4 Reasons This Year’s Trade Deadline Was Nothing Special

Looking around social media circles, it appears that most Major League Baseball fans are happy with how this year’s trade deadline went. Yes, it was an action-packed couple of days and a ton of players were moved, but the festivities as whole felt a bit bland.

That’s not to say that there aren’t specific fanbases who are over the moon right now. For instance, followers of the Marlins and Rays have to be through the roof. On a similar scale but perhaps to a slightly lesser extent, fans of the Blue Jays, Cubs, Pirates and Mariners are doing alright for themselves, too.

But outside of the handful of teams that went out and did their thing, this year’s deadline felt boring and unexciting. There weren’t any true blockbusters like ones we’ve seen in the recent past. No Juan Soto deals, none involving Max Scherzer, Trea Turner, Josh Hader or Justin Verlander either.

Instead, the biggest names and the biggest deals were ones involving Jack Flaherty, Randy Arozarena, Isaac Paredes, Jazz Chisholm Jr., Tanner Scott and Yusei Kikuchi. Just like we drew it up, right?

Not exactly.

Let’s take a closer look at some of the contributing factors that made this year’s deadline feel a little bit less exciting than the ones we’ve grown accustomed to.

1. The Superstars Stayed Put

All due respect to Flaherty and the rest of the names mentioned above, but fans were teased for weeks, if not months, that much bigger names could be moved. Here’s a quick refresher on players who were at one point labeled as trade bait.

• Tarik Skubal, Detroit Tigers, LHP

• Garrett Crochet, Chicago White Sox, LHP

• Yandy Diaz, Tampa Bay Rays, 1B

• Blake Snell, San Francisco Giants, LHP

• Vladimir Guerrero Jr., Toronto Blue Jays, 1B

• Bo Bichette, Toronto Blue Jays, SS

• Pete Alonso, New York Mets, 1B

• Mason Miller, Oakland A’s, RHP

• Jesus Luzardo, Miami Marlins, LHP

• Max Scherzer, Texas Rangers, RHP

How many of these players do you suppose were moved at the trade deadline? Let’s go with none.

Granted, there are a few on the list who get a pass. The Mets are six games above .500 and hanging on to a playoff spot, so moving on from their slugging first baseman wasn’t going to happen. The Giants and Rangers also believe they are close enough to contention that moving their ace-caliber pitchers didn’t feel like the way to go. We’ll touch on that later.

The Blue Jays’ front office firmly believes that they can make one last run at a ring with their Guerrero-Bichette core before one (or both) of them hits free agency next year. However, they should’ve leaned further into selling.

They made some promising improvements around their roster, especially in landing players that will be able to help out the 2025 club, but the fact is that everyone’s going to be a year older next year and their to-do list is going to be very long in the upcoming offseason. Bichette at the very least should’ve been shipped out, injured or not.

AL Central Aces Dominated the Headlines

Moving on from Flaherty was an excellent call by the Tigers, but Skubal should’ve joined him. The southpaw is a frontrunner for this year’s AL Cy Young Award but that only backs the argument that he should’ve moved. His value will never be higher than it is right now and on a Tigers team that’s five games under .500 and not quite ready for contention yet, this feels like a significant missed opportunity.

Ditto for the White Sox with Crochet. The left-hander was seen as one of the likeliest trade candidates at this year’s deadline before he made some silly demands involving a post-trade contract extension. After that, it seemed like virtually all of the interested teams were suddenly … not as interested. Both sides of this team shot themselves in the foot here, but there’s no reason Crochet should still be in Chicago unless he’s playing for the Cubs.

2. Sellers Didn’t Sell Hard Enough

There were multiple teams who were in position to sell at this year’s trade deadline. The Blue Jays made it clear that they were only interested in moving on from rentals, which is exactly what they did. The Angels, Marlins, Rays, A’s, Rockies, Nationals, White Sox and Tigers were others that had no hope of contention and plenty of pieces to move.

The Rays and Marlins did an exceptional job at the deadline. Tampa Bay moved on from a plethora of players from their big league roster in exchange for a ton of promising prospects all without sacrificing their chances of a run in 2025. Miami had arguably the best deadline of any team in baseball, moving on from nearly all of their top trade chips and stocking up their farm to a ridiculous degree.

The Nationals also get a pass, as they successfully moved on from Jesse Winker, Lane Thomas and Dylan Floro. Hanging on to Kyle Finnegan and Derek Law was a head-scratcher, but they didn’t fully stand pat.

Everyone else, though? They fell short.

Angels

The Angels moved on from Carlos Estevez and Luis Garcia, acquiring a group of players that could one day be legitimate contributors for them. However, they chose to hold on to some of their most attractive trade pieces that could’ve gotten some solid returns back. Tyler Anderson, Taylor Ward, Luis Rengifo and even Kevin Pillar were featured in a boatload of rumors but ultimately stayed put.

A’s

Brent Rooker, anyone? Rooker was one of the best offensive trade chips on the market but he stayed in Oakland. He’s still under control through the 2027 season, but the A’s are nowhere close to contention and his value is sky-high. Moving on from Paul Blackburn and Lucas Erceg isn’t “nothing”, but Rooker should’ve gone. Mason Miller may be on the IL right now, but his trade value is also at an all-time high, so the A’s should’ve capitalized.

Rockies

Talk about a confusing one. The Rockies had Elias Diaz, Ryan McMahon and Cal Quantrill as three of their most moveable assets but none of them went anywhere. Each would’ve netted a solid return of prospects (especially Quantrill and McMahon), but the Rockies chose to hang on to each of the trio.

3. Baseball’s Biggest Buyers Were Too Quiet

All spring, there were promises of significant splashes coming from some of baseball’s biggest teams. Yet, the Yankees, Dodgers and Orioles chose to avoid the blockbuster-type moves and instead went in the next tier down. That’s fine, and they all made out as “winners”, but they also didn’t flex their deadline muscles as expected.

Yankees

The Yankees had a relatively small to-do list at the deadline: add a bat and shore up the pitching staff. Chisholm and a combination of Enyel De Los Santos and Mark Leiter Jr. isn’t anything to scoff at, but at one point they were eyeing Crochet and Paredes as deadline splashes. The Soto-Aaron Judge core needs some support, and it’s hard to comfortably say that Chisholm alone provides that.

Dodgers

Ditto for the Dodgers, who wound up with “only” Flaherty, Michael Kopech and bench bats Amed Rosario and Kevin Kiermaier. Flaherty’s going to be a massive upgrade in their rotation, but what happened to the Crochet-Luis Robert Jr. package that took the rumor mill by storm a few weeks ago? They also looked into Arozarena, Skubal and even Bichette at one point. The Dodgers are far from trade deadline “losers”, but it felt like there should’ve been more in the tank, especially after seeing how aggressive they’ve historically been in every offseason and at every trade deadline.

Orioles

It has felt for months now that the Orioles were going to be one of the most aggressive teams at the trade deadline. They delivered on that promise, but not in the way many thought they would. Instead of Crochet, Skubal, Flaherty, Snell or Scott, they came away with Eloy Jimenez, Austin Slater, Cristian Pache, Zach Eflin, Trevor Rogers, Gregory Soto and Seranthony Dominguez. Not a bad haul, but again, it’s not what it was supposed to be.

4. Expanded Playoff Field’s False Hope

Once MLB made the decision to expand its playoff format, you knew scenarios like this would play out. Simply put, way too many teams consider themselves to still be “in the race”. This prevented multiple clubs from selling harder, even if that was the obvious choice for how they should’ve handled the deadline.

As of right now, a whopping nine American League teams are in or within five games of a playoff spot. In the National League, that number is up to 10. That shimmer of hope, however small it may be, is exactly why so many teams chose to hold on to their assets.

These numbers in mind, that means there’s only about a third of the league that is “out”. The Giants largely stayed put despite the fact that Snell was one of the most attractive trade chips out there and the Cubs, who are 52-58, chose to acquire Paredes instead of throw in the towel.

More than anything, the expanded playoff field has given teams false hope and led to their refusal to proceed as sellers. Without sellers, the buyers don’t have much to work with.