Baseball’s trade deadline is less than two weeks away, and if you thought we’d know by now exactly who’s buying and who’s selling, then you really haven’t been paying attention to this season full of teams stuck in the middle.
With the expanded playoffs and an abundance of American League mediocrity, only eight teams entered this week with less than 10 percent playoff odds on FanGraphs (and one of those, the Washington Nationals, had hit enough to remain in the wild-card conversation despite their long odds of actually advancing).
So, there are relatively few sellers, and only a handful of buyers who are in position to be particularly aggressive — at least for now. Things can change in a hurry (just ask the suddenly red-hot Boston Red Sox).
Here, then, is our second attempt to group all 30 teams into seven trade tiers. And there’s been some movement since we last tried this exercise three weeks ago.
Tier 1: Could be (should be?) aggressive buyers
TeamNeeds
RP, 3B, C
SP, RP, IF
RF, RP
SP, RP
OF, RP
Two types of teams should aggressively buy at the deadline: teams with a legitimate chance to win a championship and teams on the fringes of contention who could use a major boost to get to the postseason.
Our top four teams here fit the first category. The Yankees should see a mediocre American League as an opportunity for a second pennant in three years; Aaron Judge’s uncertain injury status applies more pressure to do something at the deadline to chase down the Rays in the AL East. The Brewers look even stronger than they did last year, when they finished the year with baseball’s best record. A major addition could be the difference in taking down the Dodgers.
The Phillies and Cubs are a step below Milwaukee right now but are facing a time crunch with their rosters. This might be their best chance to win in the next few seasons.
And then there’s the Pirates, who fit our latter qualification to buy aggressively. Pittsburgh is in the thick of the race for the third wild card with Miami and Arizona. Unlike the Diamondbacks, the Pirates own a sparkling run differential and third-order winning percentage. Unlike the Marlins, their playoff drought runs more than a decade. Unlike both, they have the ticking clock of Paul Skenes’ team control. Buying big at the deadline could get the Buccos to October.
Tier 2: Typical buyers
These teams all possess postseason odds of at least 70 percent and legitimate chances to win their respective divisions. (Only Cleveland isn’t currently in first place, and it’s just a percentage point behind the White Sox.) You can make a case here for each team to be especially aggressive at the deadline to affect its chances of actually winning a championship. But adding the one or two pieces they need to solidify a berth in the postseason is the bare minimum.
Tier 3: Trending to the buy side
TeamNeeds
RP
IF, RP
SP, RP
OF, CIF, SP
1B, SP, RP
SP, RP
SP, OF
OF, SP
Ooh boy, it’s a big group this time around. The Rangers and White Sox lead their respective divisions, and we get it if you think they should be typical buyers. But Texas is just above .500, and Chicago is ahead of schedule, so we’re being a little bit cautious with them 10 days out.
Boston’s winning streak has pushed it from well outside the picture into postseason odds over 60 percent. That’s the definition of trending to the buy side. Same with Baltimore, whose own streak has gotten it back into the picture in the American League. The Marlins and Diamondbacks — and maybe still the Cardinals, though we’ve bumped them out of this tier — have been streakier this season, but each has a legit shot at the playoffs at the moment. (We like Miami the most of this group, but it had a tough week around the All-Star Game.)
The Twins and Astros remain in the hunt for both their respective divisions and a wild card, though Houston’s recent play has it slipping from the picture. If not for the urgency around general manager Dana Brown for this season, we’d probably bump the Astros down a tier.
Tier 4: The hinge teams
TeamNeedsChips
SP, bat
RP
SP, RP
1B, SS
SP, OF
SP, CF
OF, RP
SP
Our Tier 4 label is usually “tailors,” and we fill it with teams likely to thread the needle between buying and selling. We might see some teams do that this year — some of the Tier 4 teams trending toward the buy side could ultimately end up buying and selling — but this year, perhaps more than in the past, we need this middle category for teams truly on the fence, even this close to the deadline.
The Padres are still in the wild-card hunt, but they’ve had a losing record every month since the end of April. The Nationals have exceeded expectations, but they’re hovering right at .500 and haven’t played especially well since early July. The Blue Jays have been waiting and waiting for things to turn around, but here they are in last place in the AL East with significant pieces (Kevin Gausman, Daulton Varsho, George Springer) approaching free agency at the end of the season.
And, most hinge-y of all are the Tigers, who have been pretty good lately but were so unthinkably bad in May that they’re still well below .500 while hanging onto the biggest trade chip in ace Tarik Skubal. This next week and a half could determine whether the Tigers go all-in to make a championship run with three strong top starters or give up entirely and trade Skubal, Casey Mize, Jack Flaherty and Gleyber Torres.
Tier 5: Trending to the sell side
This is what happens when there’s parity in the middle of each league: We end up with only two uncertain teams clearly trending to the sell side as the trade deadline approaches (and one of those teams is probably trending more toward a hinge than a sale).
The Cardinals are the ones basically in the middle. They were trending heavily to the buy side for much of the season, but they’ve been bad enough in July to wonder if threading the needle might be their best-case scenario. (Though their most obvious trade chip, Dustin May, is also trending the wrong direction, and if they try to buy and sell, they’d most want to buy a starting pitcher.)
The Reds were in the playoff race for a while, but their run differential never supported that early-season record, and now they’ve fallen unmistakably to the bottom of the NL Central. The Athletic reported last week that the Reds “may not fully classify themselves as sellers, but they’ve made it known they’re open for business for teams looking to buy.” Sounds like a trending seller to us.
Tier 6: Typical sellers
TeamChips
OF, SP
SP, C, OF, RP
SP, RP
Last time we did this, the Athletics were trending to the buy side, but just barely. They were a little below .500, but the AL West was a mess and FanGraphs was still giving them an 18 percent chance of making the playoffs. Key players were getting hurt, but enough was going right to think the A’s might buy a little (or, at least, not sell aggressively).
Then they lost 10 in a row, and the A’s entered this week having lost 15 of 17.
That’s a hard swing in the wrong direction, enough to jump past Tiers 4 and 5 and straight to Tier 6 with a couple of other typical sellers who clearly are not going to make the playoffs but also don’t have the types of trade chips to make an aggressive deadline particularly likely.
Tier 7: Could be (should be) aggressive sellers
TeamChips
1B, SS, SP
SP, RP
SP, OF
Since our last trade tiers, we have moved the Mets down a peg to this most aggressive selling level. The Giants and Angels were already here — though we remain doubtful that the Angels will even consider trading Mike Trout — but the Mets lost seven of 11 immediately after our last deadline tiers were published, and The Athletic reported last week that they are “open to listening to offers for nearly all of their players.”
Does that mean they’re actually going to trade a guy like Francisco Lindor? Probably not, but Clay Holmes and Freddy Peralta are obvious trade chips, both of their catchers could have value, and there may be opportunities to get creative with Luke Weaver and others who could bring back significant returns.
Given some of the names involved — Trout, Matt Chapman, etc. — it could be even more interesting to see the Angels or Giants get super aggressive. Those two are obvious sellers, but we’ll see just how far they go in starting to rebuild.