Orioles Trade Deadline Big Board: Ranking the Best Fits by Need, Cost & Likelihood

Let’s be real, this exercise, at the MLB level, is only regarding players the Orioles will ship out.

Feckless-and-failed top baseball exec Mike Elias of course changed his tune about his roster with the trade deadline mere days away. When in late June he gaslit fans like a pathetic used car salesman about "buying" and going for it at the deadline – we exposed the fallacy in real-time – on Friday, with the team completing its best month of the season, Elias whined: “We can’t sink all of our chips into 2026.”

And then he flipped the pitcher who logged the most innings of anyone during their endless, eight-year rebuild (Dean Kremer, with another year of control) for a teenager who just got to low-A.

Welcome to Birdland! The con remains the same and liftoff was utter propaganda! The Elias Way killed The Oriole Way. Where baseball operations is an adjunct department of the marketing department.

This baseball coward built another garbage roster as we told you back in May, of course he isn’t pumping more resources into it. He’s going to gut it for whatever its worth on the open market, which ain’t nearly as much as you would think for such “big” names.

Here’s the five most likely to go, and where:

Taylor Ward – Rays, Mariners, Yankees

Cost: Prorated $12.175M (UFA in 2027)

Chance He’s Here Tuesday: 0.00%

If he is still here at 6pm on Monday we should all picket The Warehouse to sell the team. Yeah, I know the latest clueless owner has only been in charge a few years, but he is arguably worse than the last guy given the astounding wealth he and his partners have and how much public money they've been able to use to spruce up Camden Yards (and they're failed besides the scoreboard). Davd Rubenstein is all about dumping this salary.

Ward’s power has been totally sapped, he is bad in left field in spacious Camden Yards and has 1 HR and 10 RBI there all season. Dylan Beavers is more than ready to take over leadoff and corner OF duties. This guy can’t move when he does get on base. It’s baffling he’s not already done.

Return: Somebody’s 15th ranked prospect maybe. Probably needs to be packed with a bullpen arm or an everyday player with oodles of control. Who cares. Another Elias bust. This team gets better the moment he is gone and same for most of these other guys.

Andrew Kittredge – Literally anywhere, they all need a relief arm

Cost: Prorated $9M (UFA in 27)

Chance He’s Here Tuesday: 0.00%

The Yennier Cano extension, one would think, takes him off the market, which means Kittredge is gone. No doubt about it. And maybe Tyler Wells too. He’s near the end of his career he has playoff experience and this is a no brainer.

Return: Fringy, quasi prospect.

Trevor Rogers – Dodgers, Brewers, White Sox, Braves, Cubs

Cost: Prorated $6.2M (UFA 2027)

Chance He’s Here Tuesday: 2.21%

Why so specific, Jason? That’s Rogers ERA since June 1. And He was that good last year in the 18 starts he made. Sure, there was some incredibly ugly stuff before that run last year and before the run this year – all the more reason you have to sell high on him now. Elias traded an All-Star everyday outfielder for what amounting to useless Rogers starts – if he’s dealt now he will have never pitched in a playoff chase for Baltimore despite allegedly being something to put them over the top at the 2024 deadline.

Clearly that scarred Elias too, because, according to Rogers, the team has never tried to buy low on him or extend him in any way.

Keeping him when he’s this hot and so many teams are lusting for a lefty and only one will get Tarik Skubal would be nuts, especially with the GM on record now that he won’t be adding much of anything real. If you like him so much, sign him as free agent whenever the upcoming labor impasse ends.

Return: A top 10 prospect, preferably an arm, and a lottery ticket

Rico Garcia – Ditto Kittredge

Cost: Prorated $900,000 (UFA 2031)

Chance He’s Here Tuesday: 5.91%

So, yeah, you probably figured out why that specific percentage, eh? That’s Garcia’s ERA since June 1. But he was great his first 21 IP this season and that’s gotta mean something, right? I don’t care how control-able he is, dude is already 32 and has been in the minors forever and if you can get anything at all for a AAA journeyman you took on to get you through meaningless games in 2025 after gutting your team at the deadline, you call anything a win now. But maybe the interest is so low, they keep him? Would be odd, even for a broken GM. This is in the Kremer category for me.

Return: Whatever

Adley Rutschman – Rays, Yankees, MYSTERY TEAM!

Cost: Prorated $7.25M (arbitration in ’27, UFA ;28)

Chance He’s Here Tuesday: 10%

Dude is on the IL again, and this time the 10-day variety which puts him eligible to be back ahead of deadline. Interesting. This is a little complicated by the wrist injury and a lot complicated by him being 27th in MLB in innings caught entering the weekend and the fact he has a .676 OPS since June 21, 2024 and just 22 HR and 96 RBI in 235 games in that span with a pathetic slash of: .225/.310/.366. Woof.

Samuel Basallo is better than him and tougher than him and he's signed long-term and he only caught 200 games in the minors and can't have this dead weight getting in the way. One of these trades would be great.

And Elias’s massive ego and egregiously overinflated sense of worth will take a blow if he can’t get anything for the guy he passed on Bobby Witt Jr to draft. There is a ton or PR and optics tied to this, and I bet he ends up packaged with another one of his failed top draft picks to goose the return. At this point, with Elias no longer trying to propagate fan fiction about not being able to envision a future without this player, he’s waffled on it Friday, now is the time to move him.

Return: Top 10 prospect + Top 20 prospect

The Rest: If Wells is getting more than nibbles, I think he’s gone. Colton Cowser should be gone, I don’t think he has the stomach to move Jackson Holliday and Rutschman, but maybe he does. Can’t put this group in the top five, but none of them would constitute a surprise and even moving Gunnar Henderson wouldn’t constitute a stunner for me at this point. Elias was telling you where his mind is Friday, no spirited comeback over the Phillies will change that, and it’s all about 2027 for him.

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