MLB trade deadline: Reviewing the impact of 2021 deadline trades
The Braves revamp
Early in July, the Braves sent minor league first baseman Bryce Ball to the Cubs in exchange for outfielder Joc Pederson. At month’s end, they continued their outfield revamp, which had been necessitated by an injury to Ronald Acuña Jr. plus Ender Inciarte’s offensive failure and Marcel Ozuna’s suspension.
Within 48 hours at month’s end, they traded catching prospect Alex Jackson to Miami for Duvall, sent minor leaguer Kasey Kalich to Kansas City for Soler, and got Rosario from Minnesota at a cost of veteran Pablo Sandoval.
In retrospect, we know exactly what rewards the Braves reaped from these trades: they won the World Series, with all four acquisitions playing a role.
How about the other teams?
Sent to High-A South Bend after the trade, Ball has spent 2022 at Double-A Tennessee, where he’s batting .282. But Ball has failed to impress scouts enough to even crack the Cubs’ own Top 30 prospects list.
Promoted to Miami following the trade deadline, Jackson batted just .157 in 42 games for the Marlins in 2021. Traded to Milwaukee for another minor leaguer this past April, he has spent most of the season at Triple-A Nashville.
Kalich is at High-A Quad Cities, where he has made 24 relief appearances. Like Ball in the Cubs’ system, Kalich has not yet cracked his team’s top prospects list, much less made a major league debut.
Sandoval never appeared in a game for Cleveland, which released him immediately after obtaining him. He has retired.
The verdict: Obviously the Braves scored a series of short-term trade deadline coups. Beyond that, it does not appear that they gave up anything of consequence in any of their trades, making those trades long-term winners for them and long-term losers for their trading partners as well.
The Javier Baez trade
As part of their wholesale unloading, the Cubs sent shortstop Javier Baez along with pitcher Trevor Williams to the Mets in exchange for an injured minor league outfielder named Pete Crow-Armstrong.
The Mets obtained Baez with the intent of moving him to second and pairing him with shortstop Francisco Lindor in what they hoped would be a world championship middle infield, at least in 2021 and — if they could sign Baez — for years to come.
Baez held up his part of the deal. In 47 games he batted .299 with an .886 OPS, all you could ask of a middle infielder and more.
But the Mets, who were solidly in first place in the NL East at the trade deadline, still lost 37 of their final 59 games finished and 11 games behind the division champion Braves. Then, with the winter lockout looming, Baez signed a six-year, $140 million contract with the Tigers, leaving the Mets empty-handed.
Crow-Armstrong, the kid the Cubs got for Baez, has not yet seen a major league stadium. But he has shown well in the minors. At High-A South Bend, he is hitting .250 with a .790 OPS, and is the third-ranked prospect in the Cubs’ system. Still only 20, he’s considered a top-flight center field prospect, he’s projected to arrive at Wrigley Field no later than 2024.
The verdict: The Mets got two good months from Baez but, in the grand scheme of things, they proved to be worthless. If Crow-Armstrong makes it in Chicago, this trade will eventually be viewed as a big one for the Cubs and a disaster in Queens.
The Kris Bryant trade
Bryant went from the Cubs to San Francisco in exchange for a pair of minor leaguers, pitcher Caleb Kilian and outfielder Alexander Canario.
At the time they acquired Bryant, the Giants were locked in a life-or-death struggle with the Los Angeles Dodgers for the NL West title. The Giants eventually won that struggle, although it took 107 victories to edge out the Dodgers by a single game. In the playoffs, Los Angeles ousted the Giants in a best-of-five division series before being ousted themselves by the Braves.
Alternating between third base and the outfield, Bryant lived up to expectations for the Giants. He hit .262 in 51 games with a .788 OPS.
And the playoff loss to the Dodgers was certainly not Bryant’s fault. In 18 plate appearances he hit. 471, albeit with just two RBI. Why the low RBI count? Easy: Fifteen of Bryant’s 18 plate appearances came with the bases empty.
Even so, when it came time to sign Bryant during the offseason, the Giants did not step forward. Instead the Colorado Rockies lured him in March with a seven-year, $172 million offer.
The Cubs’ return on Bryant has yet to be measured. Kilian, the pitcher, has made three starts for the Cubs in 2022, and he got shelled each time. Still, he’s ranked as the team’s No. 6 prospect with a 2022 delivery date.
As for Canario, the 22-year-old outfielder is batting .251 at Double-A Tennessee with 17 home runs. The Cubs think he could contend for a roster spot as early as next season.
Verdict: Bryant may have made the difference in getting the Giants to their 2021 division title, and in that respect he was worth the price of two legit prospects. But the failure of other elements of the Giants to deliver in the postseason rendered his contributions meaningless.
Scherzer and Turner to Los Angeles
The bombshell among 2021 deadline trades brought the Dodgers one of the game’s best pitchers and one of the best shortstops.
L.A. took Max Scherzer and Trea Turner from the lowly Washington Nationals as fortification for their NL West pennant race and also for the postseason.
Statistically, the Dodgers came out as big winners. Scherzer went 7-0 for the Dodgers with a 1.98 ERA in 11 starts, and Turner, plugging a hole at second base, batted .338.
The postseason was another story. Turner batted just .191 in 11 postseason games. As for Scherzer, he developed a dead arm at the worst possible time, the final games of his team’s NLCS loss to the Braves. Making only one appearance in that six-game series, he left in the fifth inning of Game 2, an eventual 5-4 Braves victory.
As the sixth game loomed, Scherzer reported a dead arm and was sidelined.
Over the winter, Scherzer signed a three-year contract with the Mets. Two-thirds of the way through the first of those three seasons, he’s 6-2 with a 2.09 ERA.
Turner, having moved to shortstop when Corey Seager elected free agency, has been a key contributor to the Dodgers’ ongoing success in 2022. An All-Star selection, he’s batting .310 with 16 home runs and 18 steals in 20 attempts.
But those pickups came at a significant cost. The Dodgers gave up four players for Scherzer and Turner, two of whom have made impacts on the 2022 Nats.
Pitcher Josiah Gray is 7-7 in 19 starts with an ERA around 4.50. At 24, the Nats view Gray as a piece of their rebuild to contender status.
They feel the same way about his battery mate, catcher Keibert Ruiz. Inheriting the regular catching duty, the 23-year-old is batting .248, and while his .648 OPS and negative defensive stats need work, Nats officials are confident he’ll get there.
The Nats think they may have a third catch in that deal in pitching prospect Gerardo Carillo. At 23, he’s the team’s seventh-rated prospect.
Verdict: Although Scherzer came up small at the key postseason moment, this remains one of those deals that really has worked out for both sides. Turner is an established piece solidifying the Dodger infield, while Gray and Ruiz — and possibly Carillo‚— are likely to be featured assets in Washington’s eventual rise from the NL East basement.
The Yankees get Rizzo
The Cubs, who figured in about half of the headline-grabbing 2021 deadline trades, sent Anthony Rizzo to the Yankees in exchange for a pair of minor leaguers.
Rizzo, who was 31 and would be a free agent at season’s end, did for New York about what he’d been doing for Chicago. Down the stretch he batted in the .240s with a .778 OPS, numbers that valued him at marginally above average.
The Yanks were good enough to make the postseason as a Wild Card, but not good enough to survive for long. They lost 6-2 to Boston in their one-game showdown and went home. Rizzo batted leadoff in that game, homered, and went 1-for-4, so he was hardly the reason they lost. At the same time, he never hit with a teammate on base ahead of him, so he had little of the postseason impact Yankee fans might have hoped for.
Still, the Yanks were impressed enough to re-sign Rizzo in March for two years at $32 million. The first two-thirds of his 2022 season reflects the kind of player Rizzo has become in Yankee Stadium: low-average, good power. His .228 average is offset by 215 home runs, amounting to a 142 OPS+.
He is, in short, part of the reason the Yanks are odds-on favorites to reach the World Series in 2022.
What did the Cubs get? The names are outfielder Kevin Alcantara and pitcher Alexander Vizcaino.
Alcantara has risen to become the team’s No. 4 prospect. Still only 20, he’s at Class A Myrtle Beach, where he is hitting .270 with a dozen homers and 11 steals. He has a 2024 projected arrival date.
Vizcaino, who is 25, has spent 2022 as a minor league cipher, sidelined by an injury.
Verdict: The Yankees got a veteran plug-in infield piece at the cost of two prospects who have not proven they will ever do anything in the majors. The trade was a win for New York.
Joey Gallo to New York
Gallo came to the Yankees from Texas on July 29 as the feature of a six-player package.
Unlike Rizzo, Gallo basically flopped in New York. Down the stretch he batted just .160 and while he did produce 13 home runs that was nearly half of his entire hit total for the final two months.
In the Wild Card game with Boston, Gallo batted cleanup, started in left, and went hitless in four at-bats, leaving three runners on base.
Signed through the end of this season, his 2022 has not gone any better. Sharing outfield time with three teammates, he’s batting in the .150s with a .621 OPS.
In that trade, the Yankees also acquired Joely Rodriguez, who they have since flipped to the Mets in a swap of journeyman pitchers.
To get Gallo, the Yankees sent Texas four minor leaguers, three of whom have at least since seen major league daylight in Texas.
Josh Smith has taken over as the Rangers’ regular third baseman, although his .221 average and .617 OPS say he’s learning on the job.
Glenn Otto is a 26-year-old who’s been given a rotation spot. Again, on-the-job learning is at work here. Otto is 4-7 in 15 big league starts this year with a 5.50 ERA.
Ezequiel Duran is a 23-year-old backup to Smith producing so-so numbers.
The fourth Ranger pickup is minor league outfielder Trevor Hauer, who is struggling at High-A Hickory.
Verdict: Gallo has been a millstone in New York. The Rangers at minimum got three usable parts who may or may not eventually develop into solid big league performers.
Passing Schwarbs around
Granted free agency by the Cubs at the end of the 2020 season, Kyle Schwarber signed with the Washington Nationals. But when the Nats tanked, he was forwarded to the Red Sox, who at the time were in a tight postseason fight.
The Red Sox did eventually reach the postseason, and not only eliminated the Yankees but took down Tampa Bay in the division series before losing the ALCS to Houston. Schwarber was a contributor to the pennant drive, batting .291 with seven home runs.
But after tearing up the Yanks and Rays, he flopped against Houston’s pitching, getting just three base hits in 25 ALCS at-bats in the six-game loss. With runners on base, he was 1-for-7 with a strikeout and a double play grounder. His one run-producing hit, a grand slam, came as the cherry atop a 12-3 Boston blowout in Game 3.
At season’s end, Schwarber left Boston for Philadelphia.
The cost to Boston of obtaining Schwarber turned out to be minor league pitcher Aldo Ramirez. Assigned to the Nats’ Rookie League team in 2022, Ramirez has had a rough time; pitching fewer than eight innings he has an 8.22 ERA. Still, the Nats project him as their 10th-best prospect with a potential 2024 arrival date.
Verdict: If the Red Sox goal was to reach the 2021 postseason (hint: it wasn’t), then Schwarber delivered. Otherwise, this trade so far has been a washout both ways.
The White Sox, part 1
The South Siders managed to lead the AL Central despite a conspicuous hole at second base. They opted to fill it by trading for Indians regular Cesar Hernandez.
In Cleveland, Hernandez had been a .230s stick with some power. In Chicago, he was a .230s stick with little power.
The Sox did win the AL Central before losing the division series to Houston in four games. Hernandez did nothing notable but he did play his role, producing two hits in seven postseason at-bats.
His contract having expired at season’s end, Hernandez signed for one season in Washington, where he continues as a run-of-the-mill, no-power middle infielder.
The cost to get Hernandez for those two months plus postseason was minor league pitcher Konnor Pilkington. He made his major league debut for the Guardians this April, but has spent most of the season on the Columbus-Cleveland shuttle.
He’s back in Columbus now, laboring as part of the Clippers’ rotation and carrying a 5.40 ERA in a half-dozen starts. The hope is for what would be a sixth call-up this season, and maybe a permanent one.
Verdict: The White Sox got a fill-in they didn’t need and lost a minor leaguer who has to date shown marginal major league potential. No winners here to date.
The White Sox, part 2
Believing they needed to beef up their bullpen or a deep post-season run, the White Sox acquired Craig Kimbrel from the Cubs for major leaguers Codi Heuer and Nick Madrigal.
The deal has turned out to hurt both teams.
On the South Side, Kimbrel immediately found himself on the losing end of a fight with Liam Hendriks for closer opportunities. Working mostly in uncomfortable eighth innings, he amassed a 5.09 ERA in 24 appearances. In the postseason loss to Houston, Kimbrel was limited to three ineffective appearances, none in critical spots.
This past April, the White Sox dumped his contract on the Dodgers, getting A.J. Pollock in return.
Not that the Cubs fared any better in the deal. Heuer pitched credibly to no good purpose in 2021, but has missed all of 2022 with an arm injury. Madrigal, sidelined by an injury for all of 2021, returned to inherit second base duties this year and has made the least of the opportunity. Injuries again have limited his chances, and he’s hitting just .222 with no power when he has played.
In the process, Madrigal has given surprise rookie Christopher Morel a chance to steal his position permanently.
Verdict: Nothing to see here, folks … just keep moving.
A swap of good players
It’s rare that established major leaguers get traded for one another in a deadline swap between a contender and a non-contender. But that’s what happened when the A’s obtained Starling Marte from Miami in exchange for pitcher Jesus Luzardo.
The A’s at that moment were a serious postseason contender, standing 13 games above .500 and three games ahead of Seattle in the race for the final Wild Card spot.
They saw Marte as a critical offensive asset. They were partly right: Marte batted .316 for Oakland after July 30 with an .824 OPS.
But even with Marte, the A’s played sub-.500 ball down the stretch and were passed for that final Wild Card spot by the Yankees.
The loss of Luzardo was probably not much of a contributor to that collapse. Only 2-4 with a 6.87 ERA in a half-dozen starts for the A’s, he got a full chance with the Marlins and did pretty much the same thing: 4-5 with a 6.44 ERA in a dozen starts.
He was 2-3 with a 4.03 ERA in six starts for the Marlins in 2022 before being sidelined by a forearm strain. He’s now on a rehab assignment, potentially returning to the big league roster at any time.
Verdict: Marte was unable to carry the Athletics into the postseason, and since he left for free agency in November that was the extent of his contribution in Oakland. Whether Luzardo ever emerges as a significant cost for the Marte flirtation remains an open question.
The Rays go old
Fortifying themselves for a postseason race with the Yankees and Red Sox, the Tampa Bay Rays obtained veteran DH Nelson Cruz along with a minor leaguer from Minnesota for two prospects.
The good news is that the Rays did end up winning the division by eight games before losing a four-game division series to Boston.
The bad news is that Cruz did little to advance Tampa Bay’s 2021 hopes. He hit .226 in the final two months of the regular season, and against the Red Sox batted just .176.
The worse news is that one of the players the Rays shipped to Minnesota for Cruz was Joe Ryan, who has emerged as a centerpiece of Minnesota’s pitching plans. In five 2021 starts, Ryan was 2-1 with a 4.05 ERA. In 2022, he’s 7-4 with a 3.78 ERA through 16 starts.
The Rays traded a front-line starting pitcher for a DH they didn’t really need who came up small in the only five critical games of his season, the division series against Boston.
The Rays also got Calvin Faucher, a fringe major league prospect who has been unimpressive in 14 relief appearances for the Rays thus far in 2022.
Next. 3 teams interested in Joey Gallo. dark
Verdict: In short, this was a trade the Rays ought to really regret making.