The Mariners are going back to the well with their playoff hopes on the line. Less than a week after acquiring Josh Naylor from the Diamondbacks, they reunited with Eugenio Suarez Wednesday in a trade deadline eve deal that makes a lot of sense for the Mariners – but shouldn’t make Fantasy players too happy.
Suarez has been one of the best hitters in Fantasy this season, ranking 11th in Roto scoring entering play Wednesday. His .248 average is nothing to write home about, but he’s been a standout power hitter, clubbing 36 homers (his second-best total for a season and we still have two months to go) while leading the league with 87 RBI. He provides a big-time power bat for a Mariners team that has collectively received a .664 OPS and five measly homers from their third basemen this year. It’s obvious why they made this trade.
That it’s a familiar face surely only helped them justify the deal. And Suarez was better than you might remember in his two seasons with the Mariners before joining the Diamondbacks, putting up a 118 wRC+ combined with 7.8 fWAR across those two seasons. Of course, the reason you might remember his two years in Seattle not being quite that good is because Suarez really struggled in the poor offensive environment in Seattle.
Suarez is a career .229 hitter in T-Mobile Park, and among the six stadiums where he has at least 250 career plate appearances, his .760 OPS in Seattle is his second-worst mark. In his two seasons combined in Seattle, Suarez had a .750 OPS; in nine seasons split between the Diamondbacks and Reds, he has an .819 OPS. Seattle is just a really hard place to hit.
Suarez can still hit there, obviously. He had 30 homers in 2022, and the way he’s hitting the ball this season, his bat would play anywhere – per Statcat, he would have 37 homers this season if he played every game in Seattle. He has his best xwOBA on contact since 2019, and his increasingly pull-heavy swing plus his improved plate discipline have taken his game to a different level.
But the problem with Seattle is not that it has especially deep walls, which would typically be the first thing you think of when determining whether a park is good for hitting homers or not. Seattle actually has a relatively shallow outfield, believe it or not. The problem is, players just don’t seem to see the ball well in Seattle. It has by far the highest park factor in the majors for strikeouts and one of the lowest for walks, per Statcast, which is the primary reason it is the best pitcher’s park in baseball.
And it’s also the reason why we can’t just take Suarez’s projected 37 homers in T-Mobile and assume he’ll be fine the rest of the way. Maybe he will be, but those 37 homers were hit in different conditions than the ones he’ll see in Seattle – and those conditions are ones we’ve already seen drag Suarez down. He should still be a good source of power, but this trade might drag his entire offensive profile down otherwise, pushing his batting average into unmanageable territory while leaving him as more of a 30-homer guy than the 50-homer guy he has played like for the last year-plus in Arizona.
Or maybe he’ll be fine. It’s only two months, and weird things can happen in two months, especially with a streaky hitter who is as locked in as Suarez is. Maybe the second time around in Seattle will go better – Randy Arozarena is having a much better season his second time around in Seattle – and he’ll just keep on raking.
At the very least, I don’t think there’s anything you can do about this – you certainly aren’t dropping Suarez, and unless someone is going to take his production to date at face value, there probably isn’t much upside in trading him. This is a downgrade to Suarez’s value the rest of the way, but your best bet is to just hang on to him and hope things go better this time in Seattle.
That was not the only trade of the day. The deadline looms at 6 p.m. Thursday, and we’ll be back Friday morning to reset the Fantasy landscape after all the pieces have fallen into place, but for now, let’s get to the rest of the trades from Wednesday you need to know about – and make sure you check out the Trade Deadline Tracker, because Scott White and I will be updating it all day tomorrow to react to all of the news as it goes down.
Here’s what else you need to know about from Wednesday around MLB, including even more trades:
Trade recap!
Jhoan Duran to the Phillies – In most instances, a great closer being sent to the Phillies would be cause for concern – this is a team that has rarely distributed saves to one single pitcher, so Duran isn’t likely to dominate the team’s share the rest of the way. But we’re used to that with Duran, whose career high in saves is just 27 despite being one of the best relievers in baseball. I suspect he’ll get most of the saves in Philadelphia and remain a high-end, but not elite closer for Fantasy. But if they do decide to treat him like a typical closer – and they have more than enough depth to do so if they choose – Duran easily has top-five closer upside in Philly. And, assuming the Twins are done, Griffin Jax is certainly a name to know. More on him shortly.
Ryan Helsley to the Mets – Now, this one is very obviously bad news. Helsley’s a setup man now. No two ways about it. Unless Edwin Diaz gets hurt or falls apart – not unheard of, but unlikely – Helsley is going to be working the eighth inning more often than not. That’s a bummer, and it renders him droppable in nearly all leagues. As for the Cardinals, Phil Maton is the best strikeout pitcher and seems like the best high-leverage option left here, though he may also wind up being traded Thursday. If he isn’t, Maton could be a very valuable reliever down the stretch here.
Michael Soroka to the Cubs – I like Soroka, but I don’t really know what the plan is here. He’s been shaky as a starter despite really solid underlying metrics, so if the Cubs stick him in the rotation, he could have a breakout second half thanks to their much better defense. But Soroka could also potentially shine in shorter bursts as a high-leverage reliever, something the Cubs need despite Daniel Palencia‘s emergence as a reliable closer. Let’s see what the role figures to be, but Soroka could be a sneaky pickup for Fantasy if he stays in the rotation.
Zack Littell to the Reds – Littell is a curious fit for the Reds, given his homer-prone tendencies, but he makes sense as a short-term pickup who doesn’t make much money and can potentially provide a rotation boost down the stretch. It’s the kind of “half-in” move a team like the Reds makes when they want to feint toward trying without investing much. He’ll probably pitch to a low-4.00s ERA and be forgettable for Fantasy.
Ke’Bryan Hayes to the Reds – It’s a huge ballpark upgrade, and you can understand why the Reds would take the chance – Hayes is signed to a long-term deal for very reasonable money, and he’s arguably the best defensive third baseman in baseball, so he’ll have value no matter what. But man, he looks completely washed up as a hitter. Back injuries have robbed him of his once-impressive raw power, and he never really tapped into that raw power back when he was healthy. Reds president of baseball operations Nick Krall told MLB.com the team will try to tweak his swing to tap into more of that power, but it’s not like the Reds have a long, successful track record of these kinds of mid-career turnaround we can point to. Hayes has to give us a reason to think there’s anything left in his bat before we buy in.
Thursday’s waiver-wire targets
Griffin Jax, RP, Twins (23%) – Is Jax just a top-12 closer now? Since the start of last season, only Cade Smith has a lower FIP than Jax, and while his actual ERA isn’t quite that good (especially this season), a 2.77 mark will still play in the back end of the bullpen. Especially with elite strikeout skills – only six relievers have a higher strikeout rate than Jax’s 35.5% mark since 2024. If he’s the Twins closer the rest of the way, I do think Jax will be a top-12 option at the position, but there are two things holding me back. One is that Cade Smith might be even better and is pretty widely available (53% rostered in CBS Fantasy leagues), so any league where both are available, Smith should be the higher priority with Emmanuel Clase out at least until the end of August. And the other thing is that we just don’t know if Jax is truly the closer here, and we won’t until later today. My assumption is that the Twins dangled both Jax and Duran on the market, took the best offer for either of them, and will just hang on to whichever one they didn’t move, in this case, Jax. But that’s just an assumption for now. If he’s still on the roster at one minute after 6 p.m. Thursday, he’s immediately in the top-12 of the rankings at RP.
Tyler Locklear, 1B, Mariners (6%) – Locklear mashed his way onto the Mariners’ big-league lineup after hitting .316 with 19 homers and 18 steals at Triple-A this season, and his reward was a ticket out of town. He was the centerpiece of the Suarez trade and figures to join the Diamondbacks roster, where he’ll get a chance to prove himself as a starting first baseman the rest of the way. Locklear hasn’t done much with his limited opportunities in the majors (just 16 games), but he’s proven himself at the highest level of the minors, with pretty strong underlying metrics backing it up, and now he’ll join a decent lineup in a good hitter’s park, so I’m down with adding Locklear just in case he can translate that Triple-A success.
Moises Ballesteros, C, Cubs (14%) – Even with Ian Happ not being placed on the IL as expected Wednesday, Ballesteros was recalled from Triple-A and started, going 1 for 2 with a three-run double. Because all he does is hit. Ballesteros was sporting a .332/.393/.496 line down at Triple-A, with a 90.7 mph average exit velocity and 42.3% hard-hit rate while striking out 12.9% of the time. Ballesteros is a legitimate talent … I just don’t know where the Cubs are going to play him. He started at DH Wednesday with Happ out of the lineup, but Happ was healthy enough to play and ultimately hit a homer late in the game after replacing Ballesteros at DH. They probably can’t justify taking Michael Busch out of the lineup too often, and now that Matt Shaw is turning things around, sliding Busch over to third seems less likely. So, Ballesteros is an incredibly intriguing talent who could be a must-start catcher, but he probably isn’t even a must-roster player given questions about his role – unless he gets traded today!
Yu Darvish, SP, Padres (59%) – It’s actually kind of annoying that Darvish pitched well here, because it seemed pretty obvious he was droppable after allowing 17 runs in 16.2 innings in his first four starts off the IL. And then he goes and does this against the Mets, with 14 whiffs on 76 pitches and a bunch of weak contact. Against the Mets? I’m still inclined to think Darvish is mostly washed up, but now I’m open to the possibility that this was a premature declaration. I’m not that excited about starting Darvish for next week against the Diamondbacks, but if that goes well, it could be all systems go.
Mike Burrows, SP, Pirates (11%) – When Burrows was promoted instead of Bubba Chandler, I think the collective disappointment from the Fantasy Baseball community made people overlook that Burrows is a pretty interesting pitcher in his own right. He had a 2.51 ERA with 11.4 K/9 at Triple-A before his promotion, and he’s up to better than a strikeout per inning in the majors with a 3.94 xERA. He hasn’t been great, but the pieces are there – his changeup is filthy, his slider and curveball have shown some promise with limiting hard contact, and his fastball isn’t getting crushed. Burrows isn’t a must-roster pitcher, but he’s an interesting streamer for next week with matchups against the Giants and Reds in a two-start week.
Jordan Lawlar, SS, Diamondbacks (33%) – The runway is cleared. Now, Lawlar just has to get healthy. With Eugenio Suarez out of the picture, Lawlar finally has somewhere to play whenever he’s healthy enough to return from his hamstring injury. He’s been out for nearly a month with that injury, so hopefully he’s not far from getting back into action, and he should be promoted to the majors as soon as he is physically ready. I know Lawlar has been around for a while without doing much at the MLB level, but he’s also still just 23, with just 56 MLB plate appearances, and a massive .334/.420/.590 line in 81 career Triple-A games. He still absolutely has impact upside for Fantasy if he can just get back on the field soon.
Randy Rodriguez, RP, Giants (30%) – One other wrinkle with Jax and Smith is the looming possibility of Rodriguez joining them as a must-roster reliever. With his 1.20 ERA and 31.0% K-BB% rate, Rodriguez has arguably been the best reliever in baseball this season, and with the Giants reportedly open to moving Camilo Doval, Rodriguez could find himself as the closer by this evening, and he might be a top-12 option, too. There’s a chance the Giants would give Ryan Walker another look in that role first, but if Doval is moved, Rodriguez could emerge as one of the biggest winners of the deadline.
