As we head into the final weekend before the trade deadline, here are three things we’ll be keeping an eye on around the baseball world throughout the day today:
1. Trade season continues:
With trade season in full swing, the deals and rumors kept coming yesterday, highlighted by a pair of intradivision swaps: the Pirates dealt first baseman Carlos Santana to the NL Central-leading Brewers while the Mets officially began their selloff by shipping closer David Robertson to the Marlins. A pair of big names also entered the rumor mill yesterday, as reports surfaced that the Padres are willing to listen to offers on superstar Juan Soto and the Dodgers have discussed a deal for third baseman Nolan Arenado with the Cardinals. And, while it at one point looked like the Cards might extend closer Jordan Hicks rather than trade him, talks on a new contract have apparently not progressed. With just four days until the deadline on August 1, who will be traded next?
2. Giolito to make Angels debut:
After being dealt to the west coast alongside relief arm Reynaldo Lopez in exchange for two prospects, right-hander Lucas Giolito is poised to make his first start as a member of the Angels this evening. He’ll take the mound against Blue Jays ace Kevin Gausman to kick off a series that could have a major impact on the state of the AL Wild Card race. The Blue Jays currently hold the third and final spot with a 57-46 record that puts them three games ahead of Anaheim prior to their three-game set. The outcome of this series could be impactful not only for the Blue Jays and Angels, but also for the Red Sox and Yankees. Both clubs sit between Toronto and Anaheim in the standings, 1.5 games and 2.5 games out of the final Wild Card spot, respectively.
3. Freeland to return:
Rockies southpaw Kyle Freeland is expected to be activated from the 15-day injured list today to take the ball in this evening’s start against the A’s at Coors Field. Freeland made his major league debut in 2017 and posted a pair of excellent seasons to kick off his major league career, with a 3.39 ERA (143 ERA+) and 4.06 FIP in 358 1/3 innings. In the following years, however, he’s had the look of a back-of-the-rotation arm rather than a clear playoff-caliber rotation piece, with an exactly league average ERA+ of 100 since the start of the 2019 season. This season, Freeland sports a 4.72 ERA (107 ERA+) in 19 starts for the Rockies. His return should bring some stability to a Rockies rotation that currently includes Austin Gomber, Chase Anderson, and Peter Lambert.
Freeland has been above average every season except for 2019. It’s misleading to include that season in with his last several to say he is exactly average.
Juiced ball 2019 stats are even more ridiculous than the Covid 2020 stats. Anything past those two seasons is too far gone to be too relevant. So we’re left with 2021 and on
It will be interesting to see how deep the Padres fire sale goes now that they have to cut that huge payroll.
We do?
They don’t. Reds has a wee little and he is under the mistaken impression that every team not named the Yankees or Dodgers is unable to spend like the Padres. He ignores facts like the Padres CEO saying they are not losing money this season, in order to maintain his delusion.
You mean after MLB gave them $30m?
Padres were not given $30 million by MLB above what they would normally get. They did not get revenue sharing this season and MLB made up just the one rights payment they didn’t get from DSG.
There won’t be a “Padres fire sale”. Selling off impending free agents like Snell and Hader make sense from the standpoint that it’s better to get something for them now than only get draft pick compensation when they leave next winter.
Selling Soto will net them a decent return, maybe not as good as the one they gave to get him, but decent.
The rumors always talk about one teams specific player, but never the specific target of the trading team. I do know until done, its all in flux, but it sure would be nice to better understand what each team is looking for, be it a specific prospect, or specific position. Too many times, like the Arenado article, the list is all encompassing to the point of telling us nothing.
@sty, yeah, its usually just going to stay on the easier names to assume as not all have sources inside the gm offices. for instance the Bader for Montgomery trade came out of no where last year.
The “This Team is Interested in This Player” articles have replaced all of the articles about “This Player is Having Tommy John Surgery.”
…but is Ohtani going to play?? He left G2 early after the 2nd HR.
He was super tired after single handedly beating the crap out of my Tigers
It was just cramps from the heat
Double-header in which he’d already thrown a complete game shout-out in game 1 and Homered twice in game 2 certainly deserved the rest of the day off
You mean after pitching 9 innings of shutout ball in game one and the team up by 7 runs n the 2nd? Yeah, that is kind of expected.
A new Soto deal would be fascinating.
So far the Nats haven’t done so well, two serviceable major leaguers Abrams and Gore, two prospect OF’s that have struggled this year in AA, a prospect pitcher who has had an ok A ball season. I’m sure the Padres will settle for two serviceable major leaguers and a few not so good looking prospects as a return for Soto………or maybe not
Disagree. The Nats made out very well on that deal and set their team up for the next 5+ years.
Abrams is 22 and has one of the highest OPS’ among SS in the NL.. and has improved his defense considerably throughout the season
Gore is a league average pitcher with upside at 24 and a 11 K/9..
Wood was just ranked the #2 prospect in baseball by fangraphs and tore up A+ at 20 and is an above average hitter in his tough AA league…
Hassell has been disappointing but he’s also only 21 in AA and has had two serious wrist injuries post trade and his power in the last month has come back.
Susana is staying the course and looks like at worst a future power reliever..
Looks like a pretty solid return from here!
None of those players need to turn into stars for it to be a good return just due to how many years of control the Nats got. Having guys that are basically league average on affordable contracts to round out your roster is exactly what SD needs and their lack of that is why they are still bad even with the really high end talent they have.
It takes a lot of players to make a good baseball team.
Abrams is not the top in OPS or OPS+ in the NL at SS. He is 4th in both. While it has improved incrementally, his defense is still abysmal. He is at the bottom of the chart in both DRS and OAA. Only a few guys worse. He is young, so he may eventually be a league average player. That day is not today.
Gore is a below league average starter, 96 ERA+, and is going almost exactly 5 innings per start. Maybe some day he will be a league average starter, but that day is not today.
Wood is ranked the #4 prospect in baseball He is striking out 35% of the time in A+ and AA this season. You can count on your fingers the number of prospects that did that and became even a 2.0 WAR or higher per season player in the majors over the past 40 years. You may want to curb your enthusiasm about him right now.
Bobby Barrels is a bust. It happens 80% of the time with top 100 prospects, so we knew some of these guys were not going to make it.
Susanna is having extreme control and command issues and at best will be a reliever. He still has not thrown more than 4 innings in a start and is averaging 3 2/3. He is just 19, so he could turn his command and control issues around, but he is not destined to be a starter.
If 2 of them ever become league average players, its a win for the Nats. Its still a solid return.
Last, but certainly not least, remember that the trade was NOT for Soto. It was for Soto (159 OPS+) and Bell (153 OPS+), two top 12 hitters in baseball at the time of the trade.
While Bell was a total bust and has continued to play like garbage since the trade, Soto has put up 158 OPS+ this season and is on pace for 8 WAR in a Padres uniform in his first year and 2 months.
Abrams has “one of the highest OPS for SS in the NL”
Maybe learn to read before writing your biased novel.. Soto has been great.. who knew!? He’s an incredible player.
In 2 month all the Padres will have left of that deal is 1 Soto season after missing the playoffs…
Maybe learn not to be a complete jerk. All the Nats will have is another last place season and some prospects that are ok, but not great. Enjoy Strasburg and Corbin
Scott Boras was in San Diego yesterday morning. Saw him at the Gaslamp Broken Yolk when I was having breakfast with a client. He was dining with 2 people I didn’t recognize and Erik Greupner, the Padres CEO.
Boras’ offices are in OC, so pretty sure that him being in SD meeting with the Padres is pretty common and probably doesn’t mean anything in terms of an extension for Soto. Probably more common than me being in that neck of the woods at 6:30 am.
Pads Fan, why couldn’t you add something juicy to that story. like, yea, pretty sure they were all signing a big contract or something, until Juan Soto walked in and started arguing with Boras in spanish and then Soto tore up the contract and smacked CEO Greupner and told him ‘don’t mess with daddy’.
That kinda story woulda really moved the needle
Lol. Wish I could. They were actually talking and laughing, so it was a pretty friendly conversation as best I could tell.
I was just surprised to see them in just a regular old breakfast place and not in the Padres facility having a team chef cook for them. Although Broken Yolk is pretty good for a breakfast place.
What a dumpster fire in Colorado. Terrible roster construction combined with a mountain of injuries. At this point just avoiding 100 losses would be a win.
The Rockies have never lost 100 games in a season. That’s kinda surprising considered their pitching is usually bad and the front office is run by monkeys.
The usually can count on a great Coors boosted home record.. even when they stink which prevents them ever from bottoming out.
The Rockies never sell high. They are probably using the bungled Arenado trade as justification.
Thats actually an insult to monkeys
Why are you insulting monkeys like that?
Interesting conversation on Thursday afternoon on 670 AM in Chicago with Rick Giolito Lucas’s dad. Worth a listen if your a fan of Sox or Lucas
Not a Sox fan, but it was a fascinating almost half hour segment. Started out as a big kumbaya session about how much Lucas loves the organization, city and fans.
As the interview went on a lot of knowledgeable insight to the organizational structure as a whole. Rick said that there was no interest in ever extending Lucas….no conversations at all since at least 2021…..Lucas was resigned to that fact, for a while, that his time was up in Chicago, and that the decisions for the organization come from the purse strings in the owner’s lap.
Also said (and I’m glad that they probed back to it) that they were shocked that it was the Angels that he went to.
If you can find it—it’s worth the listen as harrycarey above said.
you guys realize, that just because LA called, and Mozeliak picked the phone up, doesn’t mean that anything progressed past the Dodgers offering 4 “top” pitching prospects with ERAs higher than the national deficit, and Mozeliak coughing as he hung up, right?
The problem is those 4 top pitching prospects are literally holding the Dodgers rotation together. Trading any of them would be bad, trading all of them would be a disaster unless the Dodgers have 3 other trades for starting Pitchers lined up (they don’t)
and they’re not good enough for the post season, which is why the Dodgers are looking. that tells me, they’re NOT worth an Arenado. period. I wouldn’t take all 4 of them for Arenado. I sure wouldn’t take them for Arenado plus. it’s laughable.
Why would the Cards trade Arenado? They want to contend next year. The thing that sucks for Cards fans is they have traded away so many future stars from their farm. You put Alcantara, Gallen, and Arozarena on that roster and its a massive contender. Bad luck. Or Mo has to go.
Every team has had players who reach stardom after they’re traded. The White Sox once had Tatis but their “brain” trust didn’t see anything in him so they traded him away. You could look up the top players in the game and see who had them first.
Still remember this poll MLBTR took back when Shields was traded. Not too many people here thought it was only a bad trade for Chicago, which is why we follow trade rumors on the internet and don’t work for an MLB front office.
mlbtraderumors.com/2016/06/mlbtr-poll-the-james-sh…
Look at Tatis’ signing bonus, there are 29 other MLB teams that missed on him (and the sox clearly didn’t expect him to turn into what he did either).
Or they knew he was not a team player which he has proven.
Because they have too many infielders, no pitching, and freeing up his salary gives them extra $ to buy more pitching this offseason.
I’d like to see the Halos finally trade Adell and get another good young starting pitcher or back end of the pen option. Adell’s time is up and he should go to a new team for a chance to really show what he’s got. Halos have to be aggressive now and make the needed moves to get into a position to really compete these next few months.
Adell is on the IL I thought. He won’t be traded until he is healthy. Maybe you will get your wish in the offseason, but with the team potentially losing 5 position players to FA I don’t see that happening.
A no, a no, but yes on 1 more arm. I just think it’ll be 1 more RP rental. That said, u definitely wouldn’t put Adell in that for an RP. Plus I don’t think Adell goes anywhere, there going to need a OF next season on the cheap, if Ohtani re-signs.
I would get a defense first SS. That would stabilize infield defense which, in turn, help the pitching greatly.
No need for a D first SS. Neto is back with a great glove, and hits to.
You also have Velasquez who plays good defense to back up Neto.
Angels are $4.2 Mil over the threshold.
Come on, Deeds. If you use “and” to start the sentence, it can’t have a comma after it. When will you ever learn?