Twins Daily 2026 Top 20 Prospects: #9 Marek Houston, SS

[Adam Friedman]

Image courtesy of William Parmeter

As their 2024 first-round pick, Kaelen Culpepper, broke out in 2025, the Twins continued their draft strategy of many years. The Twins selected a fairly similar prospect in the 2025 first round. They selected Marek Houston, a shortstop out of Wake Forest. Like Culpepper, Houston was selected as a high-floor, right-handed-hitting college prospect who brings a hit over power approach at the plate. 

Despite those similarities, evaluators don’t expect Houston to have the same success at the plate as Culpepper. On the other hand, he’s a sure-fire shortstop who has a slick glove that’s good enough for the majors right now. The question with him is whether he can find a way to produce offensively. 

What’s to Like
The glove is the headliner with Houston. He’s athletic and has a plus arm, profiling as a very good defender at shortstop. In his short time in pro ball in 2026, he’s already put plenty of highlights on his reel. He’s firmly established himself as the best defensive shortstop in the Twins system. If he can hit at any reasonable level, he could be a key feature in the Twins' plans. 

While his bat remains a question, Houston has some qualities to build on. In college, he showed the ability to draw walks at an extremely high rate (15.4% in his last year at Wake Forest) and limit his strikeout rate (15.4% as well). He also added power to his game, popping 15 home runs, to produce a 135 wRC+, setting himself up well for the draft. That power came with Houston gaining 20 pounds, but based on exit velocities, he still has weight to be gained and power to be added. 

In just 12 games at Low-A Fort Myers, he produced, batting .370 with a 150 wRC+.He isn’t going to hit .370. but that is just a display of what to look for with Houston - a high batting average and on-base percentage to pair with great defense. 

What's Not To Like
As discussed, there aren't many questions about Houston’s defense. The question is whether or not the bat can be good enough to get his glove into the lineup. Over just 24 total games, split evenly between Fort Myers and Cedar Rapids, he put up just a .680 OPS - leaving plenty of room for improvement.

Two issues in the offensive profile in that small sample size were that he didn’t walk like he did in the minors and struck out at just an above-average level. To make his offense work, the young shortstop needs to find the approach he had in college. That means controlling the strike zone while limiting strikeouts. 

Improving the approach will help Houston, but he also needs to do more damage when he makes contact. Of his 27 hits, only six were extra for extra bases, and only one of those was a home run. That is backed up by the batted ball data from single-A. Despite hitting .370 at the level, Houston had a horrendous .259 xwOBA, posted a 90th percentile exit velocity of just 96.2 MPH, and pulled the ball in the air at a 12th percentile rate. These are the warts on the offensive side for Houston that he’ll need to clean up to ascend in his first full year at pro ball.

What to Look for in 2026
Houston should get a good run at High-A Cedar Rapids in 2026, where he can show off his defensive chops but also have a chance to show improvement on the offensive side. That would look like getting his approach back to where it was in college, which means striking out and walking at similar rates. That would indicate he might be able to get on base at a rate that, paired with his defense, makes him a valuable big-league contributor. 

For a true breakout that indicates a chance at stardom, the Wake Forest product needs to bring his exit velocities closer to average or above average and find more opportunities to lift the ball to the pull side. If he does this, he’ll start to appear on national Top 100 lists, and Twins fans will start getting very excited about a potential two-way star. 

Houston’s defense gives him a great chance to make the big leagues at some point, but the offense has plenty of questions. Do you expect to see strides in Houston's power in 2026?

View full article

[tarheeltwinsfan]

The Twins desperately need a top of the line fielder at SS. Would a .240 BA with 50 walks and 10 HR per year to go with his top of the line fielding, get the job done?

[Yoke]

39 minutes ago, tarheeltwinsfan said:

The Twins desperately need a top of the line fielder at SS. Would a .240 BA with 50 walks and 10 HR per year to go with his top of the line fielding, get the job done?

If he’s great at fielding, I would definitely take “fine” at the plate. Not for every position, but at SS.

[Steve Lein]

I'm not too worried about Houston adding any power. If he can get on base and put up an OPS around .700 or league-average-ish, there will be plenty of value via his defense. Let him be who he is.

[TJSweens]

48 minutes ago, Steve Lein said:

I'm not too worried about Houston adding any power. If he can get on base and put up an OPS around .700 or league-average-ish, there will be plenty of value via his defense. Let him be who he is.

A league average bat combined with gold glove defense can get you a 10 year run at SS. Especially if Houston is an adept base runner. 

Modern analytics have created one of the biggest copy cat trends in the history of the game. Everything is launch angle and exit velocity now. Some guys just can't hit like that. Trying to "unlock their power" screws them up.

[OregonTwinsFan]

Hopefully he can be an adequate hitter. I have my doubts.

[Road trip]

2 hours ago, tarheeltwinsfan said:

The Twins desperately need a top of the line fielder at SS. Would a .240 BA with 50 walks and 10 HR per year to go with his top of the line fielding, get the job done?

Yes, that would be fine for a defensively elite SS, but that batting line seems really optimistic for Houston.  .240 is league average these days.

Maybe he can become Mark Belanger.  That would be valuable.  Just understand what you are wishing for:  Gold Glove defense with an OPS+ of 68 (that's really bad, btw).

[Cris E]

I don't even think OPS is a good way to evaluate everyone. If a guy does a couple important things really well then you take him as he is.  For example, last year the MLB average was .245/.315/.404 (BA/OBP/SLG), so if a top defensive SS with some baserunning chops hit .230/.350/.300 (OPS+ around 75) he'd be fine in my book but utterly excoriated by most folks. (Only six guys in MLB qualified for the batting title and slugged under .350, and only five were at or below .650 OPS, but only 38 had OBP at or above .350.)  Catchers are in the same special defensive category as far as I'm concerned. 

[DataNerd]

He's a guy who sneaks into the top 100 for me, and I think that the industry as a whole underrates guys who were recently drafted.  Houston was ranked 15th by MLB, was drafted 16th and got the 16th highest bonus, so it's pretty safe to view him as the 15-16th highest guy in the class.  If we look at the current MLB Top 100 prospects, there are 13 guys from the 2024 draft top 30 (which wasn't particularly strong), as well as Burns/Kurtz/Caglianone/CamSmith who are no longer prospects but would definitely be top 100, and Moore would be a maybe.  So 17-18 guys make the top 100, so a guy taken 16th should be towards the end of the list.

There will likely be some growing pains as he learns to be more of a contact hitter in the pros (he sold out more for power at WF, which worked there but won't in pro ball), but he'll probably get the contact rates up.  I'd easily put him above Rojas/Hill/Prielipp, and would have above Abel before ST.

[jmlease1]

35 minutes ago, Cris E said:

I don't even think OPS is a good way to evaluate everyone. If a guy does a couple important things really well then you take him as he is.  For example, last year the MLB average was .245/.315/.404 (BA/OBP/SLG), so if a top defensive SS with some baserunning chops hit .230/.350/.300 he'd be fine in my book but utterly excoriated by most folks. (Only six guys in MLB qualified for the batting title and slugged under .350, but only 38 had OBP at or above .350.)  Catchers are in the same special defensive category as far as I'm concerned. 

I don't think he'd be excoriated by most folks. The issue with Houston is whether or not that kind of slash line is achievable. If he's getting on base in the .350 range, not one is going to care if he's basically slapping singles and taking some walks. But if he's not able to show the ability to tun on a meatball and do some damage, those walks start getting a lot harder to find. That's why slugging still matters, because if a pitcher doesn't have to worry about you hitting anything for extra bases in a serious way, they won't nibble on a 3 ball count, but will just look to overpower you with fastballs in the zone until you prove you can do something with it.

The concern with Houston is whether or not he'll be able to clear the Mendoza Line in MLB. If he can get to an OPS of around .650 he can start because his defense looks like it could be elite. If he's sitting more like .575, then he's maybe backup material no matter how good the glove is.

Andrelton Simmons could still play SS very well defensively when he was a Twin, but his offense turned him into a black hole and he was out of the league at 32. I'd love for Houston to become the next Simmons, but Andrelton had a better bat than what Houston has shown so far.

We'll see. I love the defense. I'm very worried about the bat. The college power was a mirage, because Wake Forest plays in a band box. The team SLG for Wake in 2025 was .540

[LyleCole]

I have a very simple rule about evaluating players:

If their extra base hits are under 25% of their total hits they are going to struggle in the major leagues.  

I am not going to say there aren't exceptions and the corollary of the rule is not a rule (that would be if they have more than 25% of their hits go for extra bases they would NOT struggle in the major leagues).

But if you do not have power major league pitchers arent going to worry about you.  Such a hitter can be very selective and have a high walk rate in the lower minors but advanced pitchers are not going to walk them.  Those pitchers will just blow their fastball by them not worrying about error.   

Houston had 6 extra base hits in the low minors out of 27 total hits last season.   That is 22% of his total hits.  

Since he was brought up, Andrelton Simmons had 73 extra base hits out of a total 296 hits.  That is 24.67% of his hits, right at the edge of the rule.  But one thing that Simmons did in the major leagues was double his home run percentage of hits.  He had just 7 home runs in the minors out, or 2.4% of his hits were home runs.  In the majors he increased that level to 70 home runs out of 1169 hits, even though his overall MLB  slugging percentage and OBP decreased about 10% from his minor league totals.

I hope Marek can develop into a starting caliber shortstop for the Twins.   I think, however, that his lack of power will make it very difficult to even reach the level of offensive production that can be acceptable given his defense.

[Fatbat]

He will develop a MLB bat. Might be comped to Gagne as his career develops. We could use that type for the next decade.

[Jim H]

Some people tend to define power based on home runs. If Houston can develop gap power, that is doubles and triples, and raise the average  to above league average, he could be very valuable. When Arraez  was with the Twins he had enough doubles and triples to get his slugging into a respectable range. If Houston can use his speed to create some extra base hits, home runs won't matter for a guy with exceptional defense.

Edited March 3 by Jim H

[TopGunn#22]

jmlease1 makes an excellent point about walks drying up if you can't punish a meatball down the middle of the plate once in awhile.  I'm hoping that Houston can find just enough power to punish said meatball occasionally.  I'd be quite happy if he's primarily a singles/doubles hitter who can effectively run the bases and draw enough walks to get on base at a .350-.360 clip.  

Because the defense is certainly real, and he can lift up the team and a pitcher consistently with the highlight reel plays he will surely make.  This is why I think he was a reasonable gamble when and where we picked him.  He was clearly the best glove in that draft.

The amateur draft won't take place until later this spring/summer.  The Twins will have had a great chance to observe and analyze where Houston is.  Right now there are a couple college and high school SS that the Twins have their eye on. 

If Houston is showing real progress, might the Twins shift their priority to a CF or SP?  Jenkins could very well be the guy to eventually take over for Buxton, but another speedy CF candidate couldn't hurt.  And there could be a kid who takes a Paul Skenes step forward as a SP prospect.  How Houston is playing at the time of the draft could have an impact on who the Twins select #3 overall.  Or, it might not matter at all.  

[Mike Sixel]

If he's the prospect people think, he should be in AA at some point this year......I prefer Culpepper, since he has shown he can hit and field, but it is way too early to know here....

[DJL44]

Everyone should be thrilled if a batter has an OBP above .350. That's better than Byron Buxton did last season.

Marek Houston could be another Taylor Walls. That's still a valuable player.

[jmlease1]

2 hours ago, TopGunn#22 said:

The amateur draft won't take place until later this spring/summer.  The Twins will have had a great chance to observe and analyze where Houston is.  Right now there are a couple college and high school SS that the Twins have their eye on. 

If Houston is showing real progress, might the Twins shift their priority to a CF or SP?  Jenkins could very well be the guy to eventually take over for Buxton, but another speedy CF candidate couldn't hurt.  And there could be a kid who takes a Paul Skenes step forward as a SP prospect.  How Houston is playing at the time of the draft could have an impact on who the Twins select #3 overall.  Or, it might not matter at all.  

I don't know that Houston's progress will define things much one way or the other for this draft; with such a high pick I'm guessing they'll take whomever they determine is the best player. (how they'll determine that would be interesting to know: how much is on projection/ceiling vs current skills, vs athleticism, vs makeup, etc) As difficult as it's been for the Twins to find quality consistent SS play and develop it internally, I don't they're going to worry much about whether Houston (or even Culpepper) is going to lock down SS in the near future.

I certainly hope Houston takes a big step forward and is hitting with conviction at AA by midseason...

[Nshore]

"8 of their 18 first round picks have been shortstops".  I know that the R2D2 stats are telling the Twins this is a wise strategy.  But it would be okay to target first base or some of the other positions a little more often with their picks. Depending upon the luck of the last minute scrap heap to find a first baseman every year is not a wise move IMO.

I hope they don't mess with Houston's swing angle too much.  As another commenter said that often seems to do as much harm as good.  

 

 

 

 

[JD-TWINS]

8 hours ago, tarheeltwinsfan said:

The Twins desperately need a top of the line fielder at SS. Would a .240 BA with 50 walks and 10 HR per year to go with his top of the line fielding, get the job done?

Sure thing!

Really hope he’s ready in ‘27 ……… Culpepper & Lee to complete the middle infield trio. Keaschall to 1B.

[DJL44]

4 hours ago, Nshore said:

I hope they don't mess with Houston's swing angle too much.  As another commenter said that often seems to do as much harm as good. 

If he continues to hit .150 in Cedar Rapids they’ll need to do something.

[DocBauer]

The fact that he hit well in college, and in his inital pro debut, and has a history of a good eye and good discipline in regard to good BB and K numbers at Wake Forest, eases my concern about his ability to be at least a decent hitter. But I am concerned somewhat about the pop/power part of his game.

I agree his HR totals i his final college season were at least partially a mirage due to Wake's small ballpark. But he's not a small guy at 6' 3" and 205lbs. He's about to turn 22yo, so there's probably room to add a little more muscle without slowing down. He's got the frame for it. I wonder if it's more of a swing adjustment to barrel the ball a little better?

But he doesn't have to be a power hitter to have success. Just having enough power to be a good doubles hitter, with a couple triples here and there, would be enough as long as he can maintain that good BB/K mix. He runs the bases well, and can steal a few bases as well. If he could crank 8-10 HR per season that would just be icing on the cake.

The glove is down right amazing. If he could hit even .250-ish with an OB above .300, stroke 30 Dbls...give or take...with a couple trips and a handful or so HR, maybe 12-15 SB with his defense, he could be a borderline All Star, even as a bottom of the order hitter.

[Brandon]

On 3/3/2026 at 5:32 AM, tarheeltwinsfan said:

The Twins desperately need a top of the line fielder at SS. Would a .240 BA with 50 walks and 10 HR per year to go with his top of the line fielding, get the job done?

Greg Gagne was valuable for the Twins with that batting line

[Linus]

I hope Houston is a great SS for the Twins. However he is a college guy that just hit a buck fifty in A ball. Let’s not get ahead of ourselves here.