Trading Tuesday

The trading deadline has passed, who are the winners and who are the losers?

Winners:
Orioles: Anytime you can turn a reliever (Sherrill) into two prospects (Josh Bell and Steven Johnson) you have to be considered a winner. Maybe this means the Orioles aren't planning on contending in 2010, but did anyone really expect them too anyways? In 2011 we could have the Yankees, Red Sox, and Rays doing there thing with a revamped Orioles and Blue Jays all in one division, realignment?

Mariners: Jarrod Washburn is a free agent next year. Jarrod Washburn won't be offered arbitration because he'll likely accept. The Mariners turned that into Luke French and Mauricio Robles from the Tigers. Jarrod Washburn is having an incredible year, but if you take him out of his context (good park, great OF defense) he's not a 2.64 ace starter. Can't blame the Tigers for getting a needed pitcher, but the Mariners are a big winner.

Red Sox: The Red Sox got Victor Martinez, one of the best catchers in the league for one player who was on their major league roster (Masterson) and two good but not great pitching prospects, of which they have plenty of. Martinez can now spell Jason Varitek, Lowell, Youklis, and Papi when necessary. Masterson could be a solid pitcher some day, but right now he was a 7th inning reliever, and the Sox essentially traded him for a top catcher. V-Mart may not stay at catcher but he's cheap (only around $7m next year) and doesn't need to play catcher to help the Sox.

Padres: Jake Peavy for 4 live arms in Clayton Richard, Aaron Poreda, Adam Russell, and Dexter Carter. Jake Peavy is an excellent pitcher but he's currently injured and Petco helps him out quite a bit. None of these guys will turn into a Peavy, but they don't have to. The Padres clearly need to cut salary and trading Peavy for more arms is a better move than the more affordable Adrian Gonzalez. It's harder to find good pitching in baseball, but it's even harder to find affordable hitters than succeed in Petco, solid choice by the Padres. How long until DePodesta gets another job?

Losers
Indians: The Indians traded their two top trading pieces in Victor Martinez and Cliff Lee and didn't get a single top prospect in return. Carlos Carrasco, Jason Knapp, Jason Donald, Lou Marson, Justin Masterson, Bryan Price, and Nick Hagadone are all nice pieces and should be good players, but for the guys they gave up they should have gotten a 'sure thing'. Losing CC, Cliff Lee, and effectively Carmona is a lot to replace, so the Indians wanted to get a lot of arms, but the Phillies and Red Sox both had better arms to trade than the ones Cleveland got.

Blue Jays: They really blew it with Halladay. They are fooling themselves if they think they can contend next year, so why keep Halladay? They weren't wowed, but Halladay would demand more this season when he still has August, September and all of next year to help out a team. I suppose that he'll still be on the block this offseason, so maybe we should reserve judgement until then, but right now keeping Halladay seems to be a mistake.

Giants: The Giants need a bat, Freddy Sanchez isn't the kind of bat they needed. In return for a $8m 2b who is marginally better than their current one, the Giants traded their 2nd best pitching prospect, Tim Alderson. And they traded another good pitching prospect Scott Barnes for an OK 1b in Ryan Garko. How could Matt Holliday's price tag be too much when the Giants traded 2 good pitching prospects for 2 mediocre players? I'd rather give up more maybe too much for a Matt Holliday, than hope Garko and Sanchez turn into better players than they really are.