{"id":111185,"date":"2025-12-24T10:05:57","date_gmt":"2025-12-24T15:05:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/?p=111185"},"modified":"2025-12-24T10:05:57","modified_gmt":"2025-12-24T15:05:57","slug":"astros-adding-new-pitchers-astros","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/2025\/12\/24\/astros-adding-new-pitchers-astros\/","title":{"rendered":"The Astros are Adding New Pitchers to the Roster in Different Ways"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Houston Astros face a critical offseason as they aim to return to the postseason. While health is always important, the Astros must rebuild their pitching staff<\/a>. Although the Astros have added new pitchers such as Mike Burrows<\/a>, Nate Pearson, and Ryan Weiss,<\/a> much more work is needed.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The Astros are Adding New Pitchers to the Roster in Different Ways<\/h2>\n

New Astros Pitchers<\/h3>\n

The major league Rule Five draft took place in December and gave the Astros another opportunity to add pitching. Houston has typically stayed quiet in the major league portion of the Rule Five draft. The last time the Astros made a selection in that category came in 2017, when they chose Texas Rangers left-hander Anthony Gose, who was cut during spring training.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Astros 2025 Rule Five Selection<\/h3>\n

After eight seasons, the Astros made a major league Rule Five selection. They picked Cincinnati Reds right-hander Roddery Mu\u00f1oz.<\/a> This is a unique pick because Mu\u00f1oz already has a good amount of significant league experience. He appeared in 27 big league games.<\/p>\n

The 25-year-old made his MLB debut back in March of 2024 for the Miami Marlins and pitched in 18 games, starting 17. Mu\u00f1oz has a substantial number of innings under his belt, which is especially unusual for a Rule Five pick. He threw 82.2 innings in 2024 but struggled to a 6.53 ERA and a 2-7 record.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The 6-foot-2, 210-lb righty managed to play in nine MLB games for the St. Louis Cardinals this past season, but finished with an 8.18 ERA across 11 innings. With his struggles, Mu\u00f1oz most recently pitched for the Cardinals’ Triple-A team, the Memphis Redbirds.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

He spent most of 2025 in Memphis, appearing in 38 games. Mu\u00f1oz threw 57.2 innings with a 3.28 ERA and had a 4-3 record. While he has bounced between organizations, the experience is there with 393.2 minor league<\/a> and 93.2 major league innings pitched. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The Plan for Mu\u00f1oz<\/h3>\n

Teams primarily used Mu\u00f1oz as a starter, but he was limited to the bullpen last season. The Astros plan to keep him there. Ideally, Houston wants to deploy Mu\u00f1oz as another option for the back of the bullpen. Mu\u00f1oz has a strong fastball that reaches 96 mph and an above-average 27.5% strikeout rate<\/a> in 2025.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

While he was primarily a fastball pitcher last season, Mu\u00f1oz has shifted more to his breaking stuff. His slider and cutter usage jumped nearly 10% from 2024 to 2025. Mu\u00f1oz now uses those two pitches just over 60% of the time. The Astros management likes<\/a> the upside and his breaking ball. After moving to a full-time relief role, Mu\u00f1oz turned the corner in Triple-A with a 0.82 ERA in September. He gave up just one earned run and 14 strikeouts in 11 innings.<\/p>\n

The Status of the Astros Bullpen<\/h3>\n

If Houston develops him during spring training, there is a good chance he can be a real contributor. The Astros added Pearson to a cheap, one-year deal earlier this offseason, and he\u2019ll likely be in the bullpen as well. Houston also typically doesn\u2019t jump into the Korean Baseball Organization player pool for MLB, but they did earlier this month for Weiss, who will battle for a rotation spot. If Weiss falls short, he could also be a bullpen option.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Besides Josh Hader<\/a> and Bryan Abreu, the Astros are searching for a couple of other reliable arms<\/a>. While Bennett Sousa looked solid before his injury, the others have been inconsistent.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Besides Burrows, the Astros have been creative in upgrading their pitchers, given their financial situation. The large contracts of star players, Jim Crane\u2019s refusal to exceed the luxury tax, plus rising arbitration and potential costs for young players, have tightened the budget. General manager Dana Brown and the club are still finding different ways to improve the pitching staff.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The Astros must keep Mu\u00f1oz on their 26-man roster for the entire 2026 season and pay the Reds $100,000 or place him on waivers if it doesn\u2019t work out.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Main Photo Credits: John E. Sokolowski-Imagn Images<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Houston Astros face a critical offseason as they aim to return to the postseason. While health is always important, the Astros must rebuild their pitching staff. Although the Astros have added new pitchers such as Mike Burrows, Nate Pearson, and Ryan Weiss, much more work is needed.\u00a0 The Astros are Adding New Pitchers to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5612,"featured_media":111203,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[14,1071],"tags":[28759,1385],"class_list":["post-111185","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-astros","category-mlb","tag-mike-burrows","tag-nate-pearson"],"modified_by":"Evan Mazza, Site Editor","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111185","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5612"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=111185"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111185\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":111205,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111185\/revisions\/111205"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/111203"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=111185"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=111185"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=111185"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}