The Astros have dragged themselves back to the top of the AL West, but that hasn’t necessarily put Dana Brown on safer ground.
Houston entered Thursday at 59-57, sitting in first place after a long climb and still carrying obvious roster questions. The record is hardly polished, yet the turnaround gives Brown at least some evidence that he’s doing the job he was hired to do. Whether that will matter to Jim Crane is another question entirely.
That’s the uncomfortable part for Brown: this is not the first time Houston has watched a front office boss do enough to keep the machine running, only to discover that wasn’t enough to keep the chair. James Click won a World Series, reached the playoffs in all three of his seasons, and helped deliver the second-most wins in franchise history in 2022.
Six days after the title parade, the Astros and Click split because he would not accept a one-year offer. A championship, 106 wins and a ring didn’t buy him long-term security.
Brown is now operating in a similar setup. Crane said before the season that there had been no extension talks with Brown or manager Joe Espada, and both are in the final year of their original contracts. Crane also said the plan was to evaluate things after the season.
“I think we’ll go through this year like we also do, evaluate it, and then make the decision at the end of the year,” Crane said.
That line sounds routine enough on its own. In Houston, though, it lands differently because of how the Click situation played out.
The trade deadline didn’t exactly strengthen Brown’s case, either. Houston brought in Daulton Varsho and little else that moved the needle.
Brown defended the lack of pitching additions by pointing to the returns of Ronel Blanco and Hayden Wesneski as if they counted as deadline acquisitions. Blanco, however, has not been good in any of his three starts back, which makes that explanation look less like a solution and more like a cover for inactivity.
And then there was the reported deal that never happened. Crane reportedly shut down a nearly completed trade that would have sent Bryan Abreu to Minnesota for Trevor Larnach, a left-handed outfield bat the Astros had discussed.
It wasn’t a splashy move, but it was the kind of sensible one that might have addressed a roster need. When the owner is personally stepping in to veto the GM’s work, it doesn’t exactly suggest smooth sailing behind the scenes.
Before the deadline, rival executives told USA Today’s Bob Nightengale that they believed Crane had already decided on Brown, according to a report that was making the rounds well before the deadline came and went. If that read is right, then Brown’s results over the final stretch may not change anything. That would put him in a familiar spot for an Astros general manager, even if Click at least got to hold the trophy before the door hit him.
None of this automatically means Brown can’t do the job. He inherited a roster with issues tied to Crane’s own free-agent mistakes, and by and large he has stabilized things.
But the standard in Houston is not stability. It’s much higher than that.
Click reached the highest possible standard and still didn’t get the long-term deal. First place in August in a weak AL West may not be enough to convince Crane to do something he has shown no interest in discussing.
So the Astros keep doing what they’ve done for years: treating championships like the minimum entry fee, not a cushion. Getting back to first place after a bad start helps Brown’s case in baseball terms. It may not help him in the only terms that really matter.
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Cristian Javier was back on the mound for just his third start since returning from injury, and the outing was encouraging only in the sense that he got through five innings. He still allowed four earned runs, which left Houston chasing the game after Jackson Merrill and Fernando Tatis Jr. delivered the kind of timely swings that have made the difference in close games. With a second straight series loss now on the books, the Astros are suddenly staring at a post-break slide they cannot afford to brush off. [Read more 🡒]