David Huzzard: Explanation of slow trade market

By next Friday, our memories on this trade deadline will be very different, but the current atmosphere is one of inaction. The biggest news we have is that the Tigers might be sellers but haven't made up their minds. Lots of people blame the second wild card for the lack of moves, but the Reds, Phillies, Braves, Padres, Athletics, and a few other clubs are known to be sellers. The inaction can best be explained by what people think should happen and what is actually going to happen.

Look at the Nationals for example. The Nats need bullpen arms, and while Kimbrel and Chapman are the attractive names, the price for them is going to be high unless the Padres or Reds make the classic mistake of believing they have to move to player. A local columnist has said the Nats should trade Trea Turner for Aroldis Chapman and a former Nats GM has said they should trade Lucas Giolito for Craig Kimbrel. Both those cost are wild speculation and not within the realm of reality of the current trade market, but it might very well be what those clubs are asking for on July 23.

As it is every year, the price of players lowers the closer it is to the actual trade deadline. Players like Chapman and Kimbrel won't clear waivers, and while it appears all the leverage is with the trading team ,it isn't. The Nationals need relievers more than they need closers. Tyler Clippard, Brad Ziegler, and Joaquin Benoit fill the Nats needs just as well, and that doesn't even mention the several relievers likely to clear waivers after the July 31 deadline and be available for the Nats to trade for after August 1.

The strange thing about the 2015 deadline so far is we don't even have any wild and crazy speculation. That is likely due to the fact that there isn't one big standout player everyone is chasing like Jon Lester last season and Cliff Lee in years past. Johnny Cueto, David Price, Jeff Samardzija, Justin Upton, and Yoenis Cespedes are all good players, but not one of them is head-and-shoulders better than the rest. At this point, there is no ability for a bidding war because if a team's offer is not accepted, they will just move on to a different player. This trade deadline has the potential to see a lot of familiar names moved, but the amount of players potentially available creates a slow market.

With the Reds, Braves, and Padres potentially in full fire-sale mode along with plenty of other teams with players to move, the 2015 deadline might be a buyers' market and the selling teams aren't going to like that. Players like Chapman or Kimbrel that are on multi-year deals may not get moved because it doesn't make sense to move them in the current market. Sure, Chapman and Kimbrel are in a different league than every other reliever, but few teams are going to part with a top prospect for a reliever and the Padres might be reluctant to trade Kimbrel after giving up their top prospect for him.

The Nats and other buying teams have an abundance of choice, and that is what is holding the deadline up. Even if both Chapman and Kimbrel are traded, the Nats and Blue Jays are the two teams with the biggest need at the back of the bullpen. Whichever team makes the first move doesn't set the market for the other reliever, but instead lowers the price by removing themselves from the market creating an incentive to wait. The Oakland A's last trade deadline saw them jump the market and end up trading Addison Russell. No one wants to be that team this season, and so we wait in a holding pattern as buying clubs wait for the selling clubs to realize they aren't going to get what they want.

David Huzzard blogs about the Nationals at Citizens of Natstown. Follow him on Twitter: @DavidHuzzard. His views appear here as part of MASNsports.com's season-long initiative of welcoming guest bloggers to our pages. All opinions expressed are those of the guest bloggers, who are not employed by MASNsports.com but are just as passionate about their baseball as our regular roster of writers.