As we move onward through the longest off-season the Astros and their fans have experienced since they missed the playoffs in 2016, we turn to one of the donated ideas for a topic.
From our dear Chip Bailey founder of the blog … “Maybe a suggested full blog entry of levity and outrageousness for the Hot Stove offseason.”
That sounded great to me and dear friend of the blog, Zanuda has already written a chunk of this for me – as shown in the first idea.
The Nuclear Option
Let’s bring back Tucker at at 7 years @ 35MM/yr, Throw in Cody Bellinger at 7 for 30MM/year. That’s good for RF and CF. Now we need some pitching. Let’s give Framber 6 years at 35MM/year, Dylan Cease for 7years at 30MM/year, and Ranger Suarez for 6 @30MM/yr. Got to have some good arms in the BP so how about Edwin Diaz for 5 years for 20MM/yr, Greg Soto for 4 at 10MM/yr, and Ryan Hensley for 4 at 12MM/yr. At catcher we have JT Realmuto for 3 years at 10MM/yr and finally we can keep Dubon for a measly 3 years at 6.5MM/yr. Oh I forgot we want to get rid of Walker so we’ll need a first baseman. Let’s see, hmmm, Pete Alsonso for 7 years at 25MM/yr. How about Luis Arraez at 2nd (since Altuve is on the downside) for 6 year at 30MM/yr.
So, let’s see we will be paying $273.5 million for 12 players of the 26 needed to make up a roster. Assuming, Christian Walker is gone somehow – we are under contract for $139.43 million for 6 other players – Jose Altuve, Carlos Correa, Yordan Alvarez, Cristian Javier, Josh Hader and Lance McCullers Jr. That takes us to $412.93 million for 18 players.
Then let’s pick 7 more players off the arbitration list, plus Cam Smith to get to 26 – which could be Isaac Paredes, Jeremy Pena, Mauricio Dubon, Bryan Abreu, Hunter Brown, Yainer Diaz, and Steven Okert and for about $44 million. So that gets you to about $466.93 million total. Putting those WS Champion Dodgers (spit!) to shame at only $350 million in 2025.
Oh, but here is where the levity comes in as there is no place for Spencer Arrighetti, J.P. France, A.J. Blubaugh, Jason Alexander, Zack Cole, Bryan King and Bennett Sousa.
A New Old Home
Enron/Minute Maid/Daikin/This Spots for Sale Park has become “ancient” by modern stadium terms and it is about to start the 27th season as the Astros’ home. The inevitable is coming.
Billionaire Jim Crane will come wandering in soon hat in hand and say the decrepit ex-Juice Box needs to be replaced. And replaced with mostly other people’s local money or the good people of Nashville, Portland, Oakland, Charlotte, or fill-in-the-blank-ville will do it instead.
So, here is the chance for the Harris County Sports Authority to kill two rats with one rock. The Astrodome has stood for it seems forever, abandoned but not quite ready for the trash heap. The HCSA could “renovate” the Astrodome (I’m sure there are tax breaks involved in renovating a classic historical building) turning it into a new crystal baseball palace and easy-peasy everything is solved. Crane can work with the McNairs and create an entertainment district that both the Texans’ and Astros’ fans can enjoy in the area. And the problem of what to do with the Astrodome is over.
Not sure if this is more levity or more outrageous, but I know this will never happen. The problem with the Astrodome the first time was that it was not a single sport arena and both sports felt under-served. And while the Texans and Astros would not share a stadium, they would be sharing a campus and neither side would buy into that.
New Old Leadership
The Astros start the season 30-50 and sometime late in June, Jim Crane pulls the plug.
“Today the Astros announced that they have let both General Manager Dana Brown and Manager Joe Espada. Owner Jim Crane also announced that the new GM would be Hall of Famer Jeff Bagwell and co-managers would be Hall of Famers Craig Biggio and Reggie Jackson. Former Astro Jose Abreu would be given a job in the front office in charge of reading the back of baseball cards.
No comment.
Reunion time
“In a shocking turn the Astros have reunited with a number of their former and almost former players from the golden era. They announced signings of top free agents Kyle Tucker, Alex Bregman and Framber Valdez, all three considered in the top five of available free agents. In addition, they signed lesser free agents Justin Verlander, Charlie Morton, Yuli Gurriel and Ryan Pressly. They also made an offer to Dallas Keuchel, who threw 35 innings at AAA Omaha in 2025.
Finally, they made two huge trades with prospects for George Springer (entering his last season before free agency) and Gerrit Cole, who sat out the 2025 season after Tommy John surgery.
GM Dana Brown was quoted as saying ‘We are getting the band back together again.’”
Yes, a combination of levity and outrageousness. But wouldn’t it be fun prior to becoming a disaster.
OK, it is your turn. What crazy stories do you have to share today?
ALL THINGS ASTROS 
14 responses to “Astros’ offseason: Levity and outrageousness”
Well, here is a nutty idea that I think someone at Fox Sports proposed when we reacquired Carlos Correa. Sorry, I don’t remember the guy’s name, but he said we should trade Jeremy Pena for a big haul and we could play Paredes at 3B, Correa at SS. I don’t think we would actually do this, at least not until we got rid of a lot more expensive guys.
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I’d rather trade Correa though you would not get as much in exchange for him. Pena is younger and is on the way up. Correa is not that young and likely past his peak.
But again that is the outrageousness of this…
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I don’t hate that idea because of Pena’s escalating salary and impending free agency. My concern is how long you could trust Correa to stay healthy enough for SS. He played 94 games there last year and was slightly worse than Pena in the field.
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The problem with that is Correa doesn’t want to play SS any longer. Too hard on his body. I do think since they probably won’t extend Pena (he just signed with Boris) and a good SS is very difficult to come by, they should look for a trade for Pena when he has 1 year left. Would bring a big haul.
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I saw a post yesterday saying the MLB privately informed the owners that they lost $1.8B collectively last year. Google tells me the total salaries paid across the league amounted to $4.27B. Take all this with a grain of salt as the Mets are estimated to have lost $350M with a payroll of $342M. What does this mean? This means they have some creative accountants employed. Regardless, a $466M payroll will undoubtedly lose money given the current state of media contracts.
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The Astros are hiring former Tigers’ first base coach Anthony Lapoce to be their assistant hitting instructor.
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Per Rome’s column on the Athletic last evening, Dana has stated Cam Smith is no guarantee in right field to start the season. He’ll be sent to AAA if he’s not having good at bats this spring.
That apparently means Jake Meyers, with a lifetime home OPS of .632 will again start in center, although there seems to be a fair amount of interest in him throughout the league. But if we don’t have a stable outfield, moving Jake would not make much sense. I was hoping we might improve center in 2026.
And surprising to me, Yordan will see more time in left per Brown, especially at AC Park. Seems like every year, the Yordan plan in left changes. Back to my old cynical self I suppose, this all means we that once again, at this point anyway, we don’t much of an outfield.
I apologize for the lack of levity or outrageousness!
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I won’t pay for the Athletic – but thanks for the info on Cam Smith. I’m surprised if they ended up here that they did not send him down last season in the second half, even if it was only a few weeks to straighten things out.
Yeah, Jake is coming off his best season hitting (on the road) but is not a hitter I have a lot of confidence in going forward.
The only way to handle the DH situation between Jose Altuve and Yordan Alvarez is to try and get Yordan to play more LF – so that they don’t have to have Jose in the field too much. But let’s face it they are moving towards a worse and worse defensive team (it seems).
I don’t like it because the more “things” Yordan does, the more chance he has of a soft tissue injury.
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Interesting article …. now whether there is more smoke than anything else here – we do not know
Astros GM: “No Interest” In Trading Isaac Paredes – MLB Trade Rumors
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Daddy plays first, mama plays second…
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Read where Framber was at the winter meetings glad-handing with a lot of the GM’s. I’d say color him gone and don’t let the door hit you in the @#! on the way out.
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Just thinking about some of the possible free agent signings and trades for the off season. I keep seeing possible trades that would further gut our already depleted farm system. One would asked is it worth the effort to gut the farm for a possible run at a playoff spot? My answer is no unless we think these MILB players will never become everyday players. And I apologise for being redundant but I think the trade for Correa is going to bite us big time in the next few years. It’ll rank right up there with signing Abreu and Walker for those 3 @ 60MM. One of the definitions of stupidity is doing the same thing over and over but expecting different results. Of course I might be wrong.
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Dana Brown does have a tough job. His boss expects post season play annually. That makes it all the more difficult to repair a crappy farm system, especially when you’re using guys at the ML level when they should still be in that system.
And yes, Carlos Correa’s acquisition was an attempt to get the Astros into October. Now we’re stuck with him. It was a Crane deal. That makes the GM’s job that much tougher. But if the club can move Walker, even for half his salary, maybe Correa at third and Paredes at first will work out. I hope. But I also think Correa spends too much time acting as a player coach. It’s not his team. Resentment might bubble up.
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I just watched a video on Youtube from 2014 of a 20 year old Shohei Ohtani pitching against the MLB All Stars where Jose Altuve leads off by lining a single to right field. Someone needs to show him and Correa clips like this. It’s too late for Walker. It’s probably never going to happen for Jake. Altuve and Correa, when willing to hit to RF, can still be among the best hitters in the league though. For whatever reason the organization either disagrees with me or is unable to convince them of that.
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