The Houston Astros entered play on Thursday six games atop the AL West as they look to bolster their roster for a postseason run. Between both leagues, there are 17 teams who are either in playoff spots or within three games of one, so it’s a sellers market ahead of the July 31 trade deadline. But the good news for the Astros is they’re the perfect team to buy low on a starter with a lot of potential.
Taj Bradley was the top prospect in the Rays’ organization when he made his debut in 2023. Since then he’s been a reliable, if below average, right-handed starter. He’s made at least 21 starts in each of his first three MLB seasons with a combined 4.70 ERA, and his last start had the Rays sending him to Triple-A Durham for a reset. Bradley made it through just 1.2 innings, walking three and giving up four earned runs, including a home run. Which would have been bad enough, were it not also coming against the offensively challenged Chicago White Sox.
Still just 24 years old, Bradley’s best days are clearly still ahead of him, and the Astros have a chance to get him while his stock is low.
The Rays are only 1.5 games back of the last AL Wild Card spot, so it’s still unclear if they’re going to be buyers or sellers. With a week until the trade deadline, every result will have massive implications for the direction the team takes at the deadline, and their willingness to give up Bradley. But you can never really tell with the Rays. They might win every game this week and still be sellers, especially considering how much pitching depth they have in their system.
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Why the Astros are the team to fix Taj Bradley
Just last year, the Astros traded for a struggling starter and turned his season around. Yusei Kikuchi had a 4.75 ERA with the Toronto Blue Jays when he went to Houston at last year’s deadline in exchange for three prospects in a move that confused everyone. He had a 2.70 ERA in his 10 regular-season starts after the trade.
So what changed? The Astros saw that Kikuchi’s slider was his most effective pitch, so they told him to throw it more. Just by throwing his most effective pitch more often, Kikuchi was able to become an incredibly effective starter. Now with the Los Angeles Angels, Kikuchi has carried that new pitch mix over to this season and just made the All-Star team while throwing more sliders than fastballs.
Bradley’s worst pitch statistically, like Kikuchi, is his fastball. Batters are hitting .277 against Bradley’s heater. Despite the fact that the average and expected batting average against this fastball have remained pretty consistent throughout his career, his fastball usage actually went up this year. Not only that, but it’s getting hit hard, with eight of his 13 home runs allowed being on fastballs.
But like Kikuchi, Bradley has an excellent breaking ball that he’s probably not using as much as he should. Batters are only hitting .104 against his curveball this season, and he’s only given up one extra base hit on that pitch. He’s increased his curveball usage this year, but it’s still at just 13.9 percent.
It’s not a perfect apples-to-apples comparison because it’s a lot harder to imagine a pitcher throwing more curveballs than fastballs, but there are definitely improvements the Astros could make with Bradley’s pitch mix. Behind Framber Valdez and Hunter Brown, the Astros rotation has been a bit of an adventure as the team deals with an almost comical run of injuries, and they would love to have a guy like Bradley who makes his starts and pitches a lot of innings.