If there is one thing that can be predicted about the MLB trade deadline each year, it is that it is unpredictable.
The big deadline winners have rarely made it to the World Series as of late, while some teams that make little to no moves end up winning the pennant.
Last season, for example, the Oakland Athletics came away as the deadline’s big winner. They went all-in to acquire pitchers Jeff Samardzija, Jason Hammel and Jon Lester and gave up outfielder Yoenis Cespedes and top prospects Addison Russell and Billy McKinney.
What did they have to show for it?
A loss in the Wild Card round to the Kansas City Royals, and none of the trio of players they acquired are with the team anymore. On top of that, they have the worst record in the American League, one of the worst farm systems in baseball and are currently having a fire sale that dates back to the winter to rebuild their prospect base (which waiting a year to trade Cespedes could have aided in doing).
It could be argued that the Athletics figured last season was their last chance to compete for a title for a few years – regardless of if they kept their prospects or not – so making all-in trades may have felt necessary. But the real takeaway is that going all-in with trades does not always yield the results the team desires.
Now compare them to the two teams that did make the World Series last year: the San Francisco Giants and Kansas City Royals. Jake Peavy was traded to the Giants from the Boston Red Sox, while the Royals acquired Josh Willingham from the Minnesota Twins. Willingham had all of four postseason at-bats, and the Giants won in spite of Peavy and his 0-2 record and nine runs given up in his two World Series starts.
This is not to say there is a definitive way to attack the trade deadline. The Royals and Giants made the World Series in spite of their lack of trades, but the Pittsburgh Pirates big trade last year was for reliever John Axford, and they did not make it out of the Wild Card round. Last season provided two good examples of lack of deals having opposite results for teams that made them.
The year before, the only big trade the 2013 World Series champion Red Sox made was the one that got them Peavy, who had a 4.04 regular season ERA with Boston and gave up 10 runs in 12.2 postseason innings. In fact, the Red Sox were on the selling end of a big trade in the midst of a lost season the year before, when they sent Josh Beckett, Carl Crawford Adrian Gonzalez Nick Punto to the Los Angeles Dodgers. The Dodgers, for what it’s worth, have not advanced past the NLCS since the trade.
Then there are some trades that may work for some teams, but not others. Take the 2012 trade of Hunter Pence from the Philadelphia Phillies to the Giants.
If you remember, the Pirates also were linked to Pence prior to him being traded to the Giants. But the rumors were that the Phillies wanted a young outfield prospect by the name of Starling Marte in return.
Pence has been a solid member of the Giants since the trade, but he is not the player Marte is. Pence alone would not have staved off the Pirates’ monumental collapse in 2012, and likely would have left as a free agent after the 2013 season, all at the expense of a now-budding superstar.
The Pirates were smart to hang onto their top prospect in that instance, but that does not always mean the prospects involved in trade talk work out. That same season the Pirates traded minor league outfielder Robbie Grossman and pitchers Rudy Owens and Colton Cain to the Houston Astros for pitcher Wandy Rodriguez.
Rodriguez did not have much of an impact with the Pirates, but the three traded prospects ended up flaming out.
The overlying point here is that it is impossible to declare winners or losers of completed trades or trades that were not made. What may seem like a huge acquisition could end up setting a team back years due to the cost; other times the prospects paid end up amounting to nothing.
So as we close in on the non-waiver trade deadline Friday, keep in mind that the best move the Pirates may make is a trade that does not happen.
