Dana Brown at the Helm

The Kyle Tucker trade indicates that Dana Brown is the primary baseball decision maker for the Astros. I'm skeptical that he made the right decision, but glad he's making them, rather than Jim Crane.

Ever since it became known that James Click was in the last year of this contract sometimes during the 2022 season, a big question has been how much power to make baseball decisions does the General Manager actually have and how much is possessed by Jim Crane himself?

It was Crane’s choice to offer James Click a below market contract offer designed to be turned down, to install himself as head of baseball operations for the 2022-23 offseason, to hire Dana Brown—with his different baseball background from Crane’s other general managers—and his decision to listen to advisers such as Jeff Bagwell and Reggie Jackson—excellent players who lacked any background in front office decision making.

I have tracked the question of the relative power of Crane and Brown frequently, because one of the most important questions for a baseball franchise is who is actually making the decisions. And has seemed to have greater influence than most owners, even after hiring Brown.

The trade of Kyle Tucker seems to be a decision made primarily by Dana Brown, and thus, a sign that he is—possibly for the first time in his two years on the job—the man most in charge of making baseball decisions for the franchise.

Building Trust With Jim Crane

Chandler Rome of The Athletic wrote a column this week arguing that Brown’s tenure “will be defined” by the Tucker trade. To me, the most relevant part was different, with Rome noting “that Brown convinced Crane to execute this plan is another example of the trust he’s built with an owner who can be difficult to work under.”

I found this important for two reasons. First, it is the type of relationship that is typical in the major league front office. Baseball decisions are made by the baseball operations department and the owner defers to those decisions.

Obviously, an owner is still influential in baseball decisions, especially in setting a team’s budget. A big part of that for Crane is his unwillingness to sign long-term contracts for free agents, something I have dubbed the “five year rule.” A market rate contract to extend Tucker would have been for longer than Crane prefers. Brown may have made the decision to trade Tucker and which deal to accept, but Crane set the parameters through his financial decision-making power.

Second, and most important, is that Rome notes Crane’s comfort with Brown. Why Crane did not “trust” James Click remains a mystery two years after Click left, but we know that “trust” and “comfort” is important to Crane. If 106 wins and a World Series title don’t bring trust and comfort, nothing will.

Crane’s discomfort with Click prompted him to start listening to advisers such as Jeff Bagwell and Reggie Jackson. In his first year as GM, Brown seemed one of a number of important decision makers in a spokes-on-a-wheel type organizational chart.

Over the last six months, with the trade for Yusei Kikuchi and the trade of Kyle Tucker, Brown seems to have more influence. One piece of evidence of that increased influence is that Jackson has stepped down from an official role with the Astros.

Broadly, I am still skeptical that Dana Brown is a top-tier general manager, though the ranks of those are quite small. And the news that he is trying to get Nolan Arenado and the three remaining years on his contract only add to that.

But I I do want is for Brown to make the baseball decisions for the team. He is steeped his life in baseball scouting and front office decision making and sits on top of team of people who have done the same. He has not spent most of his adult life running an air logistics business or making personal appearances living off of his name. Front office experience is no guarantee of good baseball decision making. But I trust it more than any other type of experience.

An Unusual Trade For This Era

The other reason to believe that the Tucker trade is Brown’s influence is that it is a different type of trade than the Astros have made in Jim Crane’s tenure as owner. But it is not a different type of trade to a veteran Astros fan. It is a Drayton McClane type of trade.

When McClane owned the Astros, the team frequently traded players like Ken Caminiti, Steve Finley, and Mike Hampton before they left in free agency to gain some value from them.

The Jim Crane era Astros had never done such a trade, allowing players like Dallas Keuchel, Gerrit Cole, George Springer, and Carlos Correa play out their final season before free agency for the Astros. One should note that list includes players from the tenures of both Jeff Luhnow and James Click as general manager.

Brown has made a different choice than his immediate predecessors. Part of that choice may be his different analysis of the Astros strengths and weaknesses. Part of that may be Brown’s faith in his scouting abilities. And part of that almost certainly is the different place of the Astros on the success cycle at the current moment.

In recent seasons, the Astros entered the year as one of the favorites to reach the World Series and keeping star level players increased the chances of winning it all. The current day Astros are one of several good American League teams, but probably not the best in the league entering the season.

More importantly, the Astros were able to withstand the losses of Keuchel, Cole, Springer, and Correa in large part because they developed star level replacements in Framber Valdez, Cristian Javier, Kyle Tucker, and Jeremy Pena. At the moment, it is unclear if any Astros minor leaguer will develop into anything more than an average major leaguer. And a team of average players cannot truly compete for a division title.

Brown made a different decision than his predecessors because the franchise is in a different state than has been. Change happens, including the development of more power from Dana Brown. That puts the franchise in a better place than when the owner was more influential on baseball decisions.

I am skeptical that Dana Brown has made the right decision for the team, but I’m glad he’s the one making the decisions over the viable alternatives.