The trade deadline has passed, and it was far from a barnburner. After Max Scherzer and Justin Verlander moved last year, Juan Soto and Josh Hader moved in 2022, and Max Scherzer and Trea Turner moved together in 2021 (alongside the entire Cubs core), this was a deadline without a big-time name. The best players traded were guys like Jack Flaherty, Jazz Chisholm Jr., Isaac Paredes, and Zach Eflin. One of those guys ended up on a team not presently in playoff contention.
Why did this happen? The 12-team playoff (Major League Baseball’s, not college football’s) is getting the attention, with two thirds of the major leagues chasing at least a 1-in-10 chance at postseason baseball. This is probably part of it. I’m curious, too, if baseball’s shift towards youth is playing a role. Of the 40 best players in baseball entering last night (going by fWAR), only four were 34 or older: Chris Sale, Seth Lugo, Freddie Freeman, and Jose Altuve. Over the 2004 season, five of the best 40 players were 37 and older. Three of them—Randy Johnson, Roger Clemens, and a guy named Barry Bonds—finished the year at or older than the age of 39. Older players have accumulated more star power. They also face more imminent contract expiration. They make more noise when they move, and they’re easier to move becasue they’re more often short-term commitments.
Overall, the fact recent deadlines bore so much fruit signals that the “why did this happen” question is misplaced. It was one year. But it sure is a handy way to drop in nuggets about Randy Johnson.
We’ve got quick thoughts on the more notable trades below (those we didn’t cover Monday or last week), but before that, let’s reset the broader MLB picture. Midway through these Wednesday games, here’s how the 30 teams shake out:
It’s Over – Chicago (AL), Colorado, Miami, Oakland, Anaheim, Toronto, Detroit, Washington
Apologies to the Blue Jays, Tigers, and Nationals for placing their accommodations in the White Sox’ lair, but these are the eight who are firmly out of the playoff race. If you squinted, you could have made a case for those last three as recently as this weekend, but that case is over now.
It’s Pretty Much Over – Chicago (NL), Cincinnati
If you include Cody Bellinger’s return from the IL, few teams improved their roster as much as the Cubs over these last six or seven days. Still, for them and the Reds, it’s almost certainly a matter of time. The players are there and the standings gap isn’t insurmountable, but there are so many teams ahead of them, and neither has found any sort of sustained winning groove this season so far. There was reason entering the season to be suspicious. Those suspicions have been proved correct.
It’s Over, Right? – San Francisco, Texas, Tampa Bay
The Rangers seem to have fallen out of the race as swiftly as they climbed back in. They’re aided by weak seasons so far from Houston and Seattle, but they still trail both those teams by quite a few games, and they have no realistic Wild Card shot.
The Rays? They’re in a fine place in the standings, but their sale picked up steam fast. The Giants? Their line seems to be that if everyone was healthy, they’d be good, but that line is betrayed by the Jorge Soler trade, as well as the reality that their rotation is mostly healthy right now.
It’s Not Over – Boston, St. Louis, Pittsburgh
This is the bubble’s current bubble. Above these three, teams can afford at least a brief slip. These three probably cannot. The Red Sox are relying on continued surprising production from their starting pitching. The Cardinals are putting their hope in the second-oldest roster in the league. The Pirates are riding the Paul Skenes train as far as it can take them, and while Skenes is only one man and only pitches every fifth game, projections do seem to be undervaluing him. The lineup is the problem there.
In the Mix – Atlanta, Minnesota, Milwaukee, San Diego, Kansas City, Arizona, Seattle, Houston, New York (NL)
This, then, is the bubble itself.
It is large.
Nine teams, of whom at least two will miss the playoff field. In the NL, four are separated by a game and a half in the Wild Card standings as I write this, while the Brewers are just close enough to the Cardinals and Pirates to be nervous. In the AL, the Twins and Royals are trying to hold down Wild Card spots themselves while the Astros and Mariners fight for the West. Most of these teams should expect to make the playoffs, but again, two won’t.
The most interesting presence in this sphere is Atlanta, who by preseason rights should have been down in the co-favorite category, below. Atlanta is probably fine organizationally, and October does tend to completely redefine seasons, meaning five good games could make the whole year a success. But for as smart as each of those early extensions were, Atlanta sure signed a lot of them. Now, they’ve got the oldest roster in baseball, and they have more money committed next year than anyone but the Dodgers. The Braves won before their championship window really opened. If they want a second title this decade, they might have to do it after the window’s closed. This remains a big year for them, tempting though it may be to write it off.
The AL West race is getting a little bizarre. Can the Mariners learn how to hit in time? What the hell is going on with Kyle Tucker’s shin?
The Twins should be here, but the Royals shouldn’t, and you’d imagine that drives the Twins a little batty, especially as they face a cash crunch while paying twelve times the money for a shortstop half the quality of Bobby Witt Jr. The salaries will even out soon, but Witt’s impact on this season can’t be understated. Bobby Witt Jr. is personally boxing the AL West out of the Wild Card picture. Bobby Witt Jr. alone made the Red Sox’ buy/sell decision very hard.
Besides Atlanta, it’s usual suspects in the NL Wild Card space. The Diamondbacks righted the ship just in time. The Mets have cooled off but haven’t gone cold. The Padres took out a strange, large loan this offseason, mourned the death of a quietly spectacular owner, traded arguably the best asset in the game, and are right back in the thick of it. The rollercoaster continues. I don’t know what time these notes will get published tonight, but if the game in San Diego goes anything like last night’s, I’ve probably already missed a major development in the race. The Pads are back.
Finally, those Brewers. They built themselves a lot of space. They might need it. They posted a losing record in July, which is much more in line with the strength of their roster than the consistent 95-win pace they won at through the end of June. They will probably be completely fine, and they do face a kinder schedule the rest of the way than their primary division competition. But if they fall into the reach of St. Louis and Pittsburgh, they’ll be caught in a frenzied Wild Card race as well.
Can They Do It? – Baltimore, Cleveland
At this moment, nobody has a better record than the Guardians, and the Orioles are only a game behind. Each, though, faces legitimate questions.
The Guardians came out of nowhere, boast the youngest roster in the league, and have one of the widest ERA/FIP gaps in baseball, which usually portends the bad kind of regression. They might be doing what the Orioles did last year—proving projection systems all kinds of wrong—but that kind of thing is rare. What’s more likely is something closer to .500 performance from here. Would that be enough to hold onto the Central? Would it be enough to hold off the Astros and Mariners for a first-round bye?
In Baltimore, belief is more warranted, but the youth is significant and the injuries are mounting and the starting pitching runs the risk of becoming legitimately bad. The Zach Eflin and Trevor Rogers acquisitions were huge, but Rogers has been iffy, Dean Kremer has flirted with a whole lot of disaster, and behind those two, there’s nobody else. If one of Corbin Burnes, Eflin, Grayson Rodriguez, Kremer, or Rogers goes down, it’s back to Albert Suárez. God bless Albert Suárez, but he’s already started struggling to keep the performance up. A lot of teams have fragile starting pitching situations. The Orioles also have a questionable bullpen and a sudden infield problem after Jordan Westburg broke his hand right after the team traded Connor Norby. Jackson Holliday, the pressure’s on.
World Series Co-Favorites – Los Angeles, Philadelphia, New York (AL)
We’ve used the word “contender” here before, but baseball doesn’t work like college football or the NBA. There’s less than a 50% chance one of these teams wins it all. That’s abnormally low, but even in normal seasons, the three or four best teams only enjoy a collective 3-in-4 prospect of raising that coveted piece of metal. That’s how we get Arizona and Texas in last year’s World Series, and Atlanta winning 2021’s, and Kansas City’s magic back in the mid-2010’s (especially 2014, when they really came out of nowhere).
So, let’s call these three the co-favorites. They have three of the five best records. They have three of the three best rosters, going by rest-of-season projections. They each have cause for concern within their division race, especially in the case of the Yankees, and both the Dodgers and New York face uncertain starting pitching situations because of health. They didn’t bust any blocks yesterday, but that’s the kind of deadline this deadline was, and that’s the kind of co-favorites these co-favorites are. This isn’t 2017. We don’t have those dominant forces.
What we instead have is Aaron Judge & Juan Soto, Shohei Ohtani & Mookie Betts, and Bryce Harper & The Phightin’ Phils. Together, they’re still an underdog against the field. But they do currently stand in a class of their own, and they each look the part.
Miscellany – Trades
- Whether Brian Cashman was classy or calculating in his indirect defense of Jack Flaherty’s health, Jack Flaherty has a faulty back, and we know this. Jack Flaherty’s also coming off a four-year stretch with only a 4.42 ERA and 4.36 FIP. Those are solid numbers, and this was a good trade for the Dodgers, but it’s unlikely Los Angeles is getting the pitcher Flaherty was over the first two thirds of the season. Flaherty’s easy to root for, so I hope I’m wrong, but if all goes well for the Dodgers, Flaherty will be their fourth starter in October. (Clayton Kershaw ain’t dead yet, unless that aforementioned Dodgers/Padres game is going very badly, in which case please ignore this parenthetical.)
- I thought I’d mentioned Jazz Chisholm earlier in these deadline days, so apologies for that omission. He’s good! He might have been the best player dealt all month. People have been making a lot of noise about him being a league-average hitter outside of 60 games in 2022, but he’s also 26 years old, slightly above average over his career offensively (which isn’t an insignificant distinction), and capable of playing some important positions, especially center field, which increases the value of that offense relative to a bench player. With roughly $100M going to Gerrit Cole, Carlos Rodón, and Giancarlo Stanton next year, and $30M going to DJ LeMahieu alone the next two years, Chisholm is also suddenly a key piece for the Yankees’ impending contention potential, being quite affordable these next couple seasons.
- The Astros gave up kind of a lot for Yusei Kikuchi. I don’t know what to make of that. It seems like a weird time to punt on Jake Bloss, which makes me wonder if they’d encountered something with him which made them want to sell him while they could. Alternatively, maybe it was about a different kind of timing. Flaherty was in the spotlight, and I wonder if the Blue Jays sold Houston on the threat of Los Angeles or New York coming calling. I don’t get the idea other front offices are especially fond of Houston. Is there some value in scuttlebutt? Regardless of how it happened, the biggest thing for Kikuchi might be how quickly he can acclimate to a new environment. He’s often been handled with specialized programs.
- There’s a comedic element to the Trevor Rogers trade where Rogers shouldn’t be a game-changing starter, but Connor Norby and Kyle Stowers also aren’t game-changing prospects. They’re fine prospects, yes. But by debuting in this Rutschman/Henderson/Holliday era, I think they’ve gotten a reputation among fans they wouldn’t have were they White Sox debutants. It’s like when all those NFL franchises hired Sean McVay’s friends to be their head coaches.
- The Giants did not get much for Jorge Soler and Luke Jackson as Atlanta tries getting the band back together. Sabin Ceballos isn’t a non-prospect, but a lot of players in a lot of systems outrank him. We’ll talk about Jameson Taillon in Off the Lake tomorrow, but teams seemed reticent to take on much salary this year. Which is a little odd because I don’t think this offseason’s is a particularly strong free agent class? Anyway, downgrading from Soler to Mark Canha isn’t a terrible swap for San Francisco, and it does clear up their books quite a bit for this winter.
- We’re not mentioning non-closer relievers, because there are so many of them and the line’s always the same. (“The championship leverage sure increases the value.”) Tanner Scott, though, is a closer, or at least he was, and so he is mentioned here. The Marlins did some good work this deadline. They acquired a lot of bodies. That’s a good way to accelerate an organizational transformation under new front office leadership. On the Padres side…man. I went to see what role Roster Resource was projecting for Scott, and I didn’t realize how messy that rotation had become. Martín Pérez makes a lot of sense there as another sandbag against the flood. Michael King and Matt Waldron are pitching their butts off behind Dylan Cease, but can it last? Hopefully everything’s ok with Yu Darvish for Yu Darvish’s sake, but also for that of the Padres.
- The Frankie Montas trade is most interesting to me because of Joey Wiemer. How long does prospect pedigree stick around? At what point do the real results become more weighty? Wiemer’s still pretty young, and while he couldn’t hit much last year, his glove is mighty.
- If the Christian Walker injury was going to happen, I suppose it’s good for the Diamondbacks that it happened when it did. Josh Bell’s not having a very good year, but you at least know he can stand in the area of first base and bop a little. Pavin Smith, what have you got in you?
- I liked the Guardians’ deadline a lot. Lane Thomas is a good player to have in your franchise for a few years, and Alex Cobb stands a good chance of making an impactful playoff start so long as he does get healthy. He’s had a weird year of rehab, but he had a sub-4.00 FIP from 2021 through 2023.
- Paul Blackburn going to the Mets continues the trend of low prices holding value this trade deadline. Blackburn shouldn’t command too much in arbitration this offseason if the Mets want to keep him around.
- I like what the Pirates did, adding Bryan De La Cruz and Isiah Kiner-Falefa. Small, sensible moves that could break the offense open a little bit. They’ll get to keep both around next year as well, again at good prices.
- The Rays are going to do something good with Dylan Carlson, aren’t they.
- The White Sox successfully moved Paul DeJong and Eloy Jiménez, with the Orioles’ Jiménez acquisition particularly interesting. Did they want him so they could stash him on their bench for pinch-hit opportunities, similarly to the base-stealing/defensive replacement role often seen out of playoff teams? Or is this more of a reclamation project?
Miscellany – Miscellany
- The Rays are getting their stadium in St. Petersburg. Pinellas County’s commissioners approved public funding for it yesterday. It’s a terrible deal for taxpayers, as all these stadium developments are, but the Rays were eventually going to move if they didn’t get a stadium, and that’s a bad deal for taxpayers as well, because they don’t get to have a professional baseball team anymore. Ultimately, this seems to come back to the leverage the Big Four leagues obtain through America’s socialist professional sports structure. Leagues are run by cartels of owners granted monopolistic power by the federal government. They then make a resource—professional sports teams—artificially scarce and use that to rob local governments at gunpoint. With some of their savings, they hire lobbyists and donate to political campaigns. Anyhoo, with the Rays locked into life in Florida and the A’s off to Nevada, the path to expansion is finally open. I’d imagine we see the bidding war begin for that this offseason, unless Jerry Reinsdorf really wants to make a stink as he threatens to relocate the White Sox.
- In the only non-baseball piece of sporting news that I, at least, have consumed these last three days, Montana and South Dakota’s attorneys general are trying to figure out if they can challenge the House v. NCAA settlement. Would this be possible, given Judge Wilken’s denial of Houston Christian’s attempted intervention? I do not know. I do think, though, that squeaky wheels eventually get grease, and that makes me wonder if there’ll be some amendment to the settlement before it really gets written in stone. A lot of small parties want this thing stopped. Not just schools or states, but athletes as well.
