Now that the 2023 All-Star Game is behind us, all 30 MLB teams should be in panic mode. Now is officially the appropriate period during the year for front offices and fans alike to hyperventilate with the August 1 Trade Deadline eerily looming in the shadows. Everyone is going to be overreacting across news and social media about the biggest storylines of the next few weeks, but what are some of the smaller narratives to keep an eye on? Here are five of them.
No-name relievers getting traded is going to be awesome. It’s the most underappreciated position in baseball because it’s the least valuable, but an important position nonetheless. I alluded in an earlier post this year that Justin Lawrence and his electric sweeper could be an optimal reliever target at the Deadline, and I’m sure a lot of you were unaware of his existence prior to me mentioning him. Well, guess what? So was I! But Lawrence is just the tip of the iceberg. There are plenty of unsung heroes out of the pen that could be difference-makers for contenders as the leaves begin to fall off the autumn trees. Yennier Cano, the “afterthought” of the Jorge Lopez trade, is a great example of this from last year's Deadline.
There will be trades that look like contenders are trading with contenders, like the Jordan Montgomery-Harrison Bader trade from 2022, but an interleague trade like that is more of a strategic partnership than a transaction. That’s different than the Ohtani-for-Soto deal I played with a couple weeks back, by the way. When playoff-bound teams trade with each other, they’re usually head-scratchers at first than make more sense as you think about them from either side of the deal. Remember: it's all about present and future values adding up that makes trades work. Now, if two teams that pull off that type of deal face off in the World Series, than this “little thing” will quadruple in size.
Which franchise is going to be the one that “maybe’d” the Trade Deadline? This, of course, is reflective of the “winning and losing” aspects of the Trade Deadline. In other words, half of the hype of the Deadline isn’t getting the flashy players, but getting the players that improve teams the most (by sheer volume, skill, or otherwise). The Padres “won” the Deadline last year, but didn’t have the flashiest second half. The 2021 Braves “won” the Deadline and the World Series, the first time in what seems like forever that happened in the same year. But what I’m interested in seeing is who won’t be active at the Deadline and how that affects the rest of the season. Trades aren’t necessary if the team naturally improves or steadies, or a lack of action could be the death of some contenders-turned-pretenders. Such is the Deadline.
The amount of trading is going be a spectacle. With so much turnover of division leaders from last season, there are a lot of good teams with holes and a lot of bad teams with good players. I’m also excited for the pure variety of the Deadline this year. It’s not going to be the usual suspects who are going to make you groan at their outlandishly simple-looking trades. The Orioles, Diamondbacks, and Rangers are going to be buyers. How fun is that?
The Cardinals selling is just painful. Or will they? St. Louis general manager John Mozeliak admitted that the Cards would most likely be trading parts of their core at the Deadline, but that admission struck me as a political move of sorts, with his true angle left a mystery. Perhaps he wants to use the big guys as leverage to start negotiations, only to trade some of the youngsters. Or maybe Paul Goldschmidt and Nolan Arenado won’t be wearing the sweetest uniform in baseball come August. I’m left puzzled and amped up at the same time for the St. Louis faithful, but either way, it feels weird to see such an institution of a franchise in such a perilous position.
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