Yes, we know that this is taking a while!

As many of you know, we at Notinhalloffame.com are slowly generating the top 50 of each major North American sports team. That being said, we have existing Top 50 lists and consistently look to update them when necessary and based on necessity. As such, we are delighted to present our post-2024 revision of our top 50 Houston Astros.

As for all of our top 50 players in baseball, we look at the following: 

1.  Advanced Statistics.

2.  Traditional statistics and how they finished in the American League.

3.  Playoff accomplishments.

4.  Their overall impact on the team and other intangibles that are not reflected in a stat sheet.

Please note that our algorithm has changed, which yielded minor changes throughout the baseball lists.

Last year, the Astros expectedly returned to the postseason but were dismissed in two games in the Wildcard by the Houston Astros.  There was one new entry and three significant elevations.

As always, we present our top five, which saw no changes.

1. Jeff Bagwell

2. Craig Biggio

3. Jose Altuve

4. Lance Berkman

5. Cesar Cedeno 

You can find the entire list here. 

Of note, Jose Altuve remained at #3, and as good as he has been still has some work to do to surpass Hall of Fame inductee, Craig Biggio for #2.

The elevations were Alex Bregman (#11 to #8), Yordan Alvarez (#27 to #19) and Kyle Tucker (#33 to #23). 

The new entrant is Framber Valdez, who debuts at #31.

We thank you for your continued support of our lists on Notinhalloffame.com.

Framber Valdez signed with the Houston Astros as an International Free Agent in 2015, and three years later he debuted for the club, which seems like the correct progression, but his initial signing at the age of 21 is older than normal than his Dominican counterparts.

Valdez needed time to find his confidence, and in the COVID-shortened 2020 year, he went 5-3 and was 11th in Cy Young voting.  He continued to grow his game in 2021 (11-6), but truly broke out in 2022, earning his first All-Star, with a 17-6 record, 2.82 ERA and was the league-leader in Innings Pitched (201.1).  Valdez finished fifth for the Cy Young that year, but more importantly, went 3-0 in the playoffs and helped Houston win the World Series.

He built on that with a ninth-place Cy Young finish (12-11, 200 SO) and a second All-Star, and last year was ninth in balloting (15-7, 2.91 ERA).

Valdez enters this year still in his peak, and with a three-year streak of top ten Cy Young finishes.