Who’s Going To Be Dealt First?

Twins General Manager Terry Ryan reportedly told a radio audience over the weekend that nobody is untouchable. Making that clear to every other GM (not to mention everyone in his own clubhouse) is the right thing. It’s not about WHETHER this guy or that guy can be had in a deal, it’s about HOW MUCH the trade partner is willing to offer.

Of course, some players have no-trade clauses in their contracts, such as Joe Mauer (full) and Justin Morneau (limited), but if you were playing for a team as bad as this one, wouldn’t you pretty seriously consider waiving that clause? Yeah… me too.

I suspect other players, such as Josh Willingham and Ryan Doumit, would at least be consulted before being traded. It would not be good for Ryan and the Twins to get a reputation for immediately trading away players that they’ve signed as free agents to reasonable multi-year contracts. You know other teams would use that against you in offseason negotiations with players the Twins might be interested in bringing in (“You can sign with the Twins, but you know they tend to use you as trade bait as soon as their season goes south.”)

The new Collective Bargaining Agreement is going to play a bit of havoc with the trade market, too. Players like Francisco Liriano that are about to be free agents don’t bring a compensation draft pick to the Twins after the year unless the Twins make a “qualifying” offer (about $12.5 million). And if they make that offer and still lose the player, they only get one “sandwich” pick between the first two rounds. Then again, if they trade Liriano, the team getting him can’t even get that sandwich pick since a player has to be on a team’s roster the whole year for that team to get compensation.

Still, you have to believe the Twins are going to deal some players either before the end of the non-waiver period at the end of July or the waiver trade period in August. I still believe most of Twinsville will be disappointed in what Ryan gets in return for his players, but he’s going to make some trades anyway. But who?

With Matt Capps and Carl Pavano both laid up until after the non-waiver trade deadline, their chances of being traded are significantly reduced. That said, it wouldn’t surprise me at all to see either or both change teams via the waiver wire in August.

Here’s my “top 5” players I expect Ryan to be most likely to trade yet this summer:

1. Francisco Liriano: Frankie’s value will probably not be any higher than it is right now. There are a lot of teams looking for starting pitching help, but there are a lot of better pitchers than Liriano on the market, too. He’s a free agent at the end of the year, so he’s just a rental arm, but I think he’s the most likely player to be traded of those currently on the Twins 40-man roster.
2. Denard Span: Span would not be a rental player, as he’s still under a reasonable multi-year contract. SI.com recently published an article listing all of the best centerfielders in the Big Leagues right now and Span’s name wasn’t even mentioned. It’s true he isn’t currently considered “elite,” but he’d be an upgrade for a lot of teams and the Twins have current and future replacements in their system that make Span more expendable than any other position player that would be in similar demand.
3. Danny Valencia: Remember him? Valencia was supposed to claim the Twins 3B job for a few years anyway. Then he stopped hitting. Then Trevor Plouffe started hitting. Then it became “Danny Who?” Valencia hasn’t exactly lit up AAA this summer, but there’s no room for him any more in Minnesota and I think the Twins will find a new home for him while he still has at least a little value.
4. Alexi Casilla: There are bound to be teams that are looking for middle infield/utility infield help and I just suspect that Lexi is not part of the Twins’ plans for 2013, making him likely to be dealt this summer.
5. Josh Willingham: I don’t expect Willingham to be traded, but I had to list someone “5th” on a Top 5 list. Maybe it would be a guy like Jared Burton, but I put Willingham here because there’s no doubt he’s going to be the first player that contenders ask about. Just the fact that there will be so much demand means his chances of getting dealt are higher than guys who most teams don’t care about at all.

In reality, I expect three of the top four players listed above to be gone by the end of August.

But what say you? Who do you most expect to see wearing a different uniform before the end of the summer? Let us know in the poll below (like I did, you can choose up to five players).

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