The recent trade deadline, along with a couple of interesting posts by rastro and saylinara about how they rank the Astros got me to thinking.  This is usually a dangerous thing, but I was surprised as to where I came out.  Basically, I wondered how I would rank the Astros as far as their overall value to the team if I were the GM .  I'm going to give you my list below, and I'd be very interested in any comments and rankings others might provide.  

I divided the team into 5 categories:

(1) Cornerstones of the team, either now or in the future. Not available for trade.
(2) Keepers - we're better off (in the long run) with them than without them.
(3) Keep 'em or trade 'em, OK players but should be easy enough to replace.
(4) Trade 'em if you can - we're better off without them than with them
(5) Get them outa' here - the sooner the better, no offer refused!

I used the current 25 man roster, plus Pence, Backe, and Everettt, and I left off Biggio, because he's retiring and it hurt when I saw where I'd have to rank one of my all time heroes.  I also omitted Wigginton on the grounds that it's too soon to tell. My rankings are a combination of statistical evaluation plus some gut feel as to what the future development opportunities might be.

So here goes:

Cornerstones: Oswalt, Berkman, Pence, Lee

Keepers: Bruntlett, Lidge, Qualls, Scott, Sampson, Loretta, Lamb, Munson

Keep 'em or trade 'em: Albers, McLemore, Miller, Rodriguez, Burke, Everett, Backe

Trade 'em if you can: Borkowski, Moehler, Williams, Lane, Palmeiro, Ausmus

Get 'em outa' here: Jennings

My major surprise was the relatively low number of players in the last two categories.  Given the disappointment the Astros have provided during the season, I thought the list would be longer.

What does your list look like?