The 21st century’s 10 most impactful MLB trade deadline deals to date

The most common refrain regarding the San Diego Padres’ MLB trade deadline acquisition of Juan Soto was that it was the biggest such trade in history.

Such respected names as Jayson Stark, John Paul Morosi, Jeff Passan, and Peter Gammons each said so. “This wasn’t just a blockbuster. This was history,” Stark said of that Tuesday trade.

Those experts and others were motivated not just by Soto’s potential, but also by the collection of elements involved in the trade. Josh Bell also went to the Padres, with Luke Voit as well as prospects MacKenzie Gore, C.J. Abrams, Robert Hassell III, Jarlin Susana and James Wood going to Washington.

Whether the trade eventually deserves all the heft being attached to it these days will obviously depend on the performance of the players involved. Soto’s ability is proven. At the young age of 23, he’s already a veteran of five seasons with 119 home runs, a .966 OPS, and 358 RBI.

The Padres clearly believe he will be the key to a 2022 postseason run.

But if we are to consider the Juan Soto trade as the biggest such MLB trade deadline deal in history, then the question arises: Which is it better than?

To answer that question, we have reviewed deadline trades going back to the beginning of this century. We’re rating each based on the actual WAR generated by the players involved for their acquiring teams.

Inevitably, some trades thought at the time to deserve “blockbuster” status don’t merit that description when considered over time. One example: The Cubs acquisition of reliever Aroldis Chapman near the 2016 deadline clearly contributed to Chicago’s first World Series win in 108 years. But Chapman only generated 1.2 WAR in his two months with the Cubs before returning to the Bronx via free agency.

Meanwhile the players the Yankees got for Chapman, chiefly Gleyber Torres, have been productive assets but not astonishingly so. The net impact of that deal to this date for the teams involved is +13.5 WAR. That ranks it outside the 10 most impactful of the century.

The same is true — at least so far — for the Dodgers’ deadline acquisition of Trea Turner and Max Scherzer in 2021. To get that pair they sent Keibert Ruiz and Josiah Gray to Washington, and both have contributed. But the net impact of that trade to this early point only adds up to +11.5 WAR … good but not top 10.

Here are the 10 most impactful deadline trades of the century.

T-9. Scott Kazmir

At the 2004 trade deadline, the New York Mets were motivated by frustration. Seeking answers to a 49-54 start that had them in fourth place in the NL East, they settled on Tampa Bay Devil Rays starter Victor Zambrano as a solution to their pitching problems.

To get Zambrano, however, the price Tampa Bay demanded was minor league left-hander Scott Kazmir, the hottest name in the Mets’ system at the time.

Called up three weeks later, Kazmir turned in a winning record in 2005. By 2008, he was the ace of Tampa Bay’s World Series team. He made a league-leading 34 starts in 2007, and by the time of his departure for Anaheim at the 2009 trade deadline, he had amassed a 55-44 record, a 3.92 ERA and +16.6 WAR.

Zambrano? He made exactly three appearances for the Mets before being sidelined with an injury. Over the next two seasons, he was 8-14. The Mets won the NL East in 2006, but Zambrano at most played a minor role, going 1-2 in five starts.

He did not pitch in the 2006 postseason and was made a free agent that December.

The math: Kazmir +16.5 for Tampa Bay; Zambrano for New York, +1.4. Net impact: +17.9 WAR.

T-9. David Price

Twice in his career Price has been a deadline pickup for a postseason hopeful. On July 31, 2014, the Tigers acquired Price from Tampa Bay as part of a three-team deal.

It was a big trade, but not top 10 material. The Price trade we are interested in was the one authored almost exactly one season later, when the Tigers shipped Price to the Toronto Blue Jays.

Six games behind the Yankees in the AL East at the time of the trade, the Jays hoped Price would shore up their rotation down the stretch. He certainly did that, winning nine of his 10 decisions in 11 starts. But Price had a rough postseason, going 1-2 and getting a no-decision in Toronto’s Game 6 ALCS loss that sent the Kansas City Royals to the World Series.

Equally as impactful was the return to the Tigers. That return included two players who would become principals for Detroit, pitchers Matt Boyd and Daniel Norris. Boyd, who is still there seven seasons later, continues to average about 15 starts per season; he has run up a 9.2 career WAR for the Tigers. Norris added 6.1 WAR before leaving in midseason 2021 for Milwaukee and later Chicago’s North Side.

The math: Price: +2.6 WAR for Toronto; Boyd and Norris +15.3 WAR for Detroit. Net impact: +17.9

8. A haul for Milwaukee

Emerging from a total rebuild, the 2015 Houston Astros were poised to make their first serious playoff run in a decade. After averaging 104 losses for the previous four seasons, the Astros led the Angels by two games at the 2015 trade deadline.

They had a sterling lineup of young talent, including Carlos Correa, Jose Altuve, and George Springer. What they needed was experienced pitching. They saw it in Milwaukee, a last place team in the NL Central and hungry to trade veterans for prospects.

That scenario set the stage for one of the most interesting “present-for-future” deals ever consummated.

The Astros got the pitching help they needed in the person of Mike Fiers. Starting nine games, he was 2-1 with a 3.32 ERA.

Houston also got offensive help in Carlos Gomez, who plugged an outfield hole. Gomez played in six post-season games, but the Astros were ousted by the Royals.

The Brewers did OK, too … maybe more than OK. The cost of obtaining Gomez and Fiers turned out to be four-fold: a minor league reliever named Josh Hader, a minor league starter named Adrian Houser, and position players Brett Phillips and Domingo Santana.

The big catch, of course, was Hader, who became the National League’s most feared reliever and just this week was the centerpiece of a trade that sent him from the Brewers to San Diego. With Milwaukee, he accumulated 125 saves.

Houser has never gotten Hader’s headlines, but he has become a competent rotation piece. Since his 2015 debut, he’s averaged a dozen starts with a 3.92 ERA. His best season was 2021, 10-6 with a 3.22 ERA.

The math: Fiers and Gomez, +0.2 WAR for Houston; Hader, Houser, Santana and Phillips, +18.7 WAR for Milwaukee. Net impact: +18.9 WAR.

7. Again 2015

The 2015 trade deadline was, with the possible exception of 2022, the century’s most impactful. Three deals that turned out to be major went down, the third one involving the Texas Rangers and Philadelphia Phillies.

The Rangers were the hungry party at the 2015 deadline, desperate to improve their position in the tight AL West. They trailed the Astros by seven games and the Angels by five at the end of July, largely due to the absence of an anchor pitcher.

Their target: Cole Hamels, veteran ace of the floundering Philadelphia Phillies.

That July 31, the Rangers obtained Hamels as well as reliever Jake Diekman, although it cost them a full half dozen players, most of them prospects.

Hamels was worth the price. In a dozen starts, he went 7-1 with a 3.66 ERA. He made two postseason starts, getting a no-decision in Game 1 of Texas’ division series with Toronto and losing Game 5, 6-3.

Hamels remained with the Rangers through the 2017 trade deadline, when the Rangers shipped him to the Cubs. He produced 11.1 WAR in those parts-of-three-seasons in Texas.
None of the six players who went to Philadelphia in return proved to be game-changers, but one, starter Jerad Eickhoff, was significant. Eickhoff lasted through 2019, made 76 starts and had a 4.15 ERA, all of that translating to 5.9 WAR for the Phillies.

The Phillies also got catcher Jorge Alfaro, who played parts of three seasons before being traded to Miami. He’s now catching in San Diego.

The math: Hamels and Diekman, +13.5 WAR for Texas; Alfaro, Eickhoff, Matt Harrison, Jake Thompson, Nick Williams and Alec Asher, +6.2 for Philadelphia. Net impact: +19.7.

5. The Cubs steal a division title

For sheer one-sidededness, only one deal this century amounts to a bigger heist than the one the Cubs pulled off close to the 2003 trade deadline.

For one of the rare times in the past half century, the Cubs were in contention at the 2003 deadline. Although third in the NL Central, they trailed the division-leading Astros by only 5.5 games.

The always hopeful Cubs fans really got their hearts going when news of the July 23 deal with Pittsburgh broke. The Cubs, whose weak points were at third base and center field, covered both of them. They got veteran Kenny Lofton and hot-hitting young third baseman Aramis Ramirez from the Pirates at a cost of middle infielder Jose Hernandez and two prospects.

With a dozen home runs in Pittsburgh, Ramirez added 15 more for the Cubs. Lofton hit .327 as the club’s leadoff man, and between them the two led Chicago to a 38-24 finish. Chicago rushed past both the Cardinals and Astros, beating out Houston by one game before losing that memorable NLCS to the Miami Marlins.

Ramirez remained nine seasons with the Cubs, making an All-Star team and hitting 239 home runs. Lofton left as a free agent following the 2003 season.

The Pirates’ main target, prospect Bobby Hill, never established himself in parts of three seasons in Pittsburgh.

The math: Ramirez and Lofton, +25.9 WAR for Chicago; Hernandez and Hill, +0.2 WAR for Pittsburgh. Net impact: +26.1 WAR.

4. The cost of Scott Rolen

At the 2009 trade deadline, third baseman Scott Rolen was an obvious available difference-maker. Rolen was stuck in Toronto, a sub-.500 fourth place team in the AL East, and he was coming up on free agency to boot.

Somehow the Jays found an unlikely buyer for Rolen in the Cincinnati Reds, whose status was, if anything, even worse than Toronto’s. The Reds were buried in fifth place in the six-team NL Central, nursing the fifth-worst record in the National League.

Still, when the chance to get Rolen arose, Reds officials couldn’t resist.

The price was three players: Edwin Encarnacion, Josh Roenicke, and Zach Stewart.

Encarnacion turned out to be the difference maker. Batting only .209 at the time of the trade, he found  his power stroke with the Rays. He was a 20-home run guy by 2010 and a 40-home run guy by 2012.

In 2015 and again in 2016, the Jays made postseason runs with Encarnacion as an offensive centerpiece. He had nine RBI during the 2016 postseason, which ended with an ALCS defeat at the hands of the Cleveland Indians.

Rolen turned out to be a valuable piece for the Reds, too, although not in 2009. But one year later he hit. 285 as the Reds reached postseason play. They qualified again in 2012, Rolen’s final season, although Rolen had minimal postseason impact in either season.

The math: Rolen +7.6 WAR for Cincinnati; Encarnacion +25.2 WAR for Toronto. Net impact: +32.8 WAR.

3. Steal of the century

At the time the deal went down, as part of the 2010 trade deadline activity, nobody saw the impact this trade would have on the fortunes of one team.

On July 31 of that year, the Cardinals, Indians and Padres got together on a three-team, four-player package. The big name was pitcher Jake Westbrook, who went from Cleveland to St. Louis to prop up the Cardinals staff in anticipation of a postseason run.

But the sleeper in the deal turned out to be a 24-year-old Padres minor league pitcher sent to Cleveland in order to pry Westbrook loose to St. Louis. Corey Kluber was still a year away from making his MLB debut, and three years away from establishing himself in Cleveland’s rotation.

But in the annals of deadline trades, no team to date has gotten more for less than the Indians — now Guardians — did in obtaining Kluber for Westbrook.

Kluber won 98 of his 156 decisions in Cleveland before being traded to Texas at the end of 2019. He started three games in the 2016 World Series, winning Games 1 and 4 but being knocked out in Game 7. He led the league in wins twice and in ERA once.

Across 12 seasons in Cleveland, Kluber ran up +34.6 WAR at a minimal cost to Cleveland.

That makes the Kluber deal not only the century’s third-most impactful when all players are considered but also the most one-sided.

Of the other three players in the deal, none amounted to much. Westbrook lasted four so-so seasons in St. Louis but generated only a +1.0 WAR for that portion of his career.

The math: Kluber: +34.6 WAR for Cleveland; Westbrook +1.0 WAR for St. Louis. Net impact: +35.6 WAR.

2. Scott Rolen again

Scott Rolen is the only player to have been the centerpiece of two of this century’s most impactful deadline trades.

On July 29, 2002, the Phillies — stuck in the NL East cellar and burdened with a disenchanted Rolen looking toward free agency — set out to find a buyer for him. They found one in the St. Louis Cardinals, who led the NL Central.

Down the stretch, Rolen batted .278 with 14 home runs for St. Louis and played a solid third base. The fortified Cardinals breezed to the NL Central title, but were upset by San Francisco in the NLCS.

The Cardinals did make the World Series in 2004, losing to Boston, then in 2006 beat Detroit in the World Series.

Rolen was a vital part of both postseason runs, batting .421 in the 2006 World Series.

To get Rolen, the Cardinals had to send four players to Philadelphia. But only one of them, infielder Placido Polanco, generated significant value for the Phillies.

The math: Rolen, +25.9 WAR for St. Louis; Placido Polanco, Mike Timlin, and Bud Smith, +10.4 WAR for Philadelphia. Net impact: +36.3 WAR.

1. For extended impact on one team, it’s hard to beat the July 2007 trade between the Atlanta Braves and Texas Rangers.

The Braves were in third place in the NL East but hopeful of running down the division-leading Mets, who at the time had them by three and one-half games. So they went all-in on beefing up their lineup, offering the Texas Rangers four top prospects in exchange for first baseman Mark Teixeira. The Rangers, last in the AL West and willing to unload their veteran slugger, bit.

Teixeira certainly helped the Braves. He batted .317 with 17 home runs over those final two months.

But he could not lift the Braves into postseason play, and so when the 2008 trade deadline arrived the Braves packaged Teixeira to the Angels.

The real headline, though, is the haul the Rangers exacted from Atlanta in exchange for Teixeira. That haul included shortstop prospect Elvis Andrus, pitching prospect Neftali Feliz, catcher Jarrod Saltalamacchia, and pitcher Matt Harrison.

As the Rangers gradually built a team that would reach both the 2010 and 2011 World Series,  all four of those players emerged as important pieces.

Andrus remained a middle infield linchpin for Texas through 2020, accumulating +29.8 WAR  alone.

The math: Teixeira: +6.12 WAR for Atlanta; Andrus, Feliz, Harrison, Saltalamacchia, +48.1 WAR for Texas. Net impact: +54.2 WAR.

Honorable mentions

This article focuses on impactful deadline trades based on subsequent WAR for the players involved. But there have been many deadline trades which, while they did not pile up large career WAR numbers, did something even more important: They kick-started successful runs to a World Series championship.

So here’s a nod to deadline deals made by teams that got enough of a short-term bump from them to win it all in the year they made the deal.

July 31, 2004. As part of a four-team  swap, the Red Sox traded Nomar Garciaparra to the Cubs but got back first baseman Doug Mientkiewicz from the Twins and Orlando Cabrera from Montreal. Cabrera was the big catch in Boston’s World Series run, delivering a +1.8 WAR as Garciaparra’s replacement.

July 17, 2008. The Phillies acquired pitcher Joe Blanton from Oakland for four prospects. None of the prospects ever amounted to anything, but Blanton was 4-0 in 13 starts for the Phillies. He was 2-0 in three postseason starts, winning Game 4 of the World Series.

July 31, 2012. The Giants sent Nate Schierholz and two minor leaguers to Philadelphia and got Hunter Pence in return. Pence would play a key role in both the 2012 and 2014 World Series runs, batting .444 in the 2014 World Series.

July 28, 2015. Needing a veteran lineup presence to beef up their playoff run, the Royals acquired Ben Zobrist from Tampa Bay. The cost was high: pitching prospect Sean Manaea. That was two days after the Royals obtained Johnny Cueto from Cincinnati for three prospects. When Zobrist and Cueto both played prominent roles in Kansas City’s five-game World Series victory over the Mets, that high cost was well worth it.

As noted earlier, the trade with New York that brought closer Aroldis Chapman in exchange for prospect Gleyber Torres had only short-term value. Chapman signed as a free agent with New York at season’s end. But Cubs fans, starved for 108 seasons, would make that kind of short-term deal any day of the week.

July 25, 2018. The Red Sox traded pitching prospect Jalen Beeks to the Rays for Nathan Eovaldi. In the 2018 postseason, Eovaldi would make two starts and four relief appearances, covering 22 innings with a 1.61 ERA.

July 31, 2021. Concluding an active trade season that saw them revamp their outfield, the Atlanta Braves acquired both Jorge Soler from Kansas City and Eddie Rosario from Cleveland. Soler would be named World Series MVP.