3 mistakes Astros could make in December to ruin their 2025 season

1. Refuse to pick a lane and attempt to walk the line between re-tooling and trying to compete

This, in my opinion, poses the biggest threat to the long-term outlook of the Houston Astros. Trying to keep a foot in each lane, both trying to win now and remain focused on the future is a delicate balancing act that, when it goes wrong, can de-rail a franchise for the better part of a decade.

There are a lot of balls in the air already this offseason that will determine which path Brown and the Astros choose to go down. The unresolved Bregman question will likely be the first domino to fall but, as mentioned, the team faces multiple losses via free agency next winter as well.

Does Houston look to keep Bregman, Tucker and Valdez, opting to run back the same core that was so successful early in their respective careers, or will the club get aggressive, shopping players on expiring contracts in hopes of revamping a farm system that MLB Pipeline ranked dead-last at No. 30 in its August rankings?

Poor contract decisions have put the front office in a corner financially. Giving $64 million to Christian Javier (4.61 FIP since the start of the 2023 season), $58 million to Jose Abreu (who is still on the books for a final $19.5 million in 2025) or $35 million to Lance McCullers Jr. (just 47.2 IP since that extension went into effect in 2022) in recent years hasn't panned out. Frankly, the team is reaching an inflection point where you can't just throw money at the problem to make it go away.

Roster Resource projects the Astros to be at $215 million next season - well below the first CBT threshold of $241 million - but that's also without Bregman on the books. Even if they manage to bring him back on their terms (5/$156) - that pushes their payroll to that $241 million mark, meaning they start paying penalties on every additional dollar spent from there.

The next month should give us plenty of answers in terms of what direction the Houston Astros are heading. It's almost unfathomable to think they'd tear it down and start over, but re-tooling for a year or two to reset the CBT penalties, reload the farm system and get bad money off the books could make this a relatively small bump in the road for a franchise that's been the perfect model of consistency for almost a decade now.

Failing to do so would put them in dangerous waters - and open the door for AL West foes like the Texas Rangers or Seattle Mariners to ascend the throne in the division, leaving the Astros playing catch-up in much the same way they were during the first half of the 2024 season.