TRADE DEADLINE: Pitcher Target Tier List

Breaking down potential arms on the market that the Guardians could make a move for, and their likelihood of happening

We are officially past the halfway point of the 2024 season, and your Cleveland Guardians sit in poll position in the AL Central, but a lot of help is still needed if this team has serious aspirations in October, namely within the starting rotation.

Coming out of the All-Star Break, this is where the Guardians starting rotation ranks in MLB in major statistical categories: 2.8 fWAR (29th) // 484.0 innings pitched (26th) // 4.52 ERA (25th) // 4.66 FIP // 92.3 average fastball velocity (LAST) // 14.0% HR/FB rate (LAST) // 8.5% BB rate (25th) // .462 SLG against (29th) // .340 wOBA against (27th)

It’s not great!

Injuries plus arms that were expected to be counted upon that have underperformed this season have created this massive issue of inconsistency among a team that’s otherwise been very good and very consistent through its first 95 games. That being said, this deadline, a front office coming off a stellar draft week has a chance to add stability to the lone unstable unit on this roster, but who will they target? What we’re going to do is break this down by tiers of more likely to less likely to completely unlikely...but hey, there’s a chance!

We’ll start with the top rung of our tree:

Dream Scenario

It’s exactly what it sounds like. The player who fits exactly what we need, but they’re too good to be true? There’s one name in this branch that's even been floated as a trade chip for a bad team. By now, you’ve guessed it: it’s Garrett Crochet.

The Chicago White Sox have the most dominant left-handed pitcher in baseball and can’t build around him? Color me shocked!

A haul to get Crochet would include your top prospect, the prospect after that, and if you have another one in the top 100, sure, them too. Crochet has notched a lot of firsts this season: first in all of baseball in strikeouts, strikeout rate, xwOBA against, and the first time in his career he’s topped 100 innings pitched. It feels as if how Crochet will be used is dependent on what team would acquire him, but the feeling, for the White Sox at least, is that as of now, his innings may be capped due to never having this kind of volume across his amateur and pro career on top of having Tommy John Surgery as well as dealing with a shoulder injury. Is there legitimate smoke with this? I have my doubts, but again, teams can be weird about usage.

Then there’s the intra-division trade. Would the White Sox really want to trade Crochet to Cleveland, a team that’s tormented them in recent memory, and help build a juggernaut in the American League? The concept of a trade within the division is certainly not impossible, far from it, in fact. Cliff Lee was dealt from Seattle in 2010 to Texas with rookie Justin Smoak headlining the package in return. Andrew Miller went from Boston to Baltimore in exchange for Eduardo Rodriguez. Roger Clemens, coming off back-to-back Cy Young’s, was dealt from Toronto to the Yankees in exchange for David Wells.

High profile packages within the division aren’t impossible, they’re just uncommon, and with the White Sox, who knows? Regardless, the amount of playoff-caliber teams who would be in on Crochet would range around 100% of them. It would be tough regardless; it will be even tougher as a rival.

Let’s Make a Deal

CLE Receives
SP Garrett Crochet

BOS Receives
OF Chase DeLauter (#39 Baseball America)
1B Ralphy Velazquez (#65 Baseball America)
IF Angel Genao (#72 Baseball America)
LHP Alex Clemmey (#7 CLE prospect Baseball America)

With that said, we’ll just go ahead and chalk him up into a tier on his own:

Unlikely, but Not Impossible

This tier belongs to three arms: Luis Severino, Dylan Cease, and Nick Pivetta. The likelihood of these players even being considered to be dealt hinges on one factor, and that’s their team’s performance when the deadline rolls around. As we stand now, the Mets and Padres are entrenched within the National League’s blob of a Wild Card race as five teams are all within five games of each other, so this is less about an in-depth breakdown of Cease and Sevy as much as it is to say that they’re here.

In reality, this section is about Nick Pivetta.

For the Red Sox, getting swept by the Dodgers out of the All-Star break was less than ideal, and they went from the second Wild Card team in the AL to below the Twins and Royals in a matter of days.

In turn, this makes Nick Pivetta a viable arm to be moved at the deadline due to his impending free agency in 2025. A rental arm like Pivetta would be ideal for the Guardians. He’s gone six or more innings in half of his 15 starts, and he’s running a career low 6.4% walk rate. Pivetta is a stuff monster. Per St, and it’s his fastball and slider (likely sweeper per savant), that grades out as his best pitches. His sweeper sits at at 152, the third best grade among starters for any slider-type per FanGraphs’ Stuff+ leaderboard while his fastball grades out as tied for second-best with MacKenzie Gore at 129. Pivetta’s 20.1 inch induced vertical break on his fastball is the best among all starters in baseball.

Pivetta lives heavily in the zone as well, which has played a big part molding him into this high strikeout/high flyball rate pitcher of extremes who gives up a lot of hard contact while also inducing whiffs.

Let’s Make a Deal

CLE Receives
SP Nick Pivetta

BOS Receives
IF Juan Brito (#7 CLE prospect — Baseball America)
RHP Davis Sharpe

Again, this is a move totally dependent on the Red Sox and how they do down the stretch. I anticipate a team like Boston to gut it out and make a push, but crazier things have happened.

Solid // Controllable // Likely to be Traded

This tier is for non-superstar arms that can help the Guardians in 2024 and beyond. There are three main names for this tier: Erick Fedde, Zach Eflin, and Nathan Eovaldi.

If we were putting percentages on odds to be dealt for all of these starters, Erick Fedde’s would be 99%.

Fedde has been an excellent contact manager since the White Sox signed him following his excellent season in the KBO in 2023. Fedde’s issues prior to leaving MLB to play in Korea was that his strikeout numbers could not offset his 10% walk rate while not being able to limit hard contact. Now, in 2024, Fedde is throwing his sinker less, his cutter and changeup more, and his curveball has evolved into a sweeper. His repertoire now reflects his numbers of a pitcher who makes a living limiting hard contact and inducing groundballs, and the biggest thing Fedde has done is eat innings efficiently. Nine pitchers have tossed 115+ innings in 2024 with a sub-3 ERA. Erick Fedde is one of them right now.

Let’s Make a Deal

CLE Receives
SP Erick Fedde

CWS Receives
LHP Parker Messick (#17 CLE prospect — Baseball America)
C Cooper Ingle (#30 CLE prospect — Baseball America)
IF Alex Mooney (#20 CLE prospect — Pipeline)

There are going to be a lot of contact managers on this list, and Zach Eflin is no exception. Eflin has been doing this at a pretty high level for a while. Coming off a season where he finished sixth in AL Cy Young voting, Eflin has orchestrated another solid season in what’s now been six straight full seasons where he’s run a high-3 to mid-4 ERA.

Consistency is the name of the game with Eflin. Of his 18 starts, 17 of them have seen him go at least five innings. He’s not a big strikeout guy, never has been, but he won’t issue a free pass while having great command to the point where he can live in the zone without getting hit too hard.

Eflin also carries an extra year with him at 18 million dollars for 2025 which, for a pitcher of his caliber, is extremely cost efficient. Should Tampa decide to sell, which I think Eflin has around a 70% chance of getting dealt, he realistically would be within my top three arms to get at this deadline.

Let’s Make a Deal

CLE Receives
SP Zach Eflin

TB Receives
IF Juan Brito (#7 CLE prospect — Baseball America)
LHP Parker Messick (#17 CLE prospect — Baseball America)

Last and certainly not least, is a legend of October and the best arm of this group, Nathan Eovaldi.

Eovaldi is an interesting arm at this deadline as he carries a 20 million dollar option for 2025 that vests into a player option for the 2025 season should he pitch just 57 more innings this season. That’s where trying to valuate a package for Eovaldi gets tricky. In theory, should he reach that threshold at the level he’s been pitching for years now, it would make sense for him to want to test free agency. The flip side of this is he will be 35 at the start of next season, so a longer deal doesn’t likely seem to be attainable for him, and 20 million guaranteed starts to sound pretty good.

Similar to Eflin, Eovaldi has gone 5+ innings in all but one start this season, and in 13 of those starts, he’s allowed two or fewer runs. Eovaldi is a very good pitcher, but again, his legacy will always surround October. Eovaldi made six starts for the Rangers last postseason, including the World Series deciding Game Five where he tossed six scoreless innings. Before that, he was the anchor to Boston’s World Series staff in 2018. There may not be a more realistic option for this team to trade for that I would want more than Eovaldi.

Let’s Make a Deal

CLE Receives
SP Nathan Eovaldi

TEX Receives
IF Angel Genao (#70 MLB prospect // #4 CLE prospect — Baseball America)

BRING HIM HOME

I mean, c’mon. He’s from Toledo. He went to Akron. He’s a Browns fan!

Chris Bassitt is running a 1.412 WHIP right now, but he’s also running a 3.71 ERA. He’s running a career high H/9, his highest walk rate in five years, but he’s a gamer, and he’s leaving runners stranded and still getting deep into games. July hasn’t been kind to Bassitt. His less than stellar peripherals have caught up to him a bit, and he’s been hit pretty hard, allowing 20 hits over three starts and 16.2 innings while walking 9 batters. It’s a bit sloppy right now, but Bassitt is someone I trust to turn that around.

Bassitt carries 1.5 years of control with $22 million owed next season. Despite a long line of success, the 35-year-old won’t carry the same value as an Eflin or Eovaldi.

Let’s Make a Deal

CLE Receives
SP Chris Bassitt
RP Genesis Cabrera

TOR Receives
OF Johnathan Rodriguez (#25 CLE prospect — Baseball America)
RHP Austin Peterson
IF Jake Fox

Rental

Yusei Kikuchi and Nick Martinez are both interesting rental options, but there’s one rental arm who rises above the rest: Jack Flaherty.

Jack Flaherty signed with Detroit on a one year deal prior to the 2024 season, and the Tigers have unlocked some magic that once was in his right arm, engineering him to his best season since 2019 when he finished fourth in NL Cy Young voting.

The mystery about Flaherty is where this all came from and where it continues to go. It’s not like Detroit found some hidden velocity, but they’ve figured out how to mold Flaherty’s offspeed and make it more effective. Flaherty struggled with location last season mightily, leaving his offspeed offerings over the heart of the plate far too often, but this season, he’s finding way more success out of the zone with his slider and knuckle curve, helping lead the way to the league’s highest whiff rate and a strikeout rate close to 10% better than last season’s.

Flaherty has long been seen as the next one after his 2019 season, but injuries have led to unavailability and overall weak performances on the mound, and he’s bounced around quite a bit. A strong back half on a playoff team will see that he gets locked up to a long deal as he enters his 30s.

Now, we touched on the intra-divisional trades with Crochet. This isn’t quite the same seeing as Cleveland would get just two-plus months of Flaherty, but he will easily be the most expensive rental arm available.

The flip side of this is Detroit doesn’t deal him, tries to push for a bat at the deadline, and get whatever comp pick they may from Flaherty’s season, which is less likely, but not impossible.

Let’s Make a Deal

CLE Receives
SP Jack Flaherty

DET Receives
OF George Valera (#14 CLE prospect — Baseball America)
LHP Parker Messick (#17 CLE prospect — Baseball America)