{"id":169377,"date":"2025-07-11T23:51:11","date_gmt":"2025-07-11T23:51:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/169377\/"},"modified":"2025-07-11T23:51:11","modified_gmt":"2025-07-11T23:51:11","slug":"astros-call-up-no-1-prospect-brice-matthews-will-start-him-at-second-base-on-friday","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/169377\/","title":{"rendered":"Astros call up No. 1 prospect Brice Matthews, will start him at second base on Friday"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Houston Astros<\/a> are calling up their No. 1 minor-league prospect to provide a boost for their offense. Second baseman Brice Matthews has been called up from Triple-A Sugar Land and is in the starting lineup for Friday’s matchup<\/a> with the Texas Rangers<\/a>, batting eighth.<\/p>\n

Matthews, 23, was Houston’s 2023 first-round pick (No. 28 overall) out of Nebraska. This season, he has hit .283\/.400\/.476 with 12 doubles, 10 home runs, 39 RBI and 25 stolen bases in 325 plate appearances. Matthews is the Astros’ top prospect, as ranked by MLB.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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He had been selected to play<\/a> in Saturday’s MLB All-Star Futures Game before the call-up.<\/p>\n

Astros manager Joe Espada said the plan is to play Matthews every day, possibly mixing him in at shortstop \u2014 where he played the majority of his college and minor-league career \u2014 in addition to second base.<\/p>\n

“We know he’s a threat on the bases. He’s driving the ball,” Espada told reporters. “I think he brings a dynamic intensity on both sides of the ball to the lineup right now.”<\/p>\n

Strikeouts have been a problem for Matthews, which Espada said he has been working on since the offseason. He has 98 in 269 at-bats this season. Last year, he totaled 108 strikeouts in 287 at-bats as he progressed through each level of the Astros’ system, going from rookie league to Triple-A.<\/p>\n

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As Espada alluded to, Matthews should bring more offense to second base. This season, Houston is getting a collective .223 batting average from the position, fourth-worst in the American League and 24th in MLB. Their .642 OPS at second is fifth-worst in the AL. The Astros moved Jose Altuve<\/a> from second base to left field<\/a> before the season in an effort to prolong his career and add depth to the lineup.<\/p>\n

Matthews will take the active roster spot of outfielder Jake Meyers, who was placed on the 10-day injured list due to a calf strain<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Houston Astros are calling up their No. 1 minor-league prospect to provide a boost for their offense.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":169378,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2389],"tags":[42,5,9027,139,54,3211,452,5918,817,4,69,31709],"class_list":{"0":"post-169377","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-houston-astros","8":"tag-astros","9":"tag-baseball","10":"tag-brice-matthews","11":"tag-houston","12":"tag-houston-astros","13":"tag-houstonastros","14":"tag-jake-meyers","15":"tag-joe-espada","16":"tag-jose-altuve","17":"tag-mlb","18":"tag-texas-rangers","19":"tag-triple-a-sugar-land"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/114837289970621506","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/169377","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=169377"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/169377\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/169378"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=169377"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=169377"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=169377"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}