10 Updated Predictions for the 2024 MLB Trade Deadline
Only seven weeks remain until Major League Baseball's 2024 trade deadline arrives on July 30, and it won't be long until trades and rumors dominate the daily news cycle.
To be sure, a lot could change in these next 50 days. Teams that look like buyers today might end up as sellers or vice versa.
Nevertheless, the deadline picture is beginning to come into focus, and we've got 10 updated not-so-early-anymore predictions on some of the bigger happenings (and not happenings) that will transpire by the end of next month.
We're not putting together hypothetical trade packages today, though. Some are more specific than others, but these are more so bird's-eye view predictions than the granular "Team A gives up prospects B, C, and D for star player E" sort of proposals that we'll save for another day closer to the deadline.
Predictions are presented in no particular order, though we'll start with the one that would've made the least sense to project 10 days ago.
Cincinnati Reds Will Be Buying Starting Pitching
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Second through fifth place in the NL Central has been a frequently shuffled deck of cards lately, with Cincinnati recently storming back into second place for the first time since the second day of the regular season.
The Reds entered Sunday as winners in 12 of 15 games. That includes a three-game sweep of the Dodgers, as well as taking five of six from the Cubs to drop the baby bears into last place in the division.
Out of seemingly nowhere—barely two weeks removed from sitting at 10 games below .500—the Reds have moved into a four-way tie for the NL's No. 6 seed.
Now, instead of wondering if they'll explore trading Frankie Montas, Nick Martinez and their litany of 30-something relievers on expiring deals, the question has become: Which starting pitcher(s) will they look to add ahead of the trade deadline?
Most likely, they'll be in the market for a two-month rental a la Jack Flaherty, Luis Severino or Yusei Kikuchi. Those are the guys they could get without giving up anything too substantial from their long-term plans.
Maybe they get aggressive, though, in what would be their first summer as a legitimate buyer in more than a decade. Getting Garrett Crochet from the White Sox or Jesús Luzardo from the Marlins—each of whom has two years of arbitration eligibility remaining—would be massive.
Chicago White Sox Completely Blow It Up
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One of our mid-May trade-deadline predictions was that the Chicago White Sox will be busy, albeit without trading Luis Robert Jr.
Translation: Everyone slated for free agency this offseason or next is up for grabs, but they'll at least hang on to a couple of long-term building blocks, hoping to be competent again by 2026.
After recently losing 18 of 19 games, though, everything must go.
That includes Robert, who is making $12.5 million this season and $15 million in 2025 with $20 million club options for each of 2026 and 2027. He has missed most of the season with a hip injury, but he mashes when healthy, with four home runs in his first 45 plate appearances after hitting 38 dingers last season. It's going to take a lot for the White Sox to give him up, but they'll definitely listen to offers.
It also includes ace southpaw Garrett Crochet, who is making a measly $800,000 this season with two years of arbitration eligibility yet to come. In seven starts since the beginning of May, he has a 1.10 ERA, a 0.78 WHIP and a 12.3 K/9. If he can even remotely keep that up for another seven weeks, the trade packages could get out of control.
Even rookie reliever Jordan Leasure might hit the trade block. He has a 3.00 ERA and is one of just two White Sox relievers with multiple saves this season, but this is a full-fledged rebuild.
No one is safe.
Astros Refuse to Sell; Double Down by Trading for Pete Alonso
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Getting demoted to the Florida Complex League and spending a month away from the Astros didn't do much to fix José Abreu. He does at least have a pair of solo home runs since returning to the big leagues, but his on-base percentage was barely .200 in those first 10 games back.
But they brought him back because Jon Singleton simply wasn't getting the job done, either.
If they're going to give it the ol' college try at getting back to the postseason for an eighth consecutive year, making an upgrade at first base is a must in order to recover from their current 30-36 record.
And if that's the case, Pete Alonso is clearly Plan A.
Though this hasn't been the best slugging season of his career, the Polar Bear has 14 home runs and 30 total extra-base hits, both of which are better marks than any Astro not named Kyle Tucker can claim. Getting that right-handed power bat into the heart of the order could be a major game-changer for a team that has been burying its first baseman at eighth in the order on a regular basis.
Will the Mets actually sell, though?
They're eight games below .500, but only three games back from what is currently a four-way tie for the NL's last wild-card spot. And of their remaining 31 games before the All-Star Break only two (vs. NYY) are against a team with a winning record. It's a major opportunity to make up some ground.
For now, though, selling remains likely.
Trading Pete Alonso Kick-Starts a Mets Fire Sale
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The New York Mets are going to wait as long as they reasonably can before admitting defeat and selling off expiring assets with any trade value for a second straight summer.
If and when they do trade Pete Alonso, though, expect a lot more to follow.
Just on the starting pitchers front, they've got both Luis Severino and Jose Quintana hitting free agency this winter, plus Sean Manaea with a player option for 2025. Might not get much of anything for Quintana with the way he's pitching this season, but all three should be on the trade block.
For relievers, they've got Adam Ottavino, Drew Smith and Adrian Houser all headed for free agency. Houser's numbers as a starter were dreadful, but he has taken well to long relief, allowing just two earned runs in 15 innings of work out of the bullpen. Could be an intriguing 'bridge' option for a contender.
Then along with Alonso, both Harrison Bader and J.D. Martinez would be available as regulars in this lineup who are slated for free agency in a few months. And if anyone wants Starling Marte and the $20.75 million he's still owed in 2025, that's a phone call the Mets would certainly answer.
Even if they were to unload all 10 of those players just named, they're still going to be paying a hefty luxury tax once again. Might as well trim the payroll some, though, while hopefully beefing up the farm system a bit.
Austin Gomber Returns to St. Louis
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It was almost exactly one decade ago when the St. Louis Cardinals selected Austin Gomber in the fourth round of the 2014 MLB draft. Over the course of the next seven seasons, he logged 674 innings pitched with a 3.07 ERA—mostly in the minors, but he did pitch more than 100 innings in the majors between 2018 and 2020.
Then, they sent the southpaw to Colorado as part of that Nolan Arenado fleecing heard 'round the world in February 2021.
His first three seasons with the Rockies were rough, as he posted a 5.22 ERA. With one year of arbitration eligibility remaining before he hits free agency, though, Gomber has broken through and developed into a legitimate trade chip.
And wouldn't you know it?
The Cardinals sure could use a left-handed pitcher for the back of their rotation.
The trio of elder statesmen they signed this offseason (Sonny Gray, Kyle Gibson and Lance Lynn) has panned out nicely. However, fourth starter Miles Mikolas is struggling mightily for the second consecutive year, while the fifth spot in the rotation has been a revolving door of disappointment.
Gomber's 3.38 ERA for the year (2.34 since the beginning of May) would be a welcome addition to what is presently an all right-handed rotation, and it probably wouldn't take a king's ransom to get him. (Maybe they do give up left-handed reliever John King in the deal, though.)
Atlanta Goes Shopping in Oakland Once More
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Two offseasons ago, the Atlanta Braves got Sean Murphy from the Oakland A's in a three-team deal.
The winter before that, Atlanta—fresh off winning the 2021 World Series—acquired Matt Olson from Oakland.
Once upon a time nearly two decades ago, Tim Hudson followed that same Oakland-to-Atlanta pipeline before winning 113 games in his new home in the NL East.
Might the A's help out the ATL once more for old time's sake?
Thanks to the season-ending injuries suffered by Spencer Strider and Ronald Acuña Jr., Atlanta could use both a corner outfielder and a starting pitcher. And while Oakland doesn't have many trade chips to play with these days—aside from Mason Miller, who isn't going anywhere—it could check both of those boxes in the form of Brent Rooker and Paul Blackburn.
Rooker was Oakland's All-Star Game representative last year, and he has been even better this year, entering play Monday with 13 home runs and an .897 OPS. He has mostly DH'd over the past two years, but he has played a fair amount of both LF and RF and would be a welcome addition to a depth chart presently completely devoid of depth.
Blackburn was their All-Star in 2022, but hasn't been anything special between various IL stints since then. If he's healthy, though, he can't be any worse than the collection of options Atlanta has tried in its fifth spot in the rotation since losing Strider in early April.
Blackburn still has a year of arbitration eligibility remaining in 2025, while Rooker isn't slated for free agency until after the 2027 campaign. Atlanta would need to offer up a fairly significant amount of prospect capital to grease the wheels here. But maybe Alex Anthopoulos can rob the A's one more time.
Angels Finally Embrace a Rebuild, One Year Too Late for It to Really Matter
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It's hard to fault the Angels for what they did at last year's deadline. When they traded for Lucas Giolito and Reynaldo López on July 26 and made it official they would not be trading Shohei Ohtani, they were only 3.5 games out of the playoff picture with hope that Mike Trout would be returning from his fractured hamate bone before too much longer to hopefully help lead a playoff push.
It didn't work out. At all. Trout played in one game the rest of the way and they went 21-40 and missed the playoffs by a mile before losing Ohtani for nothing more than a compensatory, 74th overall pick in this year's draft.
Now, they've bottomed out from "annually underachieving" to "painfully bad," sitting 15 games below .500 with Trout and Anthony Rendon getting paid a combined $76 million to hang out on the IL, per usual.
It's time to blow it up and put a "For Sale" sign on anyone who isn't under team control through at least 2027.
Which is, to be clear, every single player making at least $775,000 this year, except for Trout. But go ahead and slap that "For Sale" sign on him, too, and see if anyone bites on that massive salary for the next six-plus seasons.
The noteworthy trade chips here are LHP Tyler Anderson ($13M in 2024, $13M in 2025) and IF Luis Rengifo ($4.4M in 2024, arbitration-eligible in 2025), plus Kevin Pillar ($1M in 2024) if he inexplicably continues to hit darn near .400 in an Angels jersey.
Taylor Ward ($4.8M in 2024, arbitration-eligible in 2025 and 2026) would also be a goodie, provided they are willing to turn his 2.5 years of team control into some prospects.
Compared to what the Halos could've gotten for two months of Ohtani last summer, though, the prospect return on their fire sale will only marginally expedite the rebuilding process here.
'No Man's Land' Claims a Minimum of 3 Victims
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Every year, there's at least one team that just kind of spectates at the trade deadline, being unwilling to throw in the towel and embrace a selling mentality while also being unwilling to spend more money and/or part with any prospects to try to improve a team a few games out of the playoff picture.
This year, though, the stage is set for a lot of teams to simply stand pat.
Through 65ish games, there are only five teams at least five games back in the wild-card picture—A's, Angels, Marlins, Rockies and White Sox.
Everyone else has a pulse.
That will change to some extent in the next seven weeks, when a couple of teams stumble through July and opt to join what is very much a seller's market right now. But there are just a ton of mediocre teams out there this year, with more than one-third of MLB entering Monday either at .500 or one, two or three games below .500—in the hunt for a postseason berth, but not exactly one or two pieces away from becoming a serious World Series threat.
Notably in that group are the Boston Red Sox, San Francisco Giants, Texas Rangers and Toronto Blue Jays. Those are the four big dominoes this year with quite a bit to offer if they do become sellers. However, if the trade deadline were today, it's likely that all four would more or less shrug their shoulders and let it ride.
Other .500ish teams who don't seem likely to do much buying or selling are the Minnesota Twins, Pittsburgh Pirates and Tampa Bay Rays, each of whom has minimal budget in a small market and hardly anything to offer as far as expiring assets go.
It will make for a less entertaining deadline, but it wouldn't be shocking if there end up being at least half a dozen teams who either make no trades or put together just one or two inconsequential swaps.
Padres Add a Starting Pitcher
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Not exactly a bold prediction here, as we already know from earlier this month that the Padres have been trying to pry Garrett Crochet away from the White Sox. And even without those rumblings, you don't need to squint to see that San Diego could use another arm with Joe Musgrove out indefinitely, Yu Darvish hurt again and Randy Vásquez struggling in most of his spot starts.
It's not a question of if they want to add a starting pitcher, but rather one of how big they want to go.
With Musgrove, Darvish, Vásquez, Dylan Cease, Michael King and Matt Waldron all under team control for at least one more season, the Padres don't necessarily need more than a two-month rental. Sure, they'll take Crochet for 2.5 seasons if they can get him for a reasonable trade package, but a band-aid solution like Jack Flaherty would be more than adequate.
Then again, half-measures aren't really A.J. Preller's thing, are they?
Remember in December 2020 when the Padres traded for Blake Snell and Darvish on the same day? The 2022 deadline when they added all of Juan Soto, Josh Hader, Josh Bell and Brandon Drury? Or how about the trades they've made just in the past seven months, swapping Soto and Trent Grisham for five Yankees before adding Cease and Luis Arraez?
If they're in on winning, chances are they'll be all the way in on winning and will get a multi-year ace like Crochet or Jesús Luzardo—or perhaps Justin Verlander or Max Scherzer as a marquee rental if either of those AL West teams falls out of contention.
Phillies Acquire an Outfielder; Yankees Add Relief Pitching
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Both the Phillies and the Yankees are 25 games above .500, on pace to finish the season with more than 110 wins—a mark reached just once in the past two decades, when the Dodgers won 111 games two years ago.
Needless to say, they won't be sellers at the trade deadline.
But what do you get the teams that seem to already have it all?
The NL leaders could certainly use another outfielder.
Johan Rojas has great range in center and good speed if he gets on base, but his .577 OPS is a black hole in the lineup—with neither Cristian Pache (.588 OPS) nor Whit Merrifield (.542 OPS) offering much of a replacement plan. Nick Castellanos is maybe starting to come around, but he's putting up some of the worst numbers of his career. And while Kyle Schwarber is at least hitting OK, putting his glove and limited range back in the field is something they'd like to avoid at all costs.
Might Philadelphia be where Luis Robert Jr. ends up? If not him, maybe they can get Tyler O'Neill or Michael Conforto if the Red Sox or Giants sputter into selling.
For the Yankees, the starting rotation has been historically great and is on the verge of getting reigning Cy Young winner Gerrit Cole in there for the first time this season. However, outside of closer Clay Holmes, the NYY bullpen has been just OK.
In particular, they could use a left-handed reliever, as Caleb Ferguson (4.95 ERA, 1.50 WHIP) has been a considerable disappointment since they acquired him from the Dodgers in February.
Without question, the top target on that front is impending-free-agent-on-a-terrible-team Tanner Scott. He struggled with walks in a huge way early in the year, but he has reined that in to just seven walks over his last 17 innings pitched—without allowing an earned run in nearly two months. The Yankees would use Miami's current closer in a set-up role, which is where Scott thrived for the majority of last season.
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