Astros: Decision to Hold at the Deadline, Good or Bad?

After multiple rumors surrounded the Astros throughout trade season, the organization decided to stand pat through the non-waiver trade deadline.

Jeff Luhnow and the Astros decided not to make any big moves to improve the team in the midst of a playoff race. It could be that the front office thinks that the team on the field is good enough to win right now. It is also a possibility that they believe that this is not the year for the team to go all in.

Over the past few weeks the Astros have been linked to many players ranging from Chris Sale to Carlos Beltran. Granted, the organization would have had to ship out a number of good young prospects in order to land one of these types of players, but there are many people around Houston that look at what the Texas Rangers did before the deadline and cannot help but feel a little shortchanged.

The Rangers went out and grabbed catcher Jonathan Lucroy and pitcher Jeremy Jeffress in exchange for two guys that are already top five prospects in the Milwaukee Brewers system: Lewis Brinson (#2) and Luis Ortiz (#5). They also received New York Yankees outfielder Carlos Beltran in exchange for Dillon Tate who is now the Yankees 11th ranked prospect and was the number five prospect in the Rangers organization. So the Rangers traded away three of their top five prospects for those two players.

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If there is a good take away from this year’s trade deadline, it is that the Astros did not give away any good young prospects. The only two deals made by Houston were trading Scott Feldman to the Toronto Blue Jays for 19-year-old RHP Guadalupe Chavez and trading Josh Fields to the Los Angeles Dodgers for 19-year-old 1B Yordan Alvarez. These seem to just be moves to open some spots on the 40-man roster for players the organization would like to protect from the Rule 5 Draft.

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• Just how much better is the Houston Astros playoff rotation than the rest?
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• Always faithful Astros World Series champion Josh Reddick defends the title
• Michael Conforto declines Astros’ 2-year, $30 million offer

But many Astros fans were hoping to see a blockbuster trade or two and with all the rumors flying around it appeared as though it could happen. The Astros front office, however, seemed to have different plans. They made the decision not to mortgage the future of the franchise in order to win this season. After the trades from last season trying to accomplish that very thing did not quite work out as planned, you could imagine why they are a little weary of giving up prospects.

As you watch the Astros’ bullpen give up the lead, the two catchers on the roster go 1-10 with 7 K’s and the outfielders go 2-14 with 5 K’s on the day of the deadline, you cannot help but wonder how much a few good trades could have helped this team and just how far they could go if its needs were met.

Next: Astros Trade Scott Feldman, Activate Joe Musgrove

To many, it feels as though the Astros organization has given up on winning the division this season and they are banking on the Rangers dropping off in the next few years, having given up their best prospects for a couple of short-term fixes. But it could prove to be a very sound strategy if the Astros are able to pull off multiple world series victories in the very near future. Only time will tell.

**Prospect rankings provided by MLB.com**