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During Wednesday night's MLB Tonight Jeff Luhnow was asked a very interesting question about the Astros future.
Before we get to that, Luhnow was asked about Derek Jeter and the recent announcement that he'll retire after this season. Luhnow responded as you would expect he would and wrapped up his response with, "he's one of the greatest shortstops of all-time." In my head he said:
Did you know that Jeff Bagwell has a higher career WAR than Derek Jeter. /dropmic
My vendettas aside, the Jeter question was really just a setup for Al Leiter to ask who Luhnow thought his core four would be 10 years from now. Luhnow responded with Carlos Correa, George Springer, Mark Appel and essentially a player to be named later. With the depth of the farm system he said that it could be any number of guys, "Domingo Santana, Max Stassi, Jason Castro." Carlos Rodon, no wait, he didn't say Carlos Rodon. But it is certainly possible that after this year Rodon or someone else drafted with the first pick could make Luhnow's "Core Four" list*.
*not that there's some kind of special list that Luhnow carries with him and puts under his pillow at night.
It's an interesting thought exercise because not only is the fourth spot left open, but there's a good chance that one of the other three don't live up to expectations and that someone not named exceeds expectations. Having a core four that sticks together is rare, heck having even two stick together is rare, but for this exercise lets say Correa, Springer and Appel meet expectations and are the faces of the franchise for the next 10 years. And there is in fact a fourth. Who's the fourth?
Is it someone in the system or someone? Mike Foltynewicz, Preston Tucker, Jon Singleton, Lance McCullers, Micheal Feliz,
Is it someone not yet in the system, Rodon maybe?
