3 reasons the Boston Red Sox and New York Yankees were quiet at the trade deadline

Other AL contenders who were already better than the Yankees and Red Sox got better

There are several teams in the hunt for the three AL Wild Card berths. Boston is currently 1.5 games behind the Blue Jays for the last spot and the Yankees are 3.5 behind Toronto and the Los Angeles Angels are in between Boston and New York.

Toronto received a scare on Monday night when Bo Bichette left the game after suffering a knee injury running the bases. They can’t afford to lose one of their most consistent bats for any length of time. If there is a silver lining to the timing of the injury, it gave the front office one day to add. They made their second deal in a week with the St. Louis Cardinals when they acquired Paul DeJong for infield depth after getting pitcher Jordan Hicks last week. Both are upgrades for the final two months.

The Rays picked up starting pitcher Aaron Civale from the Cleveland Guardians, the Orioles got Cardinals’ starting pitcher Jack Flaherty and the Angels continued to add after taking Shohei Ohtani off the trade market by getting CJ Cron and Randal Grichuk from the Colorado Rockies. The Houston Astros, who hold the second Wild Card spot in the AL, reacquired pitcher Justin Verlander from the New York Mets, who shipped Max Scherzer over the weekend to the Texas Rangers.

It feels like both Bloom and Cashman stood pat for the most part knowing that adding any big pieces would more than likely not make a difference in the long run.