For every transaction that happens, there are probably three or four transactions that might have happened, but didn’t. Maybe more than that. Maybe way more than that. I don’t know, I’m not a baseball insider. What I do know is that, if you’re not interested in transactions that might have happened but didn’t, you’re not interested in interesting things. You can go ahead and get back to your collection of identical generic stamps.
Michael Pineda, Brett Lawrie, And The Trade That Wasn’t
One transaction that happened was Michael Pineda and Jose Campos going from the Mariners to the Yankees for Jesus Montero and Hector Noesi. One transaction that might have happened, but didn't? Michael Pineda going from the Mariners to the Blue Jays for Brett Lawrie.
That’s the speculation from Jeff Blair, anyway. Alex Anthopoulos said at a team function that he turned down a trade that would’ve taken a player from the major league roster. Blair did some digging and came up with Pineda and Lawrie. I’ve since confirmed that the Mariners and Blue Jays talked about Pineda and Lawrie, but talks didn’t get all that far before the Blue Jays closed the door. This trade didn’t come real close to happening, and I don’t know how much it would’ve taken to make it happen.
It's still fascinating, though. The Yankees were interested in Felix Hernandez, and settled for Pineda. The Blue Jays were also interested in Felix Hernandez, and might've settled for Pineda. Then the centerpiece going to the Mariners would've been a third baseman instead of a possible catcher. The Blue Jays would look different. The Yankees would look different. The Mariners would look different. And so on.
It is funny that Blair was able to dig and come up with names. Anthopoulos said he turned down a trade, but didn’t specify. Jack Zduriencik said he would’ve traded Pineda for one of four young position players around the league, but didn’t specify. One figures there’s a reason, or several reasons why each front office wanted to keep things vague. But Blair talked to sources, and Blair got his info. I’m guessing these are front office sources. Why would you ever give information to the media? If you’re a member of a front office, why be free with this sort of thing? What’s the benefit?
I don’t understand sources. Teams would probably prefer that there not be sources. Whatever. There have always been sources, and there will probably always be sources, for some reason. And because there are sources, we get posts like this one.
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