It only took one tweak for this Astros prospect to start turning heads

Eric Cole

Gregory-Portland's Walker Janek rounds second base / Courtney Sacco/Caller-Times via Imagn Content Services, LLC

The Houston Astros were thrilled when catcher Walker Janek fell to them in the first-round of the 2024 MLB Draft. While the Astros wasted no time selecting Janek their top pick, his first look at pro ball last year was actually disappointing. Thankfully, it looks like it just took one piece of advice about his approach and an offseason to implement it to help get Janek back on track.

Most experts agree that Janek is likely to be a good defensive catcher. He has a cannon for an arm and, by all accounts, his pitchers have loved working with him. Janek also has the leadership qualities and unbelievable toughness that will serve him well as a big league backstop. Slashing .175/.214/.289 in his first 103 plate appearances, however, caused some Astros fans to have understandable concerns.

The Astros, looking to improve his pitch recognition, zeroed in on Janek's swing decisions and specifically what pitches he was trying to do damage against. Now, Janek is on the verge of ascending the minor league ladder in a hurry.

Astros prospect Walker Janek spent the offseason focusing on pitch recognition and selection

There's no shortage of prospects who need a course correction early on in their careers. Mechanical adjustments are common, and sometimes, it takes several fixes before a team finally finds the formula to unlock a player's potential. However, in Janek's case, it seems that he just needed to be coached on what pitches to turn on, and now he is making more contact while letting his talent do the rest.

He's been on a tear of late with a .759 OPS through 29 games in High-A, and his status as a college draft pick is starting to matter. There hasn't been much justification promoting Janek any higher until he proved he could hit in the lower levels of the minors. Assuming he is even average offensively, Janek will be in Double-A sometime soon.

As for the timeline for Janek's arrival to the big leagues, assuming he keeps hitting, that's a problem for another day. Houston is already set at catcher with Yainer Diaz and Victor Caratini, but no organization has ever complained about having too much talent at catcher. All we really know now is that Janek could be forcing his way into the conversation sooner that his pro debut suggested.

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Eric Cole

I started my career writing about baseball covering the Atlanta Braves for SB Nation's Talking Chop back in 2015 which has since been renamed Battery Power. After years of writing for those fine folks, I made the decision to take over as Site Expert at House That Hank Built before becoming a full-time MLB Staff Writer for FanSided in 2023. Along the way, I have been a guest on multiple ESPN radio affiliates as well as 680 The Fan and 92.9 The Game to discuss Braves baseball and especially Braves prospects and was a long-time host on the Battery Power podcast. These days, I continue to write about the Braves as well as covering the Astros, Padres, and Angels with particular expertise with minor league coverage, the MLB Draft, and bashing Anthony Rendon when possible. When I am not writing about or talking about baseball (which is seldom), I am an avid baseball card collector (Maddux and Soroka being my primary personal collections) and I also collect shark teeth. All other sports are mostly dead to me as my Bills have broken my heart too many times.