Jay Jaffe FanGraphs Chat – 8/4/26
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AvatarJay Jaffe
12:00
Good afternoon, and happy post-trade deadline day!
12:01
I'm still recovering from the past few days. I stayed up until an ungodly hour writing up the Luis Castillo trade on Saturday night (https://blogs.fangraphs.com/squeezed-out-of-seattle-luis-castillo-land...) even while knowing that the Tarik Skubal trade would become the bigger news
Wrote about the Gausman to the Cubs trade https://blogs.fangraphs.com/the-cubs-land-a-potential-playoff-starter-...
12:03
If you missed anything — and I'm still catching up, because when i was writing, deals were flying around like it was a dust storm — the landing page for all of our coverage is here:  https://blogs.fangraphs.com/the-2026-fangraphs-trade-deadline-roundup/
12:04
I believe that as usual, we still have a winners & losers piece, the ZiPS post-deadline outlook, and the top prospects traded guide in the pipeline
opifijikl
12:04
Great articles on May, Adell, and Gausman. How do you at FG select who writes what article? I'm impressed with how much team-specific context you're able to include, along with interesting thoughts on the futures of the involved teams. How do you get smart on everything in such a short time? Were there any deals you wanted to write up but couldn't?
AvatarJay Jaffe
12:06
Thanks! Some of it is just timing, some of it is affinity for a player, and some of it is familiarity with a team's situation. I carved out Saturday night waiting for something to happen and grabbed Castillo when it came across the wire, because I've written about him before and did some stuff on the White Sox rotation. I wrote about Jo Adell's breakout last year, and about Dustin May's breakout earlier this year (one of many May articles I've done, usually the sad ones regarding his injuries)
12:08
Oh, and I had just done a predeadline postmortem on the Blue Jays where i connected the dots between Gausman and the Cubs, who weren't on his 8-team no-trade list.

Doing the Replacement-Level Killers series also attunes me to various needs and connections. That's kind of my spring training for deadline deals. You say the Guardians have an outfield production problem? I got it.
opifijikl
12:08
What was your most surprising trade deadline move?
AvatarJay Jaffe
12:10
The Cardinals trading May within the division was a bit of a surprise, and I didn't think the Arraez to Phillies deal made sense given how badly they need to improve their defense. Instead htey played musical chairs and brought in a guy who has worked hard to improve but who bumps others into less familiar positions
Big Fan
12:10
Deeply sad Braves fan.  How can I ever love my team again?  And curse you, Jacob Degrom - you would've been so happy here!
AvatarJay Jaffe
12:12
I agree that getting Lane Thomas, Tyler Mahle, and Brent Suter isn't particularly exciting when there were bigger names out there, but I think the sting of deadline disappointment only lasts so long because a lot of these deals, for as much as we hype them, don't end up moving the needle much. Then again, sometimes wacky stuff happens, like all the outfielders the 2021 Braves brought in.
Justin
12:12
Surprised Holmes and Taylor brought back a top 50 prospect? That one stood out to me
AvatarJay Jaffe
12:15
Yeah. I like Clay Holmes and think he's a good fit for the Cubs with that defense and that rotation situation, but if he's just a rental, even by also getting Tyrone Taylor that's not enough for me to give up a 50-FV infielder on the left side. Likewise with the Brewers giving up Alexander Frias, also a top 50 guy (50 FV) in the May trade
12:16
Granted, i didn't know much in the way of specifics about either of these guys 24 hours ago because I'm not on the prospect beat, but credit to our prospect team for helping us assimilate so much information on the fly.
Baseball Learner
12:16
Do you think we see Volpe and Dominguez again someday or are they just done?
AvatarJay Jaffe
12:18
I'm sure we haven't seen the last of them in the Bronx because injuries happen, but it's clear that the Yankees realize they're not the droids they're looking for right now, and I suspect the reality is that they'll be on the move at some point this offseason. Particularly Volpe, with George Lombard Jr. just promoted
war2d2
12:19
Jay! Hope you had an exciting and fulfilling Trade Deadline Day and that Baseball Santa brought you that late-inning reliever you always wanted.
AvatarJay Jaffe
12:19
It wasn't so much what I wanted but I learned a lot about Ryan Zeferjahn, such as the fact that he exists and wasn't a guy made up by https://bsky.app/profile/productiveouts.bsky.social/
12:20
My depth of knowledge of Angels middle relievers isn't enough to drown an ant.
ImKeithHernandez
12:20
I always assumed relievers are so volatile because the samples are too small, but is there something else? When are you confident that a reliever is actually "good?"
AvatarJay Jaffe
12:22
Some of it is looking at their pitch modeling scores (PitchingBot and Stuff+) to see what their weapons are. OK, this guy isn't missing a ton of bats right now and walking too many guys, but does he have a pitch that makes batters chase? Does he have a gap in his repertoire and a team that can teach him a new pitch or tweak an existing one?
Baby Yoda
12:22
Did the Tigers get less for Skubal than the Cardinals got for May? (I don't think so but the fact that we even have to talk about this...)
AvatarJay Jaffe
12:23
No, and both River Ryan and Zyhir Hope are closer to the majors than those two — Frias is just 18 and there's a lot of space between him and the majors
hayz11
12:24
What are your thoughts on the Red Sox deadline moves? Discourse is all over the place on them. While I agree that it felt like they overpaid in most of the moves, I can appreciate that Breslow aggressively tried to improve the team in a year where the AL is weak, rather than trying to "win" every trade, which I think has been a problem for him (and Bloom before him) in the past
AvatarJay Jaffe
12:27
I didn't like the Early/Mead trade much even before the latter got injured (which is just dumb luck) but I am absolutely gobsmacked that they were able to get Adley Rutschman from within the division. I think getting something for Mayer was good too
Phil
12:28
I know it kinda got lost amid other events, but boy, Rafaela had himself a weekend, didn't he?
AvatarJay Jaffe
12:29
four homers against the Dodgers, including two off Yamamoto, was very impressive. Of course the other two guys he hit them off, Irvin and Sheehan, are already not there anymore.
Ryan Carra
12:29
What players were you most surprised to see not move? What holes are most surprising that went unfilled? (Yankee catcher?)
AvatarJay Jaffe
12:31
I am surprised the Yankees didn't get something to help out behind the plate, but once the Twins decided to approach the deadline as buyers, that pretty much took Jeffers off the table. Joey Bart, who went from the Braves to the White Sox, would have been a good addition.
12:34
As far as bigger-picture not moving, hmm. I guess I'm surprised the Angels didn't also trade Reid Detmers if they were trading Jose Soriano. Nolan Gorman seems like a guy who needs a change of scenery and I'm surprised somebody didn't take the gamble there. Kenley Jansen ain't what he used to be but he could help in a setup role. I'm sure there are many more
Phil
12:34
How do the story assignments work on a weekend like this? Is it just first dibs, or does Meg mostly just pick people?
AvatarJay Jaffe
12:36
again, it's kind of 50/50 — when there are more of them blockbuster types besides Skubal we do talk ahead of time about who's standing by for those particular moves (in the winter we divvy up top free agents). But a lot of times it's who's got the phone in their hand and shouts ME ME ME when a trade comes across and sometimes it's "Hey i know you're buried in this but when you're done can you write up this next one"
StuShea
12:38
How are you feeling about the Mets' acquisition of Rojas? Thanks
AvatarJay Jaffe
12:39
He seems like a good addition and perhaps a steal given what they traded, but this is still putting lipstick on a pig. A team with a payroll of $350 million as deadline sellers is a black eye for the organization.
fincampbell05
12:39
As a Red Sox fan, I am trying to balance my awareness that we gave up an absolute haul for Adley Rutschman with my awareness/strong belief that we will simply generate 1-3 new top-100 pitching prospects by this time next year. Is this sane? Am I coping too hard? Did we get fleeced?
AvatarJay Jaffe
12:42
With a tip of the ol' TINSTAAPP cap, that's the thing about teams that are good at churning out pitching prospects, they can use them as currency at the trade deadline. It's some thing the Red Sox do well, perhaps not equally well every year but it's a core strength of theres, and there are a lot easier to produce than switch-hitting All-Star catchers
Eric Martell
12:42
A starting pitcher trade (even for someone as good as Skubal) is only going to move the needle on the regular season so much, especially for a team like the Dodgers, right? In ~50 games, he might get 10 starts. They'd likely go 5-5 or 6-4 in those 10 starts with even an okay starter, and it's unlikely that they'll go 9-1 or something with him. It's all about the postseason with the teams most likely to go, right? Given that, which team(s) helped themselves the most with their chances to win playoff series in the last couple of days?
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