2025 MLB Trade Deadline Buyers: 5 Biggest Winners, Losers

It is August 1st, which means now that the dust has settled, we get the chance to make our gut reactions on which teams have “won” and which teams have “lost” the deadline.

In reality, we really won’t know who won or lost the deadline until one team has outlasted all the rest and is holding the Commissioner’s Trophy as World Series champions. For now, though, let’s speculate on which front office did the best to bolster their roster for a playoff push.

Plenty of outlets have their own biggest winners and losers piece after the deadline, often coming with deadline grades they have given each team. For us at Just Baseball, we have decided to split this concept into two different articles. One were we identify the winners and losers amongst the buyers at the deadline. And a follow-up where we will review the best and worst sellers.

These rankings are not about the prospects given up to get deals done and who did the most with less at this year’s deadline. It is about which teams did what they had to do to win right now.

Whether that means putting themselves in position to make the playoffs, if that was far from a certainty, or if they were already a favorite to make the postseason, but needed more pieces as they are dreaming of that World Series run.

We have identified and ranked both the five biggest winners and losers at this year’s deadline, amongst the teams that were on the market searching for upgrades to win now.

Top 5 Trade Deadline Winners

Honorable Mention: Toronto Blue Jays

Players Added: RHP Shane Bieber, RHP Seranthony Dominguez, RHP Louis Varland, 1B Ty France

The Toronto Blue Jays were the one trade deadline winner we had to leave on the cutting room floor, but they still deserved a mention for what was a pretty solid deadline. They have been swinging the bats as good as any team in baseball lately, but have had some holes to fill on their pitching staff.

For a team that needed to add bullpen help, they landed two arms who are in the midst of good seasons, with Seranthony Dominguez (3.12 ERA), and Louis Varland (2.02 ERA). Dominguez is a veteran reliever has plenty of playoff experience with the Phillies. He will be a free agent after this season.

Varland is a failed starter, who is having great success in his first full season pitching out of the bullpen. If it’s sustainable, Varland could be a piece in this bullpen for year’s to come, as he has five years of team control.

Finally, the Blue Jays took a flier on bolstering their rotation with injured former ace Shane Bieber.

Bieber is recovering off Tommy John surgery, making him the ultimate Wild Card, but the upside is immense. He was up to 57 pitches in his last rehab start, so he is likely still a few weeks away from making an impact.

The Blue Jays did not make our list because they did not add a closer in a market that was ripe with them, and the gamble on Bieber is a risky one. We could look back, though, and realize they got everything they needed come October.

5. Philadelphia Phillies

Players Added: RHP Jhoan Duran, CF Harrison Bader

The Phillies didn’t make a ton of moves, but they made a few very impactful ones, namely, landing the best closer on the market (apologies to Mason Miller) in Jhoan Duran.

Phillies fans now get to delight in watching 97 MPH splitters for the next three playoff runs, adding a bona fide closer to a team that desperately needed one.

David Robertson was effectively another deadline addition for the Phillies, giving them another arm that will bolster their bullpen down the stretch and into the playoffs (that signing did not count for this exercise, or they may have been ranked higher).

Seemingly in a competition with their division rival, the New York Mets, in the center field market, the Phillies struck first and landed Harrison Bader. Last year, Bader played on the other side of that rivalry (although he was relegated to the bench come October). Now he’s a member of the Phillies, and he is joining them in what is arguably a career year.

Bader’s best season came in 2021, when he won a Gold Glove and posted a career-best .785 OPS. Playing in left field instead of center, next to Byron Buxton, Bader was great for the Twins this season, posting a .778 OPS and hitting 12 home runs in 96 games.

This move should allow Brandon Marsh to stick in a corner, where he is much better defensively, and it takes Johan Rojas’ bat out of the lineup. Solid upgrade for a team that didn’t need too much offensively.

4. New York Yankees

Players Added: RHP David Bednar, RHP Jake Bird, RHP Camilo Doval, 3B Ryan McMahon, IF Amed Rosario, IF Jose Caballero, OF Austin Slater

There are going to be a lot of Yankees fans who are not going to like seeing their team this “low” in our rankings compared to a few teams ahead of them that did less. But this is not about the quantity of moves; it is about getting what you need to make a run.

When it comes to their bullpen, the Yankees did exactly that. They landed three high-leverage relievers, all of whom come with extra years of team control.

David Bednar is the biggest prize, having pitched to a 2.37 ERA as the Pirates’ closer this season. Camilo Doval comes with plenty of closing experience as well, and has pitched to a 3.09 ERA this season, and a career 3.29 ERA.

Doval comes with two and a half years of control, Bendar comes with one and a half. Meanwhile, Jake Bird comes with three and a half years of control, although he has a 4.73 ERA on the season.

The former Rockie got off to a great start this year, but has really faded lately, and it is not due to pitching in Coors. Instead, it is pitching on the road that has killed Bird, who has an ERA of 2.48 ERA at home this year, and a 7.40 ERA on the road. Still, he has good stuff and could be unlocked to be the best version of himself with the Yankees.

There is no doubt that the Yankees’ bullpen is much better than it was a week ago, but they notably did not make any additions to their starting rotation. They also picked up four bats at this deadline, but only Amed Rosario has a wRC+ over 100 (108) this year.

McMahon improves the Yankees by a significant margin defensively. But offensively, there are still questions at the bottom of that Yankee lineup. And the Yankees failed to address their starting rotation.

3. New York Mets

Players Added: RHP Ryan Helsley, RHP Tyler Rogers, LHP Gregory Soto, CF Cedric Mullins

In a trade market that was defined by great relievers getting moved, no team was more aggressive in adding arms than the New York Mets. They first pulled off a trade about a week ahead of the deadline, swinging a deal with the Orioles to land left-handed flamethrower Gregory Soto.

They then followed up with a pair of big bullpen moves on deadline eve, first swinging a deal for submariner Tyler Rogers, then landing a true closer in Ryan Helsley. In the trio of moves, the Mets built a completely new bridge to incumbent closer Edwin Diaz, and his previous bridge wasn’t that bad either.

The Mets recently got Brooks Raley off the IL (a sneaky good late-April signing), and the 37-year-old has picked up where he left off when he did not allow a run in seven innings in 2024, before going down with TJ. In his road back, Raley did not allow a single run on his rehab tour through the Mets’ minor leagues, and he hasn’t given up one in his first five appearances since being back.

Reed Garrett was the Mets’ 8th inning guy two weeks ago; now he takes his 2.70 ERA into the middle innings, as the Mets have Raley, and two new additions that move up the pecking order for the 7th and 8th innings.

Helsley is the big addition that fans will be most excited about, and rightfully so. The 31-year-old routinely lights up the radar gun with triple digits, being able to grab 101, 102 with ease. And his fastball is not even his best pitch.

Instead, it is Helsley’s slider that is his greatest weapon, as he routinely runs whiff rates over 50% on his breaker. By run value over 100, Helsey’s slider is tied with Andres Munoz for being the best in baseball. Having two closers gives manager Carlos Mendoza so much freedom to use his bullpen aggressively, especially come October.

Then you have Tyler Rogers, who gives the Mets bullpen a completely different look from the hard-throwing fastball-slider repertoire of their closers. From fastest to slowest, Rogers averages just 83 MPH on his sinker, in the 1st percentile for average fastball velocity.

But he throws that sinker from a -60 angle, making it one of the most difficult pitches to hit in the game, along with his change-of-pace 74 MPH slider. Rogers has been baffling hitters with his two-pitch mix for years now, and has quietly been one of the most effective set-up men in baseball.

Rogers’ 1.80 ERA would be a career-best over a full season, but he has never finished with an ERA over 3.57, and last year pitched to a 2.82. He also has a rubber arm, three times leading the league in appearances, and clearing 70 innings in each of the last four seasons.

Helsey and Diaz will likely be the only Met to pitch in the ninth inning for save situations, but Rogers will own the 8th inning, as the perfect buffer between the two closers whenever they use all three in the same game.

The addition of Soto as a set-up man would have been a little underwhelming on it’s own, but when combined with the other moves, this looks to be a great addition as well. Soto will likely pitch in high leverage situations but more for those key left-on-left matchups, for which he thrives.

You can quibble with the Mets not getting a starting pitcher to a rotation that still has plenty of question marks, but building a super-bullpen should hedge some of the concern in the rotation. The Mets are hoping that the return of Kodai Senga and Sean Manaea will be enough, along with the breakout All-Star David Peterson, to have enough in their rotation.

Finally, the Mets wanted a center fielder, and while all reports had them in hot pursuit of Luis Robert Jr., nobody could pull off a deal with the White Sox, and they ended up landing Mullins instead. While having a real up-and-down year, Mullins has been hot lately and is a huge upgrade offensively over Tyrone Taylor.

2. Seattle Mariners

Players Added: 3B Eugenio Suarez, 1B Josh Naylor, LHP Caleb Ferguson

The Seattle Mariners are the only team at this trade deadline that significantly improved their offense, and that is not being hyperbolic. Very few bats were traded, and none were better than the two the Mariners got, trading for Eugenio Suarez and Josh Naylor.

Suarez was the top bat on the block, with 36 home runs and 87 RBIs. Naylor is hitting .288/.356/.442, bringing a solid veteran left-handed bat to the middle of a lineup that could use one.

Now with Randy Arozarena, Julio Rodriguez, MVP candidate Cal Raleigh, Suarez, and Naylor, the Mariners have a 1-5 that teams will really fear. Finally, the Mariners can rake!

The other need the Mariners were able to fill was grabbing a left-handed reliever in Caleb Ferguson, who has a 3.74 ERA this season in 43 1/3 innings pitched.

Part of what went into our rankings was how much the teams changed their outlooks for this season based on the moves they made, and the Mariners have done that as well as anyone. The Mariners were in the race before the deadline, but now you can look at them as the favorites to run down the Astros and win the AL West.

For years, we have been clamoring for the Mariners to make moves to add bats for this team that has always had such great pitching. Finally, they make the moves to win now, and should be celebrated for it.

1. San Diego Padres

Players Added: RHP Mason Miller, LHP JP Sears, LHP Nestor Cortes, C Freddy Fermin, OF Ramon Laureano, 1B/DH Ryan O’Hearn, IF Will Wagner

The San Diego Padres are going to win this exercise 9/10 times if we grade on this scale, where we ignore the future implications of the moves made. The reality is, this is how they operate. A.J. Preller is going to turn over his farm system to win every time and will do so without remorse.

So instead of talking about the top 10 prospect in baseball they dealt, or the 10 prospects they sent out in just two trades, let’s talk about what they accomplished. The Padres landed a top-five closer in baseball, two starting pitchers, a new starting catcher, left fielder, and DH, while picking up a new utilityman for the heck of it. That’s seven players, which amounts to 26.9% of their 26-man roster.

Obviously, the best player added was Mason Miller, who comes with the intrigue of potentially becoming a starting pitcher next season. For now, though, Miller gets slotted into a super-bullpen that has five legitimate lights-out options.

Robert Suarez, Jason Adam, and Adrian Morejon were all All-Stars, as was Miller, and as Jack McMullen said on the Just Baseball Show, “and Jeremiah Estrada might have the best stuff out of all of them.” That’s not to mention solid veteran left-handers in Wandy Peralta and Yuki Matsui.

Here’s what the Padres are going to have in their bullpen come October:

• Robert Suarez: 44 2/3 IP, 3.43 ERA, 30 SV, 9.47 K/9, 2.42 BB/9, 0.40 HR/9
• Mason Miller: 38 1/3 IP, 3.76 ERA, 20 SV, 13.85 K/9, 4.23 BB/9, 0.94 HR/9
• Jason Adam: 52 1/3 IP, 1.89 ERA, 9.63 K/9, 3.96 BB/9, 0.52 HR/9
• Adrian Morejon: 49 2/3 IP, 1.63 ERA, 9.06 K/9, 1.63 BB/9, 0.18 HR/9
• Jeremiah Estrada: 48 2/3 IP, 2.59 ERA, 12.21 K/9, 2.96 BB/9, 0.92 HR/9

That group doesn’t even include rookie David Morgan, who averages 97.7 MPH on his fastball and is pitching to a 2.08 ERA across his first 23 MLB appearances this season. Bottom line, if the Padres get a lead, good luck.

Adding Mason Miller was not a necessity for the Padres. It was a luxury add, but one of the best kind, because it is doubling, tripling, maybe even quadrupling down on the best part of this team, their ability to win tight games and shorten games for a shaky rotation.

Speaking of the rotation, JP Sears is more than just some throw-in in the Mason Miller trade, this is a cost-controlled MLB starter for a team that is desperate for one. Sears will hit arbitration for the first time this offseason, meaning he has three more years of cheap control ahead of him.

A left-hander starter with a career 4.48 ERA, which he is not quite meeting this year (4.95 ERA), Sears has eclipsed 170 innings in each of the last two seasons, and very well could hit that mark with a strong finish, as he is currently sitting at 111. Getting out of Sacramento should help his ERA, but regardless, the Padres needed innings and they got them with Sears.

Finally, one of the last moves that was slid across the finish line at the deadline was a trade to pick up Nestor Cortes from the Brewers. Cortes has been hurt all year, and the Brewers simply had no room for him. The Padres swoop in and pick up a guy who is a year removed from pitching to a 3.77 ERA over 174 1/3 innings pitched.

If all goes as planned with Yu Darvish, Nick Pivetta, Dylan Cease, and probably Randy Vasquez, neither Cortes nor Sears should be in a playoff rotation for the Padres. But it doesn’t hurt that Cortes at least has that experience and the upside of someone who could make a playoff start if need be.

All of this talk about the arms, and we still haven’t talked about how the Padres added three likely starters into their lineup at the deadline. Landing Ryan O’Hearn and Ramon Laureno in the same deal with the Orioles immediately lengthens their lineup.

O’Hearn was an All-Star and will be a big upgrade either at the DH spot, or at first base if the Padres decide to DH Luis Arraez. Left field has been a revolving door for the Padres since losing Jurickson Profar in free agency, and Laureano fills that spot as a huge upgrade (144 wRC+, 2.3 fWAR).

Freddy Fermin may not seem like the biggest of upgrades, but the catcher position has been a black hole for the Padres this year, so anything helps.

Preller took a fringe Wild Card team and turned them into a bona fide World Series contender in about 10 hours. That’s really impressive work, long-term ramifications be damned.

Top 5 Trade Deadline Losers

Honorable Mention: Los Angeles Dodgers

Players Added: OF Alex Call, RHP Brock Stewart

The Dodgers are betting on what they have in-house, and if they get healthy, that is more than enough for them to be feared as the favorite come October. For now though, there are questions and questions that weren’t really answered.

The bullpen has been an issue, and they did get an arm. Just an underwhelming one. Maybe that is not fair to Brock Stewart, who has a 2.38 ERA this season in 34 innings pitched. But at a deadline where countless bullpen splashes were made, the Dodgers were notably quiet.

They picked up an upgrade in left field with Alex Call, which was probably their biggest need, but despite his 118 wRC+, there’s something inherently unsexy about Call. This is the Dodgers!

We were expecting a Steven Kwan, Emmanuel Clase blockbuster going into deadline week, and while it was Clase that took his own name off the market, the Dodgers didn’t push the chips in for Kwan when he would have been a perfect fit.

If we were grading the Dodgers for their deadline, it would be a C. Not good enough to be called a winner, but not truly bad enough to be called a loser of the 2025 MLB Trade Deadline.

5. Cincinnati Reds

Players Added: 3B Ke’Bryan Hayes, RHP Zack Littell

The Cincinnati Reds don’t often get the opportunity to be buyers at the trade deadline, but this year they played themselves into that position as the first time out of the NL Wild Card picture on deadline day. When compared to what that third Wild Card team did (Padres), the Reds have fallen behind despite buying a few pieces at the deadline.

Clay Snowden wrote a piece for us on the Reds’ deadline and put it best when he noted the Laureno/O’Hearn trade that the Padres made, and how that would have been the perfect move to bolster a lineup that desperately needed a few bats.

Instead, the Reds traded for the best defensive third baseman in baseball. Which helps, and is a long-term play, but Hayes has a .570 OPS this year. And that’s after homering in his first game in Cincinnati last night.

In a vacuum, Zack Littell was a solid move for the Reds starting rotation, giving them an innings-eater who has pitched to a 3.58 ERA this season.

Neither trade was necessarily bad, but the Reds did not push more chips in to win now. Maybe the other six teams in the National League were always too good to catch and they are proven right, but it feels like they all but punted a year with Elly De La Cruz in pre-arb and a starting rotation that could do real damage in a playoff setting.

4. Detroit Tigers

Players Added: RHP Charlie Morton, RHP Kyle Finnegan, RHP Paul Sewald, RHP Rafael Montero, RHP Codi Heuer, RHP Chris Paddack

We framed this exercise under the concept of which teams most improved their standing as buyers at the deadline. For the Tigers, they improved, but when you have a chance to be the favorites in the American League and the best player added was either Charlie Morton, Chris Paddack, or Kyle Finnegan, something gets lost in the translation.

Detroit may have enough, and could win it all this year. But it feels like they didn’t make a single move that makes this team tougher to beat come October.

Finnegan has enjoyed the closer’s role on a second-division team for the past three years, racking up 108 career saves, with 86 of them coming in the last three years. Getting another guy who is comfortable pitching in the ninth is great, but playoff lineups are not going to fear him if they are trailing by one in the late innings of an October game.

Same can be said for Rafael Montero and Paul Sewald, who have not been good in a few years now.

Chris Paddack was a solid get to add some depth to a rotation that needed it, and Charlie Morton has been much better over the past few months and we all know he is capable to stepping up with a slow heart-beat in a playoff setting.

Maybe it’s enough, but the Tigers have a good enough farm system where they could have put some better chips on the table for some more impactful pieces.

3. Milwaukee Brewers

Players Added: RHP Shelby Miller, LHP Jordan Montgomery, C Danny Jansen, OF Brandon Lockridge

The Milwaukee Brewers had the best record in baseball on deadline day, but they sure didn’t act like a team with World Series aspirations with how they made moves at the deadline. Being passive and holding onto prospects is what has put the Brewers in this position to be atop the NL Central every year. At some point, though, when do you try to win now?

This is not a team that has to worry about the state of their farm system. Our top analysts believe this is the best farm system in all of baseball. Yet, they refused to part with the necessary pieces to land Eugenio Suarez, who would have transformed their lineup.

Other third baseman traded may not have been the best of fits, like Ryan MacMahon and Ke’Bryan Hayes, who have contracts that are not very attractive, but a utilityman like Willi Castro could have helped the Brewers at the hot corner.

If not third base, why not jump on a Ramon Laureno for another bat to stick in a corner outfield spot? The Brewers seem to be buying into what they have gotten out of Andrew Vaughn, which has been remarkable, but is likely unsustainable.

Then we look at their bullpen, and the Brewers almost let the clock expire on the deadline without grabbing any reinforcements. Now, their one trade on deadline day really salvaged things.

They ate some salary on Jordan Montgomery, who is recovering from Tommy John surgery, and were able to pick up Shelby Miller. Before a recent injury, Miller was closing games for the D-backs, picking up 10 saves and pitching to a 1.98 ERA across 36 1/3 innings pitched before going down.

Picking up a local kid in Danny Jansen to back up William Contreras behind the dish was another quietly solid move for the Brewers.

The two additions of Miller and Jansen do make the Brewers better, and they may still have enough to win the World Series. It just feels like this is a team that has been knocking on the door for so long; it is frustrating when they don’t seize the opportunity to do more, when they have so much prospect capital to play with.

2. Chicago Cubs

Players Added: UTL Willi Castro, RHP Michael Soroka, RHP Andrew Kittredge, LHP Taylor Rogers

If the Brewers and Cubs had a handshake agreement to not go for it at the deadline, that would explain a lot. These two teams are staring down the barrel of a real battle to win the NL Central, yet neither participated in the arms race at the deadline.

The Cubs could have used a frontline starter, and, like the Brewers, have a deep enough farm system to pull off any trade. The market was clearly overpriced when it came to starters, as only a few moved, but why weren’t the Cubs the team that took a shot on Shane Bieber?

Could they not have offered something more valuable than the QO draft pick to get the D-backs to move Zac Gallen? Or could they have put Owen Cassie on the table to land a young pitcher with control like Edward Cabrera or Joe Ryan?

You already made this a win-now year when you traded Cam Smith for a year of Kyle Tucker in the offseason. This was the time to double down, and they did not do that.

Taylor Rogers is a good lefty for your bullpen. Andrew Kittredge has been solid this year. Neither is the closer type the Cubs should have gotten, and Mike Soroka is not a starting pitcher you want to hand the ball to in a playoff game.

We love Willi Castro here at Just Baseball, and he does make the Cubs better as a really solid utilityman, but that can’t be your best move at the deadline when you are trying to win the World Series.

1. Boston Red Sox

Players Added: RHP Dustin May, LHP Steven Matz

Right in line with Cubs, the Boston Red Sox became a win-now team when they gave Alex Bregman $40 million to play third base for them this season. A 17-7 month of July put the Red Sox in playoff position at the deadline.

When it was time to add, GM Craig Breslow stepped up to the plate and did nothing but whiff, striking out in miserable fashion. Breslow said as much in his post-deadline presser:

Nobody wants to hear that you tried to make deals but couldn’t. It makes the front office look bad that they couldn’t find a way to get deals across the finish line. One of the trades they did make was for a rental in Dustin May, who has great stuff, but a 4.85 ERA this season.

To make matters worse, they traded James Tibbs III to get him, and he was the headlining piece in the Rafael Devers trade. So now you have traded Devers for two months of Dustin May?

Steven Matz was the other addition, and he is having a fine year. Pitching to a 3.44 ERA across 55 innings out of the Cardinals bullpen. The former starting pitcher has done well in a multi-inning role and pitches from the left side. Still, he’s pretty low down the list of impact relievers moved at the tradea deadline.

The optics are pretty bad around the Red Sox and their front office right now, but this team is still talented enough to overcome all of that and make the playoffs this season.