Forrest Whitley has seen his share of ups and downs throughout his career to this point.
The Houston Astros added him to the 40-man roster in November 2020, but the former top prospect dealt with injuries, a suspension and a lost season to the COVID-19 pandemic, which knocked Whitley off course from contributing to the big league club.
In 2024, the Astros made a change with Whitley, moving him permanently to the bullpen for the first time in his career. This decision paid off as the righty posted a 1.89 ERA with 45 strikeouts in 33.1 innings at Triple-A and collected 5 strikeouts in 3.1 scoreless innings with the big league club.
Due to a roster crunch at the major league level, Whitley was optioned back to Triple-A. But with his help, the Space Cowboys kept winning, and the strong bullpen carried them to the Pacific Coast League Championship.
“It’s been awesome,” Whitley said. “You don’t get a group like this in Triple-A all the time.. I’ve been at this level for quite some time. And to do it with Mickey [Storey] too, who’s been my Triple-A manager all the way through, it’s just been absolutely amazing. I can’t say enough about this group.”
Whitley was one of the many Space Cowboys players that spent some time with the big league club. More than 25 players on the Sugar Land roster this year had some major league time with the Astros in 2024. But the club was able to maintain their high level of play winning 93 games in the regular season.
“It just kind of came together, I can’t really draw it up any other way than that,” Whitley said about the team chemistry. “This team meshes so good, that’s so rare. We kind of joked about it all year we’re the 31st big league team. We’re a good team and we showed it this series.”
Mickey Storey, the manager of the Space Cowboys, and Whitley have spent a lot of time together. Storey has been the manager of the Astros Triple-A affiliate since 2019. During that time, Whitley has spent time with the pitching staff on Storey’s teams in 2019, 2022, 2023 and 2024. They were also together on the Buies Creek Astros in 2017, though this season was the most success they had together.
“It’s what it’s all about. All of our careers unfolding. In the minors it’s a special situation.. players are in the minors but so are the coaches,” Whitley said. “To see Mickey have the success with this team, it means the world to me and I know it means the world to him.”
Storey knew how important this moment was for a lot of the players. Not only the guys who have spent years in the system or have been in multiple organizations, but also for the young players trying to build a winning culture.
“Special,” Storey said on winning this Championship. “To get these guys back to experiencing this and feeling what it feels like to celebrate winning and be a part of something special.. it’s been an unbelievable year.”
Whitley knows there is still more work to be done though.
“Job’s not done yet, we still got a win to take care of and we are looking forward to it,” he said.
This weekend, Sugar Land will travel to Las Vegas to take on Omaha for the Triple-A Championship. Through the ups and downs of his career, Whitley has maintained a positive attitude and continued to show up every day. This season, everything has came together for him with his MLB debut and now a Pacific Coast League Championship.
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