The Astros Dynasty Continues To FALL After Trading Kyle Tucker

Another year, another Astro star player leaving that status and taking his talents elsewhere. I feel like this is an annual thing at this point, or maybe not annual. It seems to happen like every two years or something like that. So maybe not annually, but what would you call something occurring every other year, whatever? I don't know. But Kyle Tucker is no longer a Houston Astro. And although his fate ended similarly to a lot of the other Astro stars over the last several years, his situation is actually an anomaly because he was traded. And I'll get to the with the way the Astro season just came to an end. Anticlimactically getting dusted by the Tigers without seemingly much of a fight. And here the Astros only made the playoffs anyway, because of how disgustingly weak their division was. Does this trade really signify the end of the Houston Astros dynasty? The one that began in 2017? Really quick, if you're part of the 59% of viewers not subscribed yet, go ahead and hit that button if you enjoy the videos. As it began with Garrett Cole, although I'd say even in hindsight, it was never a bad thing to let him go to let him sign a historic contract with the Yankees. Yeah, Cole is of course a monster, but did they ever really need to spend 300 plus million dollars for him when they had plenty other talented arms in the rotation? Yeah, like I don't think so. So whatever. And then it was George Springer. And well, you could even justify that a lot by saying, yeah, Springer was great. No denying that. But do you really need to pay him what the Blue Jays gave them when they had Kyle Tucker and Jordan Alvarez ready to take over? And like letting Cole go, letting Springer go worked out. But then it was Carlos Correa, and this is when you start to get into the conversation of was it a true mistake to let this guy go? Right when it happened, it didn't seem like it, especially to Astros fans. Correa leaves, Jeremy Pena slots right in at shortstop, wins ALCS, and World Series MVP, being a part of another Astros championship. Wow, that turned out perfect, right? Well, it doesn't look great right now. Pena's rookie year wasn't anything special anyway, at least for the way he was in the regular season. But you can look at that and go, OK, it's his first ever season. He showed up in the playoffs. Now we go. But he hasn't gone anywhere since 2022. Pena hasn't been good. His bat has only been worse in 2023 and 2024. Look, he doesn't have to be some insane hitter, but we're now getting to the point where we kind of know the player Pena is, a very average bat with little power that you hope gives you good defense at shortstop. But for some reason, even that was bad this past year. His defensive range was good his first two seasons, but then that plummeted in 2024. He was a fast base runner. That was really just about the only really good thing Pena provided. While Correa had, yeah, an injury-plague season, sure, but he was great. Now, should the Astros have given Correa $30 million a year for however many years? I don't know. But their shortstop production has most definitely been bad since Correa left. But not just that. Correa was also, you could argue, the heart and soul of that Astros clubhouse. Or at least he shared that with Altuve. I mean, Correa seemed to be that guy where if he starts talking, you listen. He seems to be that with the Twins. He, of course, was that in Houston. So Cole and Springer are one thing that you can easily justify. But Correa, especially now, looks to be more of a tough one to lose. Now, like I said with Tucker, though, his departure is different because it's via a trade. The Astros have been perfectly okay with letting their big guns walk in free agency without trading them for prospects. Now, a big reason for that is because they were in the midst of World Series runs when Cole and Correa were about to hit free agency. Springer they should have traded, but whatever. They didn't. And again, they've just shown they're okay with not trading these guys and not getting anything for them when they leave. But now they've traded Tucker and they've done it before next year. Well, he has one year left before free agency. And I'll commend the Astros for at least deciding to make a trade this time to get players back rather than nothing when Tucker inevitably doesn't sign with them. But my question is, why trade Tucker at all? I mean, I understand why. I think I just disagree with it. Kyle Tucker has been arguably baseball's most unappreciated player over the last several years. He's really, really good. He did miss more than half of his last season because he was hurt. But before getting hurt, he was incredible for all of April and May. He got hurt early June. I mean, we're talking MVP level hitting. He came back to play the last month of the season and was even better. His defense at times has been great too, but the hitting alone is what makes him so great. The fact that he doesn't strike out much, he gets on base a lot, hits for power. I mean, he's been a top overall hitter in baseball for four years now, period. Tucker, to me, has always been a guy I feel like the Astros should pay up for. I know they're not a franchise that's known for paying massive contracts, but I don't know. Him and Jordan Alvarez for sure seem to be those guys they should really be locking up. And Alvarez, they did fortunately strike a nice deal with. I mean, talk about a star. He's insane. And they have him for four more years unless they decide to trade him at some point. Altuve is locked up. He was always going to be an Astro for life, but Altuve is also about to enter his age 35 season. Tucker is 28, but they decided to move on and get pieces for him. And this is the return from Chicago. Third baseman Isak Perades, right-handed pitcher Hayden Wisneski, and the Cubs' 2024 first-round draft pick Cam Smith, another infielder. Smith's obviously the most valuable part of the return. Wisneski seems like a guy the Astros see they can work with to become a stud, which seems realistic. The Astros have proven really good at working with pitching and making pitchers better. And then Perades is the big league ready hitter. Perades to me is the perfect example of Tampa Bay Rays' sloppy seconds, a player who the Rays got the most out of, and when they realize they can get something for him, they train him away and he's never as good. The Rays are so good at doing that. Austin Meadows, Joey Wendell, etc. He was just traded to the Cubs not that long ago, and now he's traded to Houston. Perades is very poll-happy, which can play well at Minute Maid or, sorry, Dakin Park, but he doesn't hit the ball hard. At all. He's young with tons of years left of team control, but all that other stuff is concerning. An interesting little tidbit on this trade is the report that the Astros' owner Jim Crane didn't want to make a trade with the Yankees, who are another team that wanted Tucker, so he wanted any reason to deny Yankees' offer of players for Tucker and took the Cubs' deal instead, which was just about even with the Yankees' offer. I guess he just really hates the Yankees. Obviously, the two have a rivalry. I mean, it's pretty one-sided, but yeah. I just don't really fully see the future for the Astros right now. They don't seem to fully know what they're doing, and I know that's easy to say from the outside looking in, but I said this when the trade for Yusei Kikuchi happened at the trade deadline. Why would they trade young prospects for half a season of Yusei Kikuchi? That to me never made any sense. I don't care how good he was after the trade. You're talking about a guy who is literally two months away from hitting the free market. You could have just waited to pay money for him if you really wanted him that bad and still keep all the young guys you traded away for in order to get him in the process. Or you use those guys to get someone else. And now guess what? You don't have any of them now because Kikuchi signed a deal with the Angels, so nice going. Like, that's so stupid. That alone to me is beyond worrisome, to see how the Astros are going to operate moving forward in a future that just doesn't look very bright. At least right now it doesn't. What's next? Well, they apparently plan on keeping Framber Valdez. That's a name that's been thrown around that they could trade, but according to the Astros, they plan on keeping him. Although they're still going to listen in on potential trades for players, and they also believe they can compete for the AL West title, which that's of course what they're going to say. The owner, Jim Crane, and general manager, Dana Brown, aren't going to be like, yeah, expect zero winning now. We're going to suck. Sorry about it. Like, of course they're going to say they're going to win, but what it looks like is a whole different story than what the words say. And with Kyle Tucker now becoming yet another key Astros star to leave, even if it's via a trade, it's still a big loss and continuation of what I see as the fall of the Houston Astros dominance we've seen for seven years now. Let me know what you think about this, and thank you for watching.