The trade deadline always needs an igniter, someone to go first, to show the courage to act definitively and to establish what the market price is going to be for players.
To no surprise, Oakland general manager Billy Beane went first last year as a buyer, giving up a super-prospect, Addison Russell, to facilitate an early July trade with the Cubs for Jeff Samardzija and Jason Hammel.
And, to equally no surprise, Beane went first this year as a seller. There was a logjam as the starting pitching market was getting more and more crowded. Beane jumped out ahead by dealing Houston native Scott Kazmir to the Astros for prospects – right-hander Daniel Mengden and catcher Jacob Nottingham.
Beane’s mentor in Oakland, Sandy Alderson, had a biography written about him this year in which Alderson was described as a “Maverick” in the title. But it is the protégé who fits that label.
Beane saw a chance to win last year and went all-out to do it, giving up Russell and then Yoenis Cespedes later in July to get Jon Lester. It did not work out, but Beane was willing to seize the moment.
He acted that way again Thursday. His team has been wrecked by being unable to win one-run games (10-22), and he saw no way to get to the playoffs standing at 44-52 overall. So rather than wait for a pipe dream, Beane and the A’s began a sell-off that is likely to include other walk-year players such as Ben Zobrist and Tyler Clippard. But this is Beane, so who knows how far he will go?
Houston also behaved aggressively. The Astros and the Mets are the only teams with losing records in each of the last six years, but with a chance to go for it, Houston moved ahead of the other clubs viewed as pushing hardest for starting pitching — notably the Dodgers, Royals, Blue Jays and Cubs.
And the Astros did so without ceding the best prospects from their deep system. Nottingham is viewed as a catcher with power potential and questions on defense – not dissimilar to Derek Norris, whom the A’s traded to the Padres last offseason. Megden is a college-drafted pitcher who does not have a huge ceiling, but is expected to pitch in the majors as a back-end starter or setup man.
This could establish the good-but-not-great-return trade market for other free-agent-to-be starters who could be traded, such as Samardzija, Johnny Cueto and David Price — though Cueto and Price are viewed as superior in talent to Kazmir.
The Astros make this trade at a time when they trail the Angels by two games in the AL West and lead the wild-card race. The Astros were trying to find someone to pitch at the top of the rotation with Dallas Keuchel, and now have two of the majors’ top 10 pitchers in ERA: Keuchel (2nd, 2.09) and fellow lefty Kazmir (10th, 2.38).
“Scott helps us accomplish our goals for this season … to return the Astros to the postseason and to go as deep as possible into October,” Astros general manager Jeff Luhnow said in an email.
The Astros tried to sign Kazmir as a free agent after the 2013 season, when he went to the A’s following a rebound year with the Indians. Kazmir also benefits from being traded in the middle of a season because he cannot be made the qualifying offer that would have draft-pick compensation tied to it and perhaps chill his free-agent market.
The worries on Kazmir are two-fold: He he had to pull himself from two starts this year with arm discomfort, though he did not miss significant time on either occasion, and his home-road splits are dramatic. At Oakland’s spacious O.co Coliseum, he has a 1.36 ERA and holds opponents to a .441 OPS. On the road, it is 3.92 and .804.