This isn’t necessarily a prediction but one outcome that would not shock me is if Houston’s farm system takes a big step forward this season, Dana Brown will probably get an extension even if the big league team doesn’t make the playoffs. Espada almost certainly doesn’t survive if Houston misses the playoffs no matter what.
If we know anything about Crane is that he trusts the process. The guy let Luhnow have three 100 loss seasons without losing confidence. If he sees Brown doing the right thing with the draft and farm, he will stick with him. Crane understands how the Astros are successful long term. The only bad decision Brown has had so far is signing Walker but it’s not like he had tons of options and it still may end up okay if Walker turns it around a little bit. The biggest problem right now is that we aren’t turning out rookie of the year candidates almost every season like have been. If Burrow and Imai stay as impressive as they have been during ST, the off-season has been a success.
I will say that Houston really has churned out ROY candidates each year. Cam Smith received ROY votes last season, and could have been a better candidate if he’d not been rushed or if he’d been used differently. The year before (2024), Arrighetti was 84th in SP fwar (top 10 among rookies) so he was a really good rookie even though he didn’t get ROY votes. Prior to that you had Hunter Brown (2023) and Yainer Diaz (2023) and Jeremy Pena (2022), so the system has consistently produced core players year in and year out since like 2011; it’s actually amazing when you think about it. Last year was an anomaly because Smith fell off in the 2nd half, Arrighetti got hurt, and Diaz took a step back.
