) of these guys can hit is important. If the 2027 Hooks roster looks as weak as the 2026 one, the Astros are in trouble.

Have a successful FCL season

The 2025 international class was one of the Astros best in a while. Kevin Alvarez has always been the big name, but there's interesting depth as well. Of the 9 Astros players who got 160+ PAs in the DSL last season, 6 of them were 17 or younger with $250K + bonuses, all of whom were above average hitters, none of whom had worrisome strikeout issues. (Alvarez, Sami Manzueta, Anthony Milan, Juan Rojas, Santiago Martinez, and Pablo Martinez.) Milan (defense) and Manzueta (power) have had their tools praised in some scouting reports after the season. There were also some impressive pro debuts from 18 year olds Anderson Areinamo and Yensi de la Cruz. I'm not sure all of them will come stateside, but those that do will likely join 2025 draftees Jase Mitchell, Elijah Farley, and Landon Arroyos, assuming Neyens is the only teen to go straight to Fayetteville. While I'm sure there will be plenty of attrition among this group, it should probably the best FCL group they've had in some time.

State of the Farm

The Astros aren't going to be able to trade for an impact player under team control at the deadline. They might not even be outbid shopping in the rental aisle. While their upper level position players are interesting, I think a ~2 win season out of any of them would be as much as one could reasonably hope for. They added enough MLB pitching that their AAA staff should be pretty exciting. Colton Gordon had the 3rd most innings among Astros starters last season, and fangraphs doesn't even have him on the depth chart.

The future of the Astros depends on what happens below AA. Dana Brown was brought in to rejuvenate the farm system. You can see how that might be taking shape, but it's still in the nascent stages. Brown didn't draft like he's on the hot seat, spending a lot of resources on Neyens and Mitchell. After having to spend most of the 2024 international pool on older Cubans, the 2025 class hit the ground running. The AAA depth can probably complement the MLB roster for the next two years, but they're going to need to start replacing core pieces for the 2028 season, and I don't see much in the upper levels that makes me believe they'll be able to do so.

 

Good stuff. The Astros should have an above average system below AA. They need to develop those guys and not trade them. The upcoming draft where they have 6 of the top 134 picks will make or break Dana Brown’s tenure as GM; they need to come out of that draft with 5-6 of the top 100 prospects available, which would mean getting 4-5 guys who should slot in their org top 10.

They have enough guys locked up to be competitive thru 2028. 3 years is a really long time and most of the guys who will start 2026 in A or high A will be ready or busted by 2029.

 

Would you give up top 10 prospects. I would because from what I've read there's only 5 or so that I wouldn't trade and even a couple of those 5 if they could trade for a similar prospect OF.

 

As a matter of principle I would listen on any prospect and always go for good value. But in conversations about potential trades I would generally steer away from discussing any of the high ceiling guys in the lower levels. I would be much more inclined to discuss guys closer to the majors with more value (Dezenzo, Loperfido, Cole, Sullivan, all the AA and AAA pitchers) than I would any of the guys in the lower levels. Cam Smith and Brice Matthews are the only 2 guys currently at AA or above that I’d place a high value on.

 

That’s a damn fine first post. You should post more.

 

Damn swing reminds me a ton of Kyle Tucker

 

Astros added IF CJ Alexander this week. So that's 10 minor league free agent position players they've added this year:

C Carlos Perez
C Freuddy Batista
C Hemmanuel Rosario
IF Riley Unroe
IF Cavan Biggio
IF CJ Alexander
IF Jack Winkler
IF Jax Biggers
IF/OF James Nelson
OF Kellen Strahm

Damn near an entire AAA position player roster added in the last 90 days. Sign of a really bad upper level of the farm system.

 

If I were GM this would be my organizational position player opening day rosters:


C Diaz
1B Walker
2B Altuve
SS Pena
3B Correa
RF Conforto*
CF Meyers
LF Alvarez
DH Paredes
Bench: Allen, Salazar, Biggio, Trammell

AAA:
C Price
1B Dezenzo
2B Loperfido
SS Matthews
3B Whitcomb
RF Smith
CF Cole
LF Sullivan
DH J Nelson
Bench: Alexander, Perez, Biggers, Strahm

AA:
C Janek
1B Bush
2B Winkler
SS A Nunez
3B Ferreras
RF T Whitaker
CF Spence
LF Y Encarnacion
DH Baez
Bench: Austin, Williams, Guillemette, Batista

High A:
C Schiavone
1B Daudet
2B Walker
SS Powell
3B Monistere
RF Frey
CF Gomez
LF C Hernandez
DH Brutcher
Bench: H Rosario, Lytle, Holy, Trujillo

A:
C Y Vazquez
1B J Sierra
2B A Hernandez
SS G Ramirez
3B Neyens
RF Ochoa
CF Huezo
LF K Alvarez
DH Thomas
Bench: Call, Forrester, Cauro, Luciano

FCL:
C Mitchell
1B Farley
2B Pereira
SS Arroyos
3B C Diaz
RF Wagner
CF Wakefield
LF Quintana
DH Rives
Bench: Flores, Cuneo, De Leon, Pratt

 

Stopped reading at Conforto.
Sorry.

 

This probably belongs more in the 5 year outlook thread than the minor league one, but oh well. If I'm reading it right, all of Meyers, Paredes, and Peña are free agents after next season. I think Peña is going to be hard to replace. Based on what's in the organization right now, the options seem to be Nick Allen, Carlos Correa, or Xavier Neyens. Neyens sticking at short and bring ready by 2028 are each unlikely so to accomplish both would be surprising. Correa is going to be 33, likely will have spent the last 2.5 seasons at 3rd, and has injury concerns. If Allen is still an elite defender, I think he's probably an okay stop gap, but you'd probably want something better in short order. A college SS in the 2026 draft might aggressively be ready by 2028. It's a little strange that the only college SS they drafted in 2025 was a money saving pick who played most of his college season at 1B. Of course this is an issue that could be solved with money, either via a Peña extension or signing a free agent.

While my personal brand of fandom would prefer them to keep the high upside young players and roll the dice, I do think there's some argument for a Preller-esque attitude towards prospects. Dana might not be able to sign a couple of prospects quite as good Alvarez/Neyens every year, presumably they should have at least some similar prospects in the future to dream on. Especially with how the Astros organization looks right now, a 3 win player this year is arguably more valuable than a 4 win player in 2029 when Brown, Diaz, and Alvarez join the list of free agents.