Astros insider just said what fans should be thinking after flurry of coaching staff changes

While it seems that Houston Astros leadership, specifically Dana Brown and Joe Espada, will be sticking around, the same can't be said for much of Espada's staff. Some firings were deserved, like letting go of the head trainer after wave upon wave of injuries were mismanaged. Others, though, deserve more scrutiny.

In dismissing Alex Cintrón and Troy Snitker, Brown is sending a clear message that he wasn't happy with the Astros' offensive attack. He's not wrong. Houston finished 21st in runs scored with 686. The club's .715 OPS was middle of the pack, coming in 15th, but there was an overall lack of power with the team's .149 ISO ranking 20th.

Much of that has to do with the approach at the plate. Houston swung at the second-most pitches outside of the zone, after only the Colorado Rockies, at 34% of the time. The team's 11.5% swinging strike rate was the eighth highest in the league, while their 15.6% called strike rate ranked 26th. Translation: the approach was not one of patience but rather grip and rip at anything near the strike zone.

On the surface, pointing the finger at the hitting coaches makes sense, but as Astros insider Chandler Rome points out, the primary culprit might be someone else.

Chandler Rome calls out Dana Brown after the firing of the Astros' hitting coaches

In his piece, Rome reveals that last Brown had grown tired of Houston's impatient approach at the plate. The general manager held a meeting with Cintrón and Snitker in the winter to re-emphasize this point. It didn't work, and Houston saw fewer pitches per plate appearance than they had in 2024, which was already among the worst marks in the league.

But as Rome points out, that might have more to do with the collection of hitters these coaches had to work with, as opposed to the coaches themselves.

"At the same time, Brown traded outfielder Kyle Tucker and allowed free-agent third baseman Alex Bregman to sign with the Boston Red Sox, robbing the offense of two players who could’ve helped the efforts," Rome wrote.

He'd add, "In response, the 2025 Astros boasted baseball’s second-highest chase rate and saw the third-fewest pitches per plate appearance of any lineup in the sport. Houston scored three or fewer runs in 82 of its 162 games while sporting a .719 OPS that ranked lower than any of Cintrón and Snitker’s past six offenses."

That part is pretty damning. Giving away Tucker and Bregman, who posted walk rates significantly higher than Houston's 27th-ranked 7.7%, at 14.6% and 10.3%, respectively, was never going to solve the Astros' plate discipline woes.

Rome acknowledges the injuries, but also points to the propensity to chase outside of the zone present among many of the players Brown collected.

"More concerning, though, is the collection of similar offensive profiles that produced the trends Brown despises. Peña, Yainer Diaz, Christian Walker, Cam Smith, Mauricio Dubón, and Jose Altuve all have top-50 swing rates in the sport. Diaz, Dubón, Altuve, and Peña all boast chase rates of at least 35.3 percent. Walker’s spiked from 24.2 percent last season to 28.4 percent in this one."

Spot on. At the end of the day, if you're going to acquire a bunch of free swingers as Brown did, you're not going to have great plate discipline. Even worse, if you try to breed patience into a veteran group that has had its success based on its aggressiveness, you might as well just shove a square peg in a round hole.

There's more than one way to skin a cat, but when you intentionally acquire personnel who don't match your offensive philosophy, you shouldn't be surprised when it doesn't work out. Maybe
Cintrón and Snitker needed to go anyway, but Brown did them no favors by forcing a certain philosophy on them and then supplying them with players who were the antithesis of it.