Astros plans for Brice Matthews are making a messy roster situation even worse

Brice Matthews had a cup of coffee with the Houston Astros in 2025, but the organization had to love what they saw from the former first-round pick. Matthews enjoyed a terrific season at Triple-A Sugar Land (.260/.371/.458) and should be in line for more playing time in 2026 after showing plenty of pop with four home runs and a .452 slugging percentage in just 13 games with the big-league club last year.

But based on comments from GM Dana Brown, one has to wonder what the Astros are planning to do with Matthews in 2026. “He’s going to get some run in the outfield, but second base is still going to be his main position,” Brown said. “We project he’ll turn the corner with the bat and get maybe some run in the outfield a little bit, as well.”

The Astros already have a logjam in the infield. Jeremy Peña is entrenched at Matthews' natural position — shortstop — and Houston has more corner infielders than they'd care to count. After trading for Isaac Paredes last December and signing Christian Walker to a three-year, $60 million deal, the Astros reunited with Carlos Correa at last year's trade deadline.

Astros plans for Brice Matthews will require a lot of clever roster management

Now, the Astros have a lot of money tied up at both first and third base, and their efforts to trade Walker this offseason have fallen on deaf ears. Paredes could see time at second base in 2026, though he's a below average defender at the keystone. Furthermore, the Jose Altuve experiment in the outfield failed miserably, and he spent more time at second base (66 games) than left field (47 games) in 2025. So how exactly do the Astros plan to give Matthews reps at second base?

Throw in the fact that Houston held onto Jesús Sanchez and have basically resigned to playing Yordan Alvarez as the team's DH only; one has wonder how in the world they plan to get Matthews into the lineup with any sort of regularity.

Trading was Jacob Melton in order to acquire Mike Burrows opens up a bit of playing time in the outfield — if Houston truly plans to give Matthews reps in center. But after dealing Melton, it's difficult to see Houston parting with Jake Meyers, meaning that the Astros already have their starting centerfielder heading into Opening Day next season.

Houston can plan all they want to get Matthews into the lineup next season, but it's going to take a lot of roster reshuffling before spring training in order to do it. At the moment, Matthews looks like he'll begin the 2026 season back in the minors.