The Oakland Athletics are one game back of the Los Angeles Angels for the AL West division lead and the Pittsburg Pirates are 1.5 games behind the San Francisco Giants for the second wild card spot. Are they looking to make waiver moves?
On Sunday at 1 p.m. the Athletics claimed Tampa Bay Rays shortstop Yunel Escobar off of revocable waivers. This means they have a 48-hour window (until 1 p.m. on Tuesday) to work out a trade with the Rays if they wish to have Escobar join their team. General manager Billy Beane is looking for help at the shortstop position while Jed Lowrie is dealing with a fractured left index finger. He suffered the injury on August 4, but was placed on the disabled list on August 14.
Escobar, an excellent defensive shortstop, is hitting .253 with four home runs and 31 RBIs in 113 games with the Rays. The A's are using a combination of Eric Sogard (.216 AVG with 17 RBIs and 10 stolen bases) and Andy Parrino (only 29 at-bats this season) at shortstop and are likely worried that Lowrie's finger issue could be a lingering injury. If that's the case, they're going to need a steady option at the position for the AL West race and beyond.
In the National League, the Pittsburgh Pirates are in the market for an impact player. General manager Neal Huntington said the front office will be aggressive this week as the last of the bigger names will be available via waivers. A number of notable players have cleared waivers already and are eligible to be traded to any MLB team including Yu Darvish, Adrian Beltre, Elvis Andrus, Shin-Soo Choo, Jonathon Niese, Curtis Granderson, Ian Desmond, Gio Gonzalez, Kevin Correia, Alex Rios, Jonathan Papelbon, Matt Kemp, Andre Ethier, Carl Crawford, Josh Beckett, Brett Gardner, Martin Prado, Stephen Drew, Bartolo Colon and Scott Feldman.
Pittsburgh could be looking for an outfielder since they demoted their top prospect and right fielder Gregory Polanco this morning. But Travis Snider has been serviceable with his .268 average, 10 home runs and 32 RBIs in 246 at-bats and manager Clint Hurdle as opted to play him over Polanco prior to the demotion. Huntington didn't make it clear what position the team was looking for.
"It could be a real active period. I don't have a real feel for whether we'll get somebody or not, but it won't be for a lack of claiming, that's for sure," Huntington told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. "We're about to hit that final wave. Clubs that weren't sure if they were in or out, they held onto their players and now they'll put them through, as well as the teams that are in it. They'll put their guys through this week."
UPDATE: The Rays have pulled Yunel Escobar back off revocable waivers and he will NOT be traded.
