The Best Players on the Market at the 2024 MLB Trade Deadline — And Who Needs to Deal for Them
Looking at the top players who might be available, by position, before Tuesday's afternoon's deadline.
I love the MLB trade deadline, because it really forces front offices to put on their thinking caps.
Specifically, they have to make decisions about whether to strategically add or subtract talent, all while having incomplete information. Teams can only estimate where they stand in the race for the playoffs and the World Series, but they need to use those estimates — as well as assessments of their own talent and that of other teams — to make big decisions that set the course of the franchise for years to come. Make the wrong decision to buy or sell (as the Angels did last year with Shohei Ohtani), and it can have far-reaching negative consequences. The pressure is immense, but it’s also pretty fun to follow as a neutral observer.
Last week, I scratched my trade deadline itch some with the release of a new and improved Doyle Number — a metric that judges whether a team’s big-picture championship hopes would be better if it bought talent or sold it. (Generally, a team with a Doyle above 1.00 should do the former; a team below 1.00 should do the latter.)1 But another fun exercise I like to do at the deadline is to pull all of the pending free agents from Spotrac and filter them down to players on teams with Doyle Numbers under 1.00 — basically, finding the players who should be on the market — and try to match them with buyers who need help from that position.
Last year, my then-colleague Javon Edmonds and I broke all of that down using Wins Above Replacement for pitchers and batters who were due to be free agents the following winter. But this year, I’ve expanded the charts to also give an option for free agents under another year of team control, since those kinds of players are being dealt more and more. With the caveat that this only includes moves up to the Carson Kelly trade on Sunday evening, let’s go through most of the players who might still be available via trade before the deadline bell strikes at 6 p.m. ET on on July 30 — and which teams with any kind of Doyle Number might be in on acquiring them.
Starting Pitchers
There’s been a lot of buzz around Detroit potentially selling Tarik Skubal, the team ace who has a couple more arbitration years left after 2024. But the truth is that another Tigers pitcher — Jack Flaherty — stands out as the most valuable by WAR among those due to be a free next winter. He leads a group of six starters with an established level of at least 2.3 WAR per 162 games under that category, and there’s a handful more really interesting names (led by Seth Lugo, if KC punts with its 49.7% playoff odds) set for free agency the next offseason. As always, this is one of the positions that could potentially swing a playoff race and/or postseason series the most.
Who needs ‘em? Among teams with any kind of Doyle that might justify buying, the Guardians (29th in rotation WAR) and Diamondbacks (26th) are in the most need of starting pitching, followed by the Brewers (No. 21), Mets (20th), Astros (17th) and Twins (16th). And it bears mentioning that Milwaukee has the best farm system — ranked 2nd by Baseball America in preseason — of that group.
Relief Pitchers
Every contender always needs relief arms at the deadline, and we’ve already seen a few fly around in the form of Carlos Estevez, Phil Maton and Ryne Stanek. But there are more good ones on the list above, if they can be pried away, headlined by Tanner Scott of the Marlins.
Who needs ‘em? The Mets (No. 27 in relief WAR) have the worst bullpen among quasi-buyers, followed by the Royals at 25th. Both of their Doyle Numbers are below 1.00, but the Mets have already been active on the market (granted, for a few of the relievers mentioned above). The team with a higher Doyle who absolutely needs bullpen help the most is the Yankees, who rank 22nd in relief WAR.
Catchers
With Carson Kelly and Danny Jansen already moving (to the Rangers and Red Sox, respectively), a few of the top backstops have already left the market. It will be highly interesting to see what the Colorado Rockies do, as they now have both of the most productive potential pending free agent catchers in Jacob Stallings and Elias Diaz. (The Rockies do also have the option to keep Stallings, making Diaz the more likely departure.)
Who needs ‘em? Among our group of plausible buyers, the Padres (24th), Guardians (23rd) and Twins (20th) have gotten the fewest WAR from their catchers, followed by the Red Sox (18th) and Mets (17th). But catcher is a tricky position to judge this way, just because one bad half of a timeshare can tank a team’s WAR ranking. (The Orioles rank just 16th, for instance, despite the play of Adley Rutschman, because James McCann is tracking for -0.71 WAR as the backup.)
Middle Infielders
As much as I recently waxed poetic about the increased importance of second basemen in modern team-building, middle infielders probably won’t be among this deadline’s earth-shattering moves. The best pending free agents at the position group (Ha-seong Kim, Willy Adames, Gleyber Torres) are all on unlikely sellers, even if Torres has been the subject of swirling trade rumors in the NY media. And the Mets seem unlikely to deal Iglesias, the heart and soul of their recent winning run. That leaves someone like Lowe, and the Rays certainly seem open for business after already dealing away Aaron Civale, Phil Maton, Randy Arozarena, Zach Eflin, Jason Adam and Isaac Paredes.
Who needs ‘em? Two potential buyers stand out as ranking 18th or worse in production from both second base and shortstop: the Red Sox (29th at 2B; 21st at SS) and Mariners (23rd; 18th). For Boston, Ceddanne Rafaela and David Hamilton have both had their moments, but it might be worth kicking the tires on some help up the middle. At second, the Yankees (22nd) and Royals (21st) have also lacked for production, while the Braves (28th) and Guardians (25th) have gotten little value out of their shortstops.
Corner Infielders
There are quite a few interesting names in the ranks of those who might be available here. Chapman is one of the best potentially available players, period, and he is on pace for his best WAR season since 2019. With the Giants sitting under 12% playoff odds, it might be time to deal him to his third team in two years. It’s a little hard to see the surging D-Backs and Mets sending off Christian Walker/Eugenio Suarez or Pete Alonso, respectively, and the Cardinals are still in the thick of the playoff chase (despite 24% odds), so Paul Goldschmidt is probably staying put. But any of those guys would be big dominoes to fall this week if they did go.
Who needs ‘em? The Yankees rank outside the Top 20 in WAR from both first (27th) and third (23rd) base, so they would do well to consider upgrades. Other teams, such as the Astros (30th at 1B), Red Sox (24th at 1B), Mariners (22nd at 1B), Royals (21st at 3B) and Brewers (20th at 1B) have more specific holes to fill.
Outfielders/Designated Hitters
The Red Sox are in a weird spot, with a low Doyle Number and 39% playoff odds, but also a very small margin to the AL’s last wild-card spot and plenty of room to improve (see above). They’ve already added Jansen and James Paxton, so they are probably looking to stay in the race — but Tyler O'Neill would be a great sell-high candidate (with 22 home runs so far) if they did choose to sell. He joins a few other flawed-yet-interesting names on the list of pending free agents — Cody Bellinger, Joc Pederson, J.D. Martinez, Mike Yastrzemski and LaMonte Wade Jr. (?) — that you could easily see coming up in big postseason moments as rentals.2
Who needs ‘em? The Atlanta Braves are the most obvious team in need of OF help, after they’ve resorted again to breaking glass in case of their emergency guys from 2021 (Adam Duvall, who has been horrible, Eddie Rosario, etc.) Atlanta ranks 25th in WAR from outfielders, with Ronald Acuña Jr. proving to be one of the season’s most costly injuries; others of note are the Royals (23rd) and Dodgers (20th). And K.C. also needs help at DH, where they rank 22nd in value this season, joining the Mariners (24th) in that regard.
Filed under: Baseball
With some exceptions, which I got into in the article.
Or in the cases of those Giants guys, rental-pluses.
Having nothing to do with the extensive work here which I greatly admire, I still do not get the trade deadline mentality. Do-not-get-it.
This year is no different. I see transaction after transaction where the sellers don't get enough, while the buyers gets marginal players for two months who won't materially impact their postseason chances in exchange for a piece of their dwindling future assets. If the Padres didn't win anything after obtaining Juan Soto in 2022, are they really going to make noise with Jason Adam?
Lose, lose. Rinse, repeat. All as the media wildly applauds the "excitement."
Look, if you are the Dodgers or Phillies or Yankees or Orioles and have a very high likelihood now of reaching the World Series and have a hole to fill and there is talent available at a reasonable price to fill it - have at it. On the other hand, if you are the Guardians, the Cardinals, the Padres, the Rangers, the Red Sox, the Cubs, the Diamondbacks, the Twins etc...what the hell are you doing? Put the phone down and build for 2025.
Your article notes: "...they have to make decisions about whether to strategically add or subtract talent, all while having incomplete information...make the wrong decision to buy or sell...and it can have far reaching negative consequences." Doesn't that sound sub-optimal, not analytical and just plain reckless given the time limitations? What's the upside for all those potential negative consequences?
My impressions are of course mine alone. But let's apply some history and data to this issue to learn more. A few days ago Mark Feinsand at MLB.com looked at around 60 years of trade deadline deals and identified 16 that were material to a postseason run. Let me repeat - 16. Now, some of those 16 reflected teams with high probabilities of making the World Series before the trade (who should have rightly been looking to deal), but let's be conservative and take all 16. When you consider the average number of deals done each year over that 60-year span, that approximates to a less than 2% success rate.
There is nothing that matters in your life where if you knew going in your likely success rate was less than 2% where you would do that transaction. You just wouldn't no matter how exciting it might be. Yet, each year supposedly smart baseball front offices continue to wheel and deal with a level of wild irrational exuberance and hysteria and incomplete information into oblivion because the artificial trade deadline is approaching. I know one thing for certain, whether it's Girl Scout cookies or the MLB trade deadline, artificial scarcity is an amazing drug.
I think this Substack can play a very important role in moving the discourse toward more rational and thoughtful behavior. What I would love to see is a piece after the World Series each year evaluating these deadline deals retrospectively. I would assign each one to four "Halos" in honor of the Angels wrecking their franchise for a decade or more by "going all in" at the deadline as championed by the pundits. Four Halos would reflect the highest level of front office delusion - one Halo, a shrewd front office move.
Once the results are more publicized and internalized and people become more aware of what a waste the deadline is for most teams, we should be able to better articulate the attributes that define who should be a buyer, who should be a seller, and the great masses that should do nothing at all.
For example, what should be the minimum predicted percentage of getting to the World Series be in late July before ever thinking about trading for a player - 30%, 40%? Then use your Doyle Number, then look at farm system/pipeline value, then examine contract control years as added value and finally, look at maximum price to be paid...some sort of scorecard evaluation system like that.
I suspect that such a thoughtful analysis will go a long way towards ending our national baseball obsession of confusing movement with progress every July. Thanks again.