The Houston Astros are in unfamiliar territory as the All-Star break approaches. Winners of the AL West in five of the last six seasons, the Astros are five games back of first place in the division and would not make the playoffs if the season ended today.

With so many teams in contention as trade season looms, some teams will need to get creative in how they improve their roster. Astros general manager Dana Brown is exploring like-for-like trades with other contending teams. With a logjam of major-league-caliber outfielders on Houston's roster, Brown is open to trading one of them for another bat.

“We’re exploring trading major-league player for major-league player with teams that are contending that make sense,” Brown said. “We have a lot of outfielders right now. If we could move an outfield piece for something that could fill another need, we probably would be interested in doing that. Player for player? Yeah. We have to get creative to open up the market. We’re definitely exploring that.”

The three most likely candidates to be moved, as mentioned by Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic, are Chas McCormick, Jake Meyers and Corey Julks. All three have played significant time with the Astros this season and all have an OPS above .700. Any of them could slot in as a plug-in fourth outfielder on a contending team and could even be full-time starters in the right situation.

Brown is adamant that the Astros will not have a firesale at the deadline, regardless of where Houston stands in a couple of weeks. The Astros will make moves that improve their roster for a run at a second consecutive World Series title.