With so many players injured and so many things going wrong to start the 2026 season, it’s tempting to think that there could be a big turnaround for the Astros that leads to them at least being respectable if not making the postseason.
But, the longer this season trudges along, the more it feels like the death knell for an era that has given us excellence rarely seen by any franchise let alone one from Houston.
So if Astros owner Jim Crane decided, as he did when he bought the team, that it was time to tear it all down, how would that look exactly?
Crane has famously said that the window for a championship is always open as long as he owns the team. But, with a wildly unbalanced roster and an empty farm system, even he might have to re-think how he feels about trying to contend while limping along, particularly given the collective bargaining chaos on the horizon.
So, let’s assume he does want to blow it up and think about how that would take shape.
Cleaning House in the Front Office
The first and most likely place a makeover begins is with management. Given that Manager Joe Espada and GM Dana Brown are both in the final year of their contracts, this may happen whether Crain decides to implode the team or not. For all the calls to remove Espada, even during the season, Brown is probably the guy that deserves the closest look. So many moves this season have backfired and the farm system is no closer to being good than it was five years ago.
How much impact a new manager would have in the near term is speculative. Remember, the Astros used Cecil Cooper, Dave Clark, Brad Mills, Tony DeFrancesco, Bo Porter and Tom Lawless to bridge the gap between Phil Garner and A.J. Hinch.
But the right GM can change the fortunes of a franchise the way Jeff Luhnow did for the Astros.
Slashing Payroll in Favor of Prospects
When you start thinking about how to cut payroll and fill your coffers with draft picks and young players, you’re talking about moving veterans. Typically, that means those who are already in the back half of their careers along with a few younger players set to make huge leaps in salary. When you consider the Astros’ current roster, names like Jose Altuve, Yordan Alvarez, Hunter Brown, Christian Walker, Carlos Correa, Isaac Paredes, Jake Meyers, Jeremy Peña, Josh Hader, Bryan Abreu, Yainer Diaz and probably Christian Vasquez immediately spring to mind.
Not only do they represent a massive amount of payroll (or soon-to-be payroll), but many of them would command a very good return on the open market. We hesitated to put Altuve on this list because he is probably going to retire as an Astro, but never say never when it comes to starting over. And while we think Alvarez is one you build around (see next), will his prime be over by the time a rebuild is finished?
Figuring Out Who to Build Around
This has got to be the most difficult decision to make because it is entirely about your perceived timeline. The 2014 Astros roster, the year they really began to turn the corner, only had three players who had been on the 2011 roster — the final season under Drayton McLane, Jr. The only one on that list you’ll likely remember is Altuve. He came up in 2011.
Everyone else was gone including names like Hunter Pence, J.D. Martinez, Carlos Lee, Jordan Lyles, Bud Norris and Wandy Rodriguez. Two of the outfielders in 2011 were Michael Bourn and Brian Bogusevic, now regular fixtures on the Astros broadcast team.
The point is, when you start over, you often REALLY start over. Baseball is a slow burn and it can take four or five years to begin competing again, which is one of the main arguments against doing it in the first place. Right now, the players fans may want to keep because they are in their prime are already 27 or older. That includes Brown, Alvarez, Meyers, Peña, Abreu and Diaz. All of those guys would be over 30 by the time the team started to turn things around after rebuilding and, even then, it might be another three or four years before a real shot at another World Series.
Building around core young players is great if those guys are in their early 20s. That would include Cam Smith, Spencer Arrighetti, Brice Matthews, AJ Blubaugh and a bunch of guys still in the minors. It is unclear at this point if any of them are worthy of building a franchise around and more likely none of them are.
Accepting Some Very Rough Times Ahead
People can say they are prepared to weather the struggles of a rebuild, but are they? Three straight 100-loss seasons is absolutely brutal. Ask anyone who went through it. And it’s unlikely Crane would tolerate that again. But, there is something more pressing to consider. What if they do all that and they still aren’t good?
What the Astros did under Lunhow is rare, extremely rare. That is especially true in today’s blockbuster payroll market where organizations can literally buy the best rosters in the sport. Some of that may change after the CBA is negotiated in the offseason, but don’t count on it changing dramatically enough to balance the scales between big and small market teams anytime soon.
That means creating a farm system that generates the kind of talent good enough to propel a team to the World Series — along with a smattering of very good veterans — is damn near impossible. Crane’s theory of always being in contention might actually be easier and more likely to end up with positive results.
But burn it down is an option. Hard to know if it would work or if fans would be able to stand the pain.
