Many Astros fans love to bash owner Jim Crane or GM Dana Brown for offloading Astros All-Star-level talent. Of course, for the last two years, that means the Astros have done without the services of crucial cogs in the Astros World Championship machine, Kyle Tucker, Alex Bregman, and Framber Valdez.
The Bible says the love of money is the root of all evil. Does Astros management put payroll ahead of wins? Or did letting these players walk make sense from a baseball perspective?
I thought it would be fun to see how much the Astros are missing based on the 2026 output of these three players compared to their ostensible replacements, and whether these players would have provided good bang for the buck if they were on the Astros.
Short answer, not much.
Let’s start with the Kyle Tucker trade. After a good year with the Cubs last year in the final year of his team control, Tucker went to the Dodgers (of course) on a $240 million, four-year contract. That’s $57 million AAV!
How is he doing hitting in the same lineup as Freddie Freeman, Mookie Betts, Teoscar Hernandez, Max Muncy, and that guy from Japan?
Here’s the slash line: .243/.339/.379. 10 home runs, wRC+ 102, 0.9 fWAR. If he manages to produce 1.5 WAR by the end of the season, that’s $38 million per win.
The Astros got Isaac Paredes, Cam Smith, and Hayden Wesneski in return, all players with considerable team control. Cam Smith, although at age 23 still growing as a hitter (wRC+ 86 with 13 home runs), has an fWAR of 1.3 on a salary of about $800,000.
Not to mention Hayden Wesneski and Isaac Paredes. Unfortunately, Wesneski went under the surgeon’s knife soon after his acquisition. But upon his recent return, early indicators say he might be the much-needed effective third pitcher if the Astros make the playoffs.
Then there’s Paredes. Between Smith and Paredes, without the Paredes injury, the Astros would have gotten as much production in the first year of the Tucker trade as they would have gotten from Tucker without the trade. (2.4 fWAR; Paredes in 102 games, 1.3 for Smith. Total 3.7. Tucker, 2025, 4.5) Of course, they have Smith for four more years, and Paredes through next year. BTW, Paredes earns $9.35 million this year, and his fWAR is 2.5 compared to Tucker’s 0.9.
But perhaps you’d rather compare Paredes to the man whose position he replaced, Alex Bregman, now a Cub. Here’s Breggie’s slash line in 2026 and below that, Paredes’:
Bregman: .245/.337/.376. 11 home runs, 101 wRC+, 2.3 fWAR.
Paredes: .249/.346/.412. 15 home runs, 117 wRC+, 2.5 fWAR.
Bregman makes $175 million over five (declining) years, an AAV of $38.89 million.
Let’s say both players end the season with three WAR. In case you’re counting, Bregman costs almost $13 million per win. Paredes costs a little more than $3 million.
Then there’s Framber Valdez. He was glorious in the 2022 World Championship year, when he learned how to tame his volcanic emotions. But last year he intentionally beaned his own catcher, and this year, after giving up 10 runs to the Red Sox, he beaned Trevor Story and got suspended. And that’s only one meltdown.
Valdez makes $115 million on a three-year contract, an AAV of $36.52 million. His current ERA is 4.41, nearly a run above his career average. His vaunted ground ball rate has dropped from nearly 61% to almost 53%. His K rate is down to 18.4% from a career average of 22.9%, but at its best was as high as 26%.
Valdez’s fWAR is 1.3. Say he makes 1.8 by year’s end. That means he would have cost Detroit $20.29 million per win.
Yes, the Astros could use his innings, but Valdez is another declining asset, and his influence in the dugout is toxic. Not worth anywhere near the money.
OK. I concede that if the Astros had kept both Bregman and Tucker in 2025, they may have made the playoffs. I say “may” because, even knowing they needed only one more win to make it to the Wild Card, who can say which players they would have had to give up due to salary cap considerations, besides not getting Cam Smith and Isaac Paredes in trade?
But even with Tucker and Bregman in a playoff scenario, I can’t see the 2025 Astros going far. But clearly, keeping them would have mortgaged the Astros’ fortunes for a long time. An Astros team, by the way, that looks like it will make the playoffs this year without the dead weight of aging Kyle Tucker, Alex Bregman, and Framber Valdez.
Dana Brown has made some questionable moves. Letting these players go is not one of them.
Oh yeah. If you were around in the sixties, you know the answer to the question in the title: “What are they good for?”
“Absolutely nothin, say it again.” (From Edwin Starr’s song, “War”)
(For the record, I still say Breggie’s walk-off hit in Game 5 of the 2017 World Series was the greatest moment in Astros History)
So you’re saying let’s trade Pena. Assignment understood captain
Good piece, Bill. I circulated to my old Astros fan buddies.
Who we really miss is Dubie.