Astros, American League West Round Up Pre-Lockout

Hopefully, this downtime, caused by the Major League Baseball owners’ lockout, has given you a chance to recover from the whiplash caused by the start of 2021-2022 free agency period.

Teams were not messing around with the Collective Bargaining Agreement set to expire back on Dec. 2. No other division in MLB was more involved than the American League West.

The Houston Astros have perennially been the representative from the AL West in the postseason. They’ve won the AL West four of the last five seasons. They’ve also been to three World Series in as many seasons, winning one.

The Astros run isn’t over yet either. Even if Carlos Correa opts to sign with a new team, the Astros have a lot of star power, young talent and quality role players to continue to this run for a few more seasons.

However, the rest of the AL West is starting to seemingly get desperate. Either opting for break it all down with no chance to compete like the Oakland Athletics, fast track rebuild to take advantage of a blossoming core of players like the Seattle Mariners or Texas Rangers, or to simply make a blind swing at some high-risk, high-reward free agents like the Los Angels Angels.

So, let’s take a look at the Astros’ AL West rivals’ free agent moves so far this season, evaluate those moves and how it could potentially impact the division.