Dana Brown’s first three drafts with the Astros have already produced a little bit of everything: a high-upside bat who looks like a real find, a couple of pitchers who have pushed their way into the conversation, and a few picks that have gone the other way fast.
That’s the reality of grading a front office this early, especially when Houston is usually picking in the high 20s and leaning toward college players over the kind of premium high school talent that can take longer to develop. The sample is still small, but some of the outlines are starting to show.
The clearest win so far is Xavier Neyens, last year’s first-round pick and the first high schooler the Astros have taken in the opening round since Forrest Whitley in 2016. He isn’t lighting up the batting average column in Single-A Fayetteville, but the important stuff is there.
Neyens has elite raw power, a walk rate that jumps off the page, and some of the best average exit velocity in the level. His game starts with plate discipline, and that’s the kind of trait that usually holds up even when the average lags behind.
Houston found two more strong returns buried deeper in the 2023 class.
Ethan Pecko, a sixth-round pick who signed for just under $250,000, just earned Pacific Coast League Pitcher of the Month for June after going 3-1 with a 2.48 ERA in four starts. He walked only six and struck out 20, and he led PCL pitchers in ERA, WHIP, and opponent batting average while also throwing enough innings to tie for the league lead. That’s the kind of performance that puts a pitcher squarely in the mix for a big league rotation look.
Then there’s Jackson Nezuh, a 14th-round pick out of Louisiana-Lafayette in 2023. At AA Corpus Christi, he has struck out 80 batters in 65.2 innings.
That follows a 2024 season in which he punched out 105 in 120.1 innings, and 105 in 81.2 innings the year before. Outside draft evaluators have praised the Astros for landing him, and the reason is obvious: the swing-and-miss stuff is real, and that gives him a chance to become one of the system’s few prospects with strong future big league buzz.
But the misses are part of the picture too, and they’re harder to ignore.
Brice Matthews, the 28th overall pick in 2023 out of Nebraska, is the one that stings because of what was available behind him. He has shown flashes, but he’s spent this season around .200 with some power and not much consistency. He’s still young enough to turn it around, but the shine has faded, especially with Kevin McGonigle taken nine picks later and already in position to get MVP votes in his rookie year.
Ryan Forcucci was the 2024 draft’s calculated risk. Houston took the UC San Diego right-hander in the third round and paid him over slot at nearly $1 million even though his elbow had already given out in March of that year and the club knew he might not pitch until 2026.
He didn’t. His best month so far was April, and even that came with seven walks and five strikeouts.
In a tiny sample spread across three games in April, three in May, one in June, and one so far in July, he has a 13.89 ERA in 11.2 innings, with 18 runs on 11 hits, eight strikeouts, and 25 walks.
Alonzo Tredwell rounds out the rough side of the ledger. The 2023 second-rounder was supposed to be Houston’s best early-round hope after Matthews, but the health issues have piled up.
He dealt with a college back injury, had already undergone Tommy John surgery, and now a shoulder issue has knocked him out for 2026. By the time this season ends, he’ll have thrown 157 professional innings across what will be three and a half years.
That said, none of this is locked in stone. These evaluations can change quickly, and these players are still young enough to rewrite the story with a few strong months.
Neyens has already climbed fast, and a player like Walker Janek has seen his stock fall sharply this year alone. For now, though, Brown’s draft record is exactly what it looks like: a mixed bag with a few real hits, some painful misses, and plenty still to be decided.
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