Well, the other shoe dropped and Hunter Pence was finally traded, and it turns out he's going to some familiar surroundings. Late Friday night, the Astros and Philadelphia Phillies agreed to send Hunter Pence to Philadelphia for four prospects, including two Top 50 guys in first baseman/left fielder Jonathan Singleton and right-handed pitcher Jarred Cosart.

The Astros will also get two more players, but not very substantial pieces (read: relievers) and we'll probably know their names as the night progresses. That means the players will not be last year's draft picks, most likely.

Pence was pulled from Friday's game with the Brewers and was somewhat emotional as he told his teammates good bye. He's going to a Philadelphia team with a couple of former Astros that he played with in Brad Lidge and Roy Oswalt. Pence will also provide an upgrade offensively over currentl Phillies right fielder Domonic Brown in the short-term.

It's the third big-time trade Ed Wade has done with Philadelphia, and this time, it centered on some very big name prospects. Both Cosart and Singleton are good gets, even if I'm a little more down on them than most people will be. What's your reaction? To me, this is by far better than either of the trades Wade made at last year's deadline, but I'm not sure it was enough for him to keep his job.

There have been a bunch of names being bandied about the past few days as Houston looks to deal Hunter Pence and at least 50 billion other players before the trade deadline Sunday. To bring some order to the Twitter chaos, let's look at some of the prospects in play so you can be a little more familiar with who they are.

From the Phillies: 

Domonic Brown, outfield - The No. 4 overall prospect ranked by Baseball America before the season, Brown hasn't shown much in the little major league exposure he's gotten so far. He's seen the most playing time this season, when he's hit .247/.338/.399 in 204 plate appearances. His strongest tool is his arm in right field, but the rest of his tools grade out very similarly to Hunter Pence. He's got the ability to hit around .300 with 20-25 home runs and decent speed. The one big difference between Brown and Pence is that Brown may have a much better walk rate, as he's posted numbers over 12 percent in the minors in the past and is at 10.7 percent for his major league career. The Phillies would be crazy to trade him.

Jonathan Singleton, first base - The big first baseman is three inches shorter than Brown and 15 pounds heavier at 6-foot-2 and 215, but he's got more power potential. He had his breakout season last summer when his name was bandied about in all the Roy Oswalt deals. That power hasn't translated this season in the minors, but his walk rate has remained strong. His strikeout rate also jumped up this season while his isolated power dropped below .150 for the first time as a pro. Scouts continue to suggest that the power is there, it will just take some time to develop. Singleton is still just 19 years old, so he's got a bright future if he keeps developing. I'm sure the Astros goal would be to pair him with George Springer and DDJ in the lower minors, instead of finding someone for the Keuchel, Martinez, Altuve group.

Jarred Cosart, right-handed pitcher - A League City native, Cosart could be a fan favorite pretty quickly. Just 21 years old, he'd also quickly become the top pitching prospect in Houston's system. The 6-foot-3, 180 pound righty had a lot of success at Low A last season, but saw a bit of a regression with his K rate and an increase in walk rate in High A ball. That's also corresponded with a rise in his ERA over the past month, but the good thing is that Cosart has been healthy for the entire season. Health is the only real knock on him, as his stuff profiles as a front of the rotation starter. He's got a fastball that sits mid to high 90's with a solid curve and a developing change. Basically, he's got the stuff of a young Roy Oswalt.

Trevor May, right-handed pitcher - Depending on how you evaluate prospects, May's 2011 season may have him leap-frogging over Cosart as the second-best pitcher in the Phillies system. He started 14 games at High A Clearwater last season to mixed results (mainly due to a 7.89 BB/9 rate). This season, he's done much, much better. May's maintained his K/9 rate above 11 for the past few seasons and dropped his walk rate to 4.03. His FIP is also down to 2.77 this season. His fastball doesn't have the same velocity as Cosart's, but it still sits in the low to mid 90's. His curve and change has potential, but are not as polished or as consistent as Cosart's. The big thing with May appears to be consistency. If he can repeat his delivery, his control will get better. 

From the Braves: 

Mike Minor, left-handed pitcher - A Top 50 pitching prospect, Minor was a favorite to win a spot in this Braves rotation, but was beaten out in spring training by Brandon Beachy. Minor hasn't done poorly in the meantime, with solid strikeout numbers, a sterling ERA and good control. Plus, he's generating plenty of ground balls, which is always a plus. At this point, he'd be ready to step in immediately to Houston's rotation beside Jordan Lyles. 

Tyler Pastornicky, shortstop -  The 14th best prospect in the Braves system, Pastornicky fits a lot of what the Astros seem to look for in a prospect. He's got speed up the middle, a little pop and should stick at shortstop. The only problem here is that Atlanta acquired Pastornicky last season in the deal with the Blue Jays for Alex Gonzalez and is their most advanced shortstop prospect.

A little while before Jeff Keppinger was traded to the San Francisco Giants for pitching prospects Henry Sosa and Jason Stoffel, I had written an article about his value, concluding that Kepp was worth about $11.1 million in surplus value. That means, the amount of production Houston could expect get from him, less his salary, meant he was still a very valuable player, even if he profiled more as a bench player on a contender.

What kind of value did Houston get for Kepp?

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We've got the first requested trade scenario, this one coming from our own Sean Feist (aka native_astro). The reason I chose this one out of his (many) suggestions was that it gave us a chance to look both at a player and team we hadn't reviewed before. By going over Bourn's value with the Atlanta Braves, we'd be rehashing a system we've already discussed, so this provides a few new pieces we didn't have.

Thinking about Bourn, his value below turns out to be almost as high as Pence and should fetch just as high a price on the trade market. Of course, as I also discuss below, the Astros will probably not get full value for him. 

The Giants have been one of the more active members in trade rumors, as they look for ways to upgrade their offense again this season. I'm sure Scott Boras would also like this move, as it'd get his client on a team that will get more exposure in the playoffs, so there are plenty of reasons this makes sense. It's also likely that Bourn will be in play this trading deadline, though it's an open question if Wade will pull the trigger on him.

With that said, onto the analysis...

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This is the first of two pieces on various trade scenarios this week. Today, we're looking at sending one Jeff Keppinger to the Cleveland Indians, thus fixing their lineup troubles. There are problems with this scenario, just like the last two, but before I lay those out, I'll say that Friday, we're going to have another one of these. It's going to be a suggestion from another writer on the site, native_astro, and I wanted to reiterate that I'm open to suggestions. Like many of you suggested, I'll try and update the Braves scenario with just Bourn, but in the meantime, if you have any ideas, feel free to email them to thecrawfishboxes@gmail.com

On to the Cleveland Indians...In case you only paid attention to the Futures Game for Jose Altuve, the U.S. Team's second baseman Jason Kipnis hit a home run and generally looked great. He's also hitting .297/.380/.506 for the Cleveland Indians Triple-A affiliate. The natural question to ask is why would Cleveland trade for Keppinger to man second base if they could just bring up Kipnis?

That's the main problem with this scenario, but doesn't entirely rule it out. After all, the Indians need some offensive help, and Kepp could play the role of super sub pretty well. After the jump, we'll break down what he might be worth and what the Astros could get for him...

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Another week, another trade scenario to kick around for the Houston Astros. This time, we're trying to spin Hunter Pence off to the Atlanta Braves.

There have been no definitive rumors linking the two teams, but there is ample evidence that a match can be found. First of all, MLB Trade Rumors does not list the Braves as one of the teams looking for an upgrade in right field, but they do list them under the center field-needy teams. In fact, the entire Braves outfield could use an upgrade as Hunter Pence would be a substantial move up from all of Martin Prado,Jordan Schaefer, Nate McLouth and even Jason Heyward.

The Braves would probably not move Heyward off of right field even if they acquired Pence, so he'd have to play center or left, with Schaefer moving to center. I'm not sure that's much of an upgrade, but Pence has played center before and wouldn't have quite as difficult an area to cover as he did in MMP. This trade scenario ultimately will come down to two things: can the Braves justify adding an impact bat to possibly get to the World Series and can the Astros part with untouchable Pence?

This is about as improbable a scenario as you'll find, but for the sake of this article, we'll break down whether the Braves need Pence and if any of those trades make sense...

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I was going to write something similar to what Brian McTaggart already did, looking at where the Astros stand at midseason. But, that thought depressed me too much to go through with it. Instead, I was very intrigued by this report by Fox Sports' Jon Paul Morosi, talking about what the Detroit Tigers are thinking in terms of trades.

See, Detroit recently took over the lead in the American League Central, after the once-front running Cleveland Indians have regressed a bit. Unfortunately, Detroit's rotation is a bit lacking and they're being forced to turn to a "Furbush" to get through the next few weeks. 

Which is exactly why they're looking for pitching right now. Add in that they're also looking for a left-hander and voila! A trade rumor immediately appears. I'm not opposed to Wandy getting traded; in fact, I think he's the most likely candidate. 

So, let's break down what a possible deal with Detroit could look like, in this topsy-turvy world where Ed Wade could be making this his last trade as an Astros GM.

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