Astros linked to left-handed pitcher who revived his career and dominated the KBO

A big part of why the Houston Astros have dominated the American League over the last 10 years, has been their incredible offense. The unit has been propped up with names like Carlos Correa, Yordan Alvarez, Alex Bregman, Kyle Tucker and Jose Altuve. Yet, with the loss of Tucker and the expectation that Bregman will be spending the rest of his career in another jersey, the pitching might become more of a focal point moving forward.

Framber Valdez and Hunter Brown anchor this rotation as two of the more intriguing arms in the American League, both with proven ability and ace potential. Along with the emergence of Ronel Blonco as a legitimate front-line starter and Spencer Arrighetti looking like a nice mid-rotation arm, the Astros are finally starting to develop some solid pitching.

However, as they learned last year, you can never have too much pitching. Injuries to Cristian Javier, JP France, along with Luis Garcia's Tommy John surgery in 2023 and the oft injured Lance McCullers Jr. missing another full year, Houston's reign atop the AL West nearly came to an end. It looks like Astros GM, Dana Brown, is learning from these costly injuries, and hoping to add some solid depth.

Astros interest in KBO pitcher, Kyle Hart, shows that Dana Brown is committed to adding solid pitching depth

Kyle Hart was a 19th round draft pick out of Indiana University, heading to the Boston Red Sox. After a few years in the minor leagues and just 11 major league innings, Hart headed to the KBO to try and resurrect his career, and boy did he.

Hart never really put up gaudy strikeout numbers, or possessed elite control, but that all seemed to change when he joined the KBO. In route to winning the KBO's version of the Cy Young award, Hart threw 157 innings with a solid 2.69 ERA. He flashed a slider that many are saying is a borderline elite pitch, with a 10.4 K/9 and miniscule 2.2 BB/9.

Will Sammon of The Athletic stated that the Astros were one of five teams that have shown the most interest in the lefty looking to rejoin a major league team. Rightfully so, we just saw the transition that Erick Fedde made from the KBO to the major leagues, posting a solid 3.9 bWAR season with the White Sox and Cardinals., looking like one of the better bargains of last offseason.

The Astros desperately need some pitching depth. As things currently stand, Lance McCullers makes up one of the six spots in your expected rotation and that's just something that you can't count on right now. Dana Brown looks like he might be placing more emphasis on the depth of the pitching than in years past.

Hart may not be the Corbin Burns level ace that many fans hoped they would add, but if Brown can snag the 32-year-old lefty, this could be looked at as one of the best moves of this offseason.