In about a month, the Houston Astros have a pretty good chance to answer the question: Can a Major League Baseball team make the postseason without employing a general manager?
It used to happen a lot, like 125 years ago, because GMs in MLB didn’t really exist back then. Astros owner Jim Crane could be attempting a pivot to the past.
Despite the Astros being in position to win the AL West, Crane fired GM Dana Brown earlier this week. Brown’s duties, such as they are at this time of the season, are handled by various underlings, reportedly including Hall of Famer Jeff Bagwell. Crane himself will oversee baseball operations, like when the actual landlord comes over to fix leaky plumbing.
In a sense, the Astros are a microcosm of the entire American League. You check to see and, yep, they’re in first or second place. Then you look closer and…
The Astros have been decidedly mediocre in 2026. Never more than three games over .500, sometimes as many as 11 under.
Still, the timing of Brown’s parting was peculiar. Not only could the Astros still make the playoffs this season, but if they did, it would be for the third time since they promoted Brown to GM in January 2023. That’s a pretty good record! The timing of Brown’s hiring was odd, too, considering former GM James Click left just days (or hours?) after the Astros won the World Series because Crane offered him a lousy contract extension.) after the Astros won the World Series because Crane offered him a lousy contract extension.
It makes you wonder if the Astros’ apparent dysfunction — which many organizations admittedly would prefer to the non-winning kind of dysfunction — has more to do with Crane than anyone else.
No matter: Let’s say manager Joe Espada’s team makes the playoffs one way or another. Would they have a chance to win something?
With slugger Yordan Alvarez in the lineup, they might have a puncher’s chance. He’s the best hitter in the AL by a wide margin. Fearsome and patient. But he’s just one man. Remember early in his career when Michael Jordan used to make the NBA playoffs with the Chicago Bulls? The Boston Celtics always seemed sweep the series, but MJ would still drop 63 points. It was fun!
That’s probably the best-case scenario for the Astros, although they’re not quite a one-man-gang like Jordan’s ’86 Bulls. Right-hander Hunter Brown, at his best, is one of the best pitchers in the AL. That could be a win right there. Jeremy Peña, Christian Walker, Isaac Paredes and maybe Jose Altuve make five-ninths of a strong lineup with Alvarez leading.
And Carlos Correa might be an “X” factor come October, if he’s able to recover from an ankle injury which, at first, looked like it would sideline him until 2027. The funny thing is, the Astros taking back Correa, in all of his expensive brittleness, might have been the move that got Brown fired — even if Crane was the authority who signed off on it.
Crane giving the illusion of being a hands-on owner harkens to a time when field managers and owners/team presidents combined to lead baseball ops in every way. The commissioner probably won’t let him go full Ted Turner, but if the Astros won another World Series while operating without a GM, Crane just might fire Espada and put himself in the dugout. Baseball needs a new Connie Mack, he’ll say.
All of that seems like a low-possibility outcome. But looking realistically at the Astros chances isn’t much fun. It’s not them, it’s the AL. League-wide mediocrity covers up a lot of warts.
