[Official] Astros Offseason

Is Paredes as the everyday LF really a worse defensive option than Yordan? Or at 2B really a worse defensive option than Altuve?

 

If you have the iHeart radio app, go to the SportsTalk 790 page and all the interviews are uploaded to there. Just listened to the Dana, Walker, and JP3 interviews. All good stuff.

 

"hope they produce" is different from "help carry the load"

When Framber came up, JV, LMJ, and Greinke were at the top of the rotation. The hope wasn't for him to be the #1.
There was a belief that Yordan would mash like he did in the minors, and that's worked out well.
The expectations of Pena weren't to replicate Correa but to be passable. That team still had a productive Altuve, Brantley, Bregman, and Tucker to rely on.

Who does this team have? The hope seems to be for these "prospects" (Cole, Dezenzo, Loperfido) to help carry the team. It's a burden I'm not convinced they're capable of.

When those players came up, there was a belief that the team was still on top. Not so much now. There's a lot of uncertainty with this roster. This could be a playoff contending team or another missed postseason

 

Last time I checked we weren’t relying on our 8th and 9th hitters to carry the team.

 

Sure, a team can get by with an 8/9 of Meyers/Mccormick and Maldy when the top 5 in the lineup are beasts... this team has maybe 3 legit hitters (Pena, Paredes, Yordan), 3 maybe average guys (Altuve, Correa, walker), and 3 likely immediate outs (Diaz, Meyers,???). That's a lot of "hope it works out"

Then add in the part about having 1 ace SP instead of 2 or 3 and the questions continue to pile up.

 

Huh?

Correa can be dinged for being fragile but he’s been an elite hitter in 7 of his 11 seasons, including 2024. He was a very good (122 wRC+) hitter with Houston last season. You can predict Father Time will come for Altuve but he was a well above average hitter last season and has been extremely good every season since 2014 except for 2020.

Walker is likely a league average hitter, but should he plus against LHP. Diaz has been above average for his career and should be elite against LHP.

Assuming everybody stays healthy and meets their projections, this lineup features 7 very very good hitters against LHP and 5 very good or better hitters against RHP. They need to add one elite hitter against RHP and they’d be on par with any of the glory years.

 

Correa had a 117 OPS+ with us last season and a 152 OPS+ in 2024. In what world is that “maybe average”? Sure, Altuve could continue to decline but at worst he’s average.

Diaz and Meyers being immediate outs is also laughable.

 

I won't let your stats and logic get in the way of my feelings!

Carlos was and is a positive addition as long as he's healthy and Walker and Diaz had (still have) potential to be good. Maybe last season were down years for them. In this "what have you done for me lately" world, they're not very good and certainly not elite.

What bat can they add without subtracting (Paredes) from the lineup? This 2026 team will not be on par with the championship teams.

152 --> 117 --> 2026? That's a downward trend.

All in all, I'm not sold on this team making noise in October. Laugh now. Cry later.

 

Thank you!!

 

Of course it won't - I don't think anyone with or around the Astros is expecting this team to be a 100-105 win type team. The goal is simply to be a legitimate contender - 94 wins last year would have been the #1 seed in the AL. The goal at this point is to be "good enough" and have some luck. That's the reality when your elite young talent has aged out and left or gotten expensive.

If Altuve and Correa are average bats, the team simply won't be very good. Nothing wrong with that. They have an entire infield that's expected to carry them - so much so that people are complaining that the Astros have too much infield talent. No one is expecting a few rookie outfielders to carry the team.

One year difference don't make a trend. Otherwise, every player would always be trending. Correa went from 94 OPS+ to 152 OPS+ from 2023 to 2024. Would anyone expect him to suddenly be a 200 OPS+ hitter in 2025? Before that, he was 130 and before that he was in the 90's and on and on. It's basically the definition of not being a trend.

 

Astros likely need to pick up ~5 wins over last year to win the division. Here's the break down by position:

C: last year Diaz, Caratini, and Salazar combined for 2.4 fwar. This year Diaz and Salazar project for 0.6 more than that.

IF: Walker, Altuve, Pena, Correa, Paredes, Dubon, Rodgers, Urias, Matthews, Short, Guillorme, and Singleton combined for 12.8 fwar. Infielders this season (Walker, Altuve, Paredes, Correa, Pena, Allen) project for 13 fwar. Crazy to think Houston gave 300 pa to Rodgers, Urias, Short, and Guillorme last year.

OF/DH: Last season, Smith, Alvarez, Meyers, Sanchez, Trammell, Chas, Dezenzo, Hummel, Melton, Cole, Whitcomb, and Corona combined for 3.4 fwar. OF/DH this season (Alvarez, Smith, Loperfido, Meyers, Cole, Dezenzo) project for 10.1 fwar. Nearly half of that comes from Alvarez. The Astros gave almost 600 pa to OF who were below replacement level last year.

SP: Last season, Framber, Brown, Gusto, Gordon, Alexander, McCullers, Walter, Blanco, Javier, Arrighetti, Wesneski, Blubaugh, and Garcia combined for 12.6 fwar. SP this season project for 11.1 fwar.

RP: RP last season combined for 5.4 fwar. They project for 4.0 this season.

So essentially getting Alvarez back, raising the floor of the OF with another year of experience from Smith and Loperfido and others, and having 5 healthy star infielders adds a net of 7.5 wins to the position player side. Losing Framber and expected regression from RP who were dominant last season loses a net of 2.9 wins from the pitching staff. On balance, they project to be 4.6 wins better than last season, which would have been good enough to win the division last year.

This roster is 1 elite LH bat and 1 ToRSP away from being on par with 2018, 2019, and 2022. But it's roughly as talented as the 2017 team was before they added JV.

 

If they sign Vasquez or Conforto, does that move the needle at all in your opinion?

 

And if it moves the needle, what direction?

 

Not really. Neither guy is likely to be an impact player. Vasquez raises the floor a bit but even if Diaz were to get hurt and Vasquez played full time instead of Salazar it’s not likely to be more than a win difference, and Salazar has upside that Vasquez doesn’t have. Conforto has upside to be a 2 win player but also a low floor and doesn’t project to be meaningfully better than Cole or Loperfido, especially factoring in defense.

I don’t think there are any obvious realistic moves Houston can make at this point that would meaningfully improve their roster. If I were GM and if my scouts/analysts/coaches gave me good feedback on Giolito, I might try to sign Giolito and then move pitching depth (Arrighetti, Blubaugh, etc.) to acquire somebody like Matt Wallner or Lars Nootbaar.

 

Yeah. The season succeeds or fails based on Alvarez.

 

Any significant bad news from Yordan or Hunter is probably curtains on Houston’s season (and potentially the final nail in the coffin of the competitive window that began in 2015).

 

Assuming Giolito signs for a lower $ amount, he could be a reasonable addition for the Astros.

 

I think they could survive Hunter’s loss. Alvarez would be brutal again.

 

Yep, everyone always assumes one bad year or one positive year is a trend. From what I've seen:

"Trend" continues ~25–30%
About the same (±5 wRC+) ~20–25% New true talent level
Bounce back halfway ~25–30% Regression to the mean
Full bounce to prior level ~10–15% Just a random bad, good year
Other (big increase or collapse) ~5–10% Outliers

Numbers are approximate.