Thursday, June 18, 2009

Who Will The Sellers Be?

With the trading deadline rapidly approaching, let's take a look at some teams, who might look to sell at the deadline.

Notice a trend here with these teams?

Pittsburgh: UNSURE (probably sellers)
-already traded away Nate McLouth, who was their best player
-only 5.5 games out of first place at the moment
-too early to say if the Pirates will trade away any other players after the McLouth backlash

Houston: UNSURE
-4 games under .500, but only 5.5 games out of first place
-Jose Valverde could be a very attractive trade chip
-can't say for sure if they will be buyers or sellers yet

Oakland: UNSURE
-9 games out of first place and 9.5 games out of the wild card
-likely to become sellers if they cannot gain some ground soon
-however, besides Matt Holliday, what pieces do they realistically have to move?

Mariners: UNSURE
-6 games out of first place, but 5 games out of wild card
-Jarrod Washburn could be a very attractive chip
-Erik Bedard's injury could/should hurt his trade value
-how much longer can they keep pace with the Angels and Rangers?
-think about the future! (SELL, SELL, SELL)

Arizona: SELLER
-16 games out of first place, but only 8 out of the wild card
-Eric Byrnes is the only veteran with a absurd contact, who the D-Backs should clamor to move
-potential free agents Doug Davis, Felipe Lopez, and Jon Garland could net a healthy return as well (especially Davis)
-Qualls, Rauch, and Schoeneweis all could be attractive trade chips

San Diego: SELLER (if they have any pieces to move)
-14 games out of first place
-tried to trade Jake Peavy earlier in the season to Chicago, but that deal fell through
-do they have any other tradeable pieces besides Peavy?

Colorado: UNSURE
-11 games out of first place, but only 3.5 out of the wild card
-Their recent 11 game winning streak sure changed their status from probable sellers to dare I say it....buyers.
-Lots of attractive pieces here: Brad Hawpe, Hutson Street, Jason Marquis

Cleveland: UNSURE
-6.5 games out of first place....9.5 games out of the wild card
-Playing better recently....AL Central is very weak
-might be getting Sizemore back soon....should they hold?

Washington: SELLERS
-19 games out of first place, 17.5 games out of the wild card
-what a mess.
-everyone outside of Zimmerman/Zimmermann (for the most part) should be available

Baltimore: SELLERS
-12 games out of first place, 9 games out of the wild card
-Future should be the focus in Baltimore
-get more young pieces!

As you can see, there are so many teams out there right now who are not sure if they will be sellers. The reason is simple: there are so many mediocre teams in baseball this season that almost every team is still in striking distance of the playoffs.

Thoughts?

3 comments:

Ron Rollins said...

Did you leave the Royals off the list due to the fact that they are so damn disgusting to watch that no one would seriously want any of thier players?

Because you're right.

Jorge Says No! said...

Ron,

Admittedly, I left the Royals off by accident.

But I honestly don't think Dayton Moore has come to the conclusion yet that the Royals are not a good baseball team.

And as you said before, who exactly do they have to trade? I can't think of anyone who other teams would want AND the Royals would want to trade away...

tHeMARksMiTh said...

I'm thinking that every season we see storylines where it's odd that there are so many mediocre teams at this point in the year. You aren't the only one to say something like this, and it's not wrong that there are a lot of mediocre teams. But one of these years, people aren't going to be surprised that there are a bunch of mediocre teams. Selig hoped that competitive balance would bring about 30 good teams, but what he did was make 30 mediocre teams.