5 Best Trade Fits for Guardians First Baseman Josh Naylor

The 2024-25 Hot Stove season is officially active and currently hotter than the surface of the sun. There have been signings and trades galore with one of the teams already getting in on the trade market being the Cleveland Guardians.

They made one of the first big moves of Winter Meetings week when they traded Gold Glover Andres Gimenez to the Blue Jays. Then they subsequently traded a prospect from the return to the Pirates. They could continue their trading ways by looking to move first baseman Josh Naylor.

One of Cleveland’s best offensive players over the last few years, any effort to trade Naylor would be so the team can shed the projected $12 million he is set to earn (per MLB Trade Rumors) in his final year of team control. It’s hard to imagine a similar motivation wasn’t at least partially behind the decision to trade Gimenez.

Plenty of teams would love to have themselves a hard-hitting first baseman who can put up 30-100 seasons and Naylor can provide that either for 2025 and beyond. The following teams are particularly good fits for the 27-year-old.

5 Best Trade Fits for Josh Naylor

Houston Astros

For years, when the Astros started their reign of terror atop the AL West, they had one of the better producing first basemen in the league in Yuli Gurriel. When his production started to decline, they attempted to replace him with former AL Rookie of the Year and MVP Jose Abreu. That experiment didn’t work out the way most people envisioned.

Last year, when the team decided to move on from Abreu midseason, they patched the position together with players like former top prospect Jon Singleton and super-utilityman Mauricio Dubon. The result was the third lowest combined fWAR (-1.4) at the position in all of MLB.

One advantage the Astros have: money. If the Naylor camp’s desire in any trade would be a potential contract extension as well, Houston has never had any qualms in handing out expensive contracts. They were third in MLB in total payroll in 2024 at $255 million according to Spotrac.

Their disadvantage: prospect capital. The Astros had the worst farm system in all of baseball according to MLB Pipeline’s 2024 midseason rankings. With Naylor technically being a rental without an attached extension Houston could shoot for a lower prospect return, but the lack of quality prospects could make a trade tough to complete.

New York Yankees

It’s no secret that the Yankees are one of the top first base needy teams out there this offseason. People have tried connecting them to several different first basemen, including top free agent option Christian Walker.

New York got just as poor offensive production out of the first base position as the Astros did. The main trio of Anthony Rizzo, DJ LeMahieu, and Ben Rice, among others who filled in, combined for the second worst wRC+ in MLB at the position at 76.

Like usual, the Yankees won’t be afraid to pay what they need to in order to improve their roster. They already signed one of the top starting pitchers on the free agent market in Max Fried earlier this week.

If New York isn’t able to win the bid for Walker, Naylor would be a great pivot. But even if they bring Walker into the fold as well, that might not stop them from bringing in as much additional firepower as possible to try and avoid another big playoff disappointment.

New York Mets

It’s hard to picture the Mets in need of a first baseman this offseason. After all, they’ve had one of the best ones in the league for the last six seasons.

Pete Alonso hit free agency for the first time in his career after 846 games, 781 hits, 226 homers, and 586 runs batted in. Not only is that a ton of production to replace, but the plan moving forward isn’t exactly clear. Mark Vientos is the most obvious option to take over, but he handled a majority of the team’s games at third base last year.

The Mets could definitely stand to reunite with Alonso after he has his chance to test the free agent market. The problem is that the slugger will be quite expensive and New York just committed an absolute boatload of money toward superstar outfielder Juan Soto.

Even Steve Cohen might not want to shell out enough to add Alonso back into the mix, though we’ve all probably thought similar thoughts before and been wrong. Naylor would be a good secondary option at a much more affordable (for a team like the Mets, anyway) price.

Cincinnati Reds

As mentioned earlier, plenty of teams would be happy to bring in a productive offensive first baseman. Perhaps no team needed it more in 2024, however, than the Cincinnati Reds.

The Reds by far had the worst combined production out of the position last season of any team in baseball. Cincinnati first basemen were last in the league in both wRC+ at just 70 and fWAR at just -1.8.

The Reds started the season with Christian Encarnacion-Strand over at first, who had a .513 OPS in 29 games before injury knocked him out for the rest of the year. They then bounced between multiple options before trading for Ty France at the deadline. He was better, but still had just a .683 OPS in 52 games with the club.

The Reds have a bunch of young talent that makes it seem like they’re ready to take the next step into playoff contention but haven’t quite put it all together yet. Maybe Naylor could bring some consistency and help lead the young group to the next level.

Seattle Mariners

Like the Mets, the Mariners didn’t actually have that bad of production out of the first base position in 2024. Their 155 wRC+ at the position ranked tied for eighth in MLB while their combined fWAR of 1.2 there tied for 17th.

Much of that production is no longer with the team, though. The aforementioned France, while he didn’t have the best year, played a majority of games at first for Seattle. Justin Turner, who mostly took over the spot at the trade deadline, heads to free agency as well.

As it currently stands, Luke Raley would be the most likely option to take over the job at first and he did have a decent year in 2024 (.783 OPS, 22 HR, 58 RBI in 137 games). He gets utilized a bunch in the outfield, though, and the team may want more production than that at a prime position.

The Mariners could use corner outfield help as a whole with third baseman Josh Rojas also now a free agent. Naylor could solve half of that problem and could be an option to keep around for the future as well.