What was once believed to be a trade between the Rays and the Padres turned into a three-way deal with a mystery team. Then it was just a deal between the Rays and Padres. Then that mystery third team came back, and it was the Washington Nationals.
The three-team trade between the Tampa Bay Rays, San Diego Padres and Washington Nationals has been agreed upon and it involves a total of 11 players. As suspected, the Rays received Steven Souza Jr. from the Nationals and the Padres got Myers from the Rays. A couple of veterans were involved in the deal, but the rest were prospects from each team's farm system.
The deal was reported by ESPN's Jim Bowden and FOX Sports' Ken Rosenthal.
Such a transaction is pretty rare since the centerpiece of the trade was a second year player who only has 175 games under his belt. Here's the breakdown:
San Diego Padres receive:
OF Wil Myers from TB
C Ryan Hanigan from TB
P Jose Castillo from TB
P Gerardo Reyes from TB
Tampa Bay Rays receive:
OF Steven Souza Jr. from WSH
P Travis Ott from WSH
C Rene Rivera from SD
P Burch Smith from SD
P Jake Bauers from SD
Washington Nationals receive:
P Joe Ross from SD
SS Trea Turner from SD
This is an interesting deal all around for a number of reasons. For the Padres, they get a great potential talent in Myers, however, they have Matt Kemp (pending a physical), Carlos Quentin, Cameron Maybin, Seth Smith, Rymer Liriano and Will Venable in the outfield as well. Unless they're going to eat the salaries of Quentin ($8 million), Maybin ($15 million over next two seasons) and/or Smith ($12.75 million over next two seasons), we can only wonder how they'll handle that logjam. They also gave away A LOT of young talent for an outfield who played only 175 MLB games.
For the Rays, they just shipped away the 2013 AL Rookie of the Year, and although they got a lot in return, a majority of the players are pitchers. According to Baseball America, four of the Rays' top 10 prospects are pitchers. Souza is a great talent who should be ready to start the season in the MLB, so at least they got a good replacement for Myers.
For the Nationals, this seemingly signifies the eventual exit of shortstop Ian Desmond. He has only one year left on his deal after rejecting a five-year, $90 million extension last offseason. Trea Turner, a 21-year-old who split the season between Class Short-Season A Eugene and Class-A Fort Wayne, should eventually be Desmond's replacement. The youngster slashed .323/.406/.448/.854 with 45 runs scored and 23 stolen bases in 69 games this past season in the minors.
It will take a number of years before we can officially declare a winner of this three-team trade because of all the young talent that was moved. However, we wouldn't be surprised if the Rays or Padres used some of the pieces they received today and executed another deal with another trade partner.
