Aug. 3

In the end, the trading deadline provided nothing that made one hit the cell phone speed dial. Oh, George Steinbrenner tied together the Kennedy assassination with the trade of Cliff Floyd, but he just mouthed off because he got caught overreacting to his own impetuousness.

	In joining the Red Sox, Cliff Floyd is now playing for his third team this season.

The Yankees, you see, could have had Floyd, but Steinbenner so overreacted to Enrique Wilson's mishaps in right field in a game against the Mets on June 29 that he overruled the sensibilities of "his baseball people," called Toronto owner Paul Godfrey and then bought Raul Mondesi on July 2. If Steinbrenner had waited an hour, he'd have found out that as the Mondesi deal was being completed, Marlins team president David Samson had Floyd's agent Seth Levinson in his office informing him that that they could not re-sign Floyd and he would be put on the market that afternoon. Then earlier this week, Steinbrenner found out the Red Sox were the leaders in pursuit of Floyd and he tried to jump in to block the deal.

"It got down to the Yankees and Boston," says Expos GM Omar Minaya. Montreal asked the Yankees for outfielder Juan Rivera and first baseman Nick Johnson. "They chose not to do that," says Minaya, "and we went with Boston."

Oakland had the best players to offer for Floyd, but there were two roadblocks: Floyd has a no-trade clause to Oakland he wouldn't waive, and the A's also needed the Expos to take back the final $2 million in the deal; Minaya wanted the $2 million to use to acquire a closer in case, as he puts it, "we get back into the race."

Oakland then tried to get Atlanta interested in taking Floyd at the end of a three-way deal, but that didn't work, leaving only the Red Sox and Mets. And Minaya did not want to improve the team with whom he is competing in the wild card and the NL East. "If we do get back into it," says Minaya, "then we have a couple of more pieces and some payroll flexibility to be able to go help our bullpen. If we exist next season, we have more chips, because this is going to be a very good team." Minaya believes this is an important weekend, one that started right with Britt Reames' strong start on Friday night in the Expos' 3-1 victory over the Astros.

"In the end, Omar did well for himself," says one GM. "The two pitchers he got (Seung Song and Sun-Woo Kim) are every bit as good as the two (Justin Wayne, Dan Levinsky) he gave Florida, so he gave it a shot and came out even." In addition, Minaya loves (Claudio) Vargas, the young pitcher he acquired in the Florida deal. Kim also threw eight innings of shutout ball on Thursday in his first start for Ottawa, the Expos' Triple-A team, his fifth straight win in the International League.

	“	It got down to the Yankees and Boston ... and we went with Boston. ”
		— Omar Minaya, Expos GM, on the trade of Cliff Floyd to the Red Sox

Money, as always, dictated and denied a lot of moves. The Phillies would have preferred the Cincinnati deal (Scott Williamson, Brandon Larson and a prospect) for Scott Rolen, but only could the Reds not take on any money, but management decided not to risk a trade in the shadow of a strike.

The Reds had another deal with Milwaukee for Jose Hernandez (Gookie Dawkins, Jose Acevedo), but the Brewers wouldn't eat Hernandez's money. So Reds GM Jim Bowden had the players to make the best offers for Chuck Finley, Kenny Rogers, Rolen, Hernandez, Brian Moehler and Ryan Dempster and only got the last two pitchers.

Whether or not Boston and St. Louis re-sign Floyd and Rolen will depend on where the market is when it stops shifting this winter. The Red Sox did not think that with five key contracts up in 2004 that they could afford to re-sign Jim Thome, which is why they turned down an offer of Thome and Ricky Gutierrez's contract for Trot Nixon and a prospect (catcher Kelly Shoppach). And it's not that Boston ownership wasn't willing to spend because they offered big bucks to Cincinnati for Larson to turn him around in a deal with Colorado for John Thomson.

In the end, Philadelphia did not get much for Rolen, essentially just Bud Smith.

"In this time when prospects are worth so much, the teams that got them were the teams that moved early," says one GM. "Cleveland is the model, but (GM) Mark Shapiro knew what he had to do and how to do it. He moved early and got prospects (going back one year, when Shapiro knew he had to retool for 2004, he's acquired 19 prospects, some outstanding and the only players he traded that would be with the Indians in 2004 were Mike Bascik, Paul Shuey, Jacob Cruz and Zach Day). The A's moved Carlos Pena, got a pitcher for now (Ted Lilly) and two good young players from the Yankees. The Tigers moved early with Jeff Weaver and got Pena and two prospects from Oakland. But the Phillies waited, and had to settle on Smith, as well as having to even out the money with the Cardinals."

No one is sure exactly what direction the Devil Rays and Royals took, and when the Orioles began marketing Sidney Ponson and Scott Erickson, it was too late. Tampa Bay isn't going to have Randy Winn in 2004, but turned down the Giants' offer of Triple-A right-hander Jerome Williams and a second prospect, and also nixed Oakland's interest. The Royals were fixated on getting a second baseman in exchange for Paul Byrd, and when the Mets couldn't acquire Orlando Hudson from the Blue Jays (who wanted Triple-A right-hander Aaron Heilman) they had to turn to Thomson. The Mets also tried to work a four-way trade to acquire the Marlins' Kevin Millar, send him to Boston for Triple-A second baseman Freddy Sanchez and a second player, then spin Sanchez in a package for Byrd, but that went up in smoke.

"Even as a seller, it's more complex than many realize," says one NL GM. "It's understandable that some teams wanted to wait, but obviously the returns diminished the closer we got to July 31. It's all about buyers who could take on contracts. It'll be the same thing in August, with claimings."

Players started going on waivers en masse on Wednesday at 5 p.m. ET, so there could be claimings and deals in the next few days. "How can a small-market team claim anyone?" asks a small-market GM. "Impossible. One claim could get me fired."

	Paul Byrd Starting pitcher Kansas City Royals Profile
	2002 SEASON STATISTICS GM IP W-L BB SO ERA 22 152.1 14-7 25 82 3.49

There will be hundreds of available players. Paul Byrd, for instance, likely won't get through, even if GM Allard Baird chooses to deal him. Oakland or Boston likely would block any claim on Byrd, figuring the remaininder of his 2002 contract and bonus would be less than $700,000, and neither would want him to go to either Seattle or New York; if Boston were the lowest claimer, they could try to work out a trade involving Sanchez, but the Royals haven't been that interested in the middle infielder since he moved from Double-A Trenton to Triple-A Pawtucket.

Some names that may be out there: Todd Jones, Tom Gordon, Paul Wilson, Esteban Yan, Jeff Suppan, Roberto Henandez, Steve Parris, Carlos Lee, Keith Foulke, Julian Tavares, Jose Hernandez, Jamey Wright ...

"I can see there being more deals the last week of August than there were the last week of July," says an NL GM."

Some August waiver deals have altered waivers. In 1982, then Brewers GM Harry Dalton snagged Hall of Famer Don Sutton from the Astros, and when Pete Vuckovich went down that September, Sutton pitched them to Game 7 of the World Series. In 1986, Boston's waiver deal for Spike Owen and David Henderson got them to a seventh game, as well. In 1990, the A's bagged Willie McGee and Harold Baines on August 31, in '92 they swapped Jose Canseco for Ruben Sierra, Jeff Russell and Bobby Witt. And that same year then Toronto GM Pat Gillick made a deal that helped the Blue Jays win the World Series when he acquired David Cone from the Mets in the final hours of August for Jeff Kent and Ryan Thompson. Last year, Woody Williams was an August waiver acquisition that got the Cardinals into the playoffs.

But panic can be expensive. Just ask the Red Sox. In 1990, when Jeff Reardon went down, they overreacted and grabbed middle reliever Larry Andersen for Jeff Bagwell, who was a prospect in the Sox system at the time. And in '98, the Padres thought Randy Myers was going to Atlanta, and blocked the deal. Whoops. They got Myers, his $14 million contract, and his career-ending injury.

Phillips quickly moved from Plan A to Plan B
Mets GM Steve Phillips is legendary for his trade deadline grind, and this year, having lost out on a three-way deal for Royals right-hander Paul Byrd, ended up with one of the best deadline deals, geting righty John Thomson from the Rockies. Granted, Thomson is not close to a .500 lifetime pitcher (27-43), and granted his road ERA has been well above 5.00 (5.26 to be exact). But he has a power 91-94 mph sinker, hard slider and has seemed to mature into a solid third starter, and with Al Leiter and Pedro Astracio New York's only signed pitchers for 2003, gives them three starters and a spot for Heilman at the end of the rotation.

That deal was a no-brainer, a product of hard work. But there were some eyebrows raised when the Rockies moved Thomson, Todd Hollandsworth and Dennys Reyes for Jay Payton, Gabe Kapler, Jason Romano and a couple of Mets prospects. "We are not playing well, and we need to try to do some things to get better," says Rockies GM Dan O'Dowd. "We're struggling against left-handed pitching. We were hitting .233 on the road, the lowest average in the majors in 15 years."

O'Dowd also figures that Thomson will cost $4-4.5 million in arbitration this offseason which with the Mike Hampton and Denny Neagle contracts makes him too expensive for the Colorado payroll.

Separating Payton and Mets manager Bobby Valentine allows Payton the opportunity to possibly blossom, while former Rangers GM Doug Melvin suggested to O'Dowd that Kapler, who did hit .302 two years ago and had 17 homers last season, just needs to be left alone, that his swing is so unconventional that people want to keep changing him. The Rockies now can bring up slugger Jack Cust (he hit a home run in his first game for Colorado on Friday) and see whether or not he can at least be Dante Bichette in left feld in Coors Field, with Payton, Kapler, Juan Pierre and Larry Walker also in the outfield along with the useful Romano in reserve.

Pierre, like Juan Uribe and Jose Ortiz, has gone through an ugly sophomore learning period. If Payton, Kapler, Cust and Romano do work out and Double-A center fielder Choo Freeman is as good as advertised ("He's Ellis Burks," says one personnel director), then Pierre could be a chip to trade for a young catcher or third baseman this winter. Houston and several other teams have been searching for a leadoff-hitting center fielder. Pierre could certainly be a terrific chip for the Rockies.

Indians now all set in terms of payroll
The A's think Marshall McDougall, who once hit six homers in a single game while at Florida State, will be a useful offensive infielder in the major leagues. He wasn't Cleveland's infielder of choice for Ricardo Rincon, but getting rid of Rincon was the last piece of the reconstruction. So the Indians now believe they can keep Burks, re-sign Thome and still be under a $60 million payroll for 2003. By 2004, they should be able to go back into the free-agent market to fill holes.

Most GMs believe there is a major market correction working, with very few teams willing to go spend on free agents this winter. If the Indians, Cardinals and Red Sox tried to sign Thome, Rolen or Floyd right now, they would have to do so at 2001 prices. Thus they have to wait and let the market dictate their value, which in each case may be far less than they expect, despite each player's ability and character.

"A classic example is Johnny Damon," says one GM. "He essentially signed with Boston for what he turned down in Kansas City. It wasn't his fault. The market shifted downward."