Giancarlo Stanton Clears Waivers

[Centerfield]

Can now be traded. According to multiple sources.

To me, this is just shocking. If you can (or at least have a chance) to get Stanton for nothing other than money, it's shocking that no one would claim him.

And not necessarily the Mets, who have corner outfielders already, but the Yankees, or Dodgers, or someone rebuilding like Philly.

[batmagadanleadoff]

Centerfield wrote: Can now be traded. And not necessarily the Mets, who have corner outfielders already, but the Yankees, or Dodgers, or someone rebuilding like Philly.

Oh. You mean the major market teams that act like major market teams.

[Frayed Knot]

GIANCARLO STANTON CLEARS WAIVERS

I'll take 'Least Surprising News of the Summer' for $600 Alex

[Benjamin Grimm]

I'm sure that if any claim had been made, the Marlins would have pulled him back.

Maybe the Mets passed on Stanton in the slim hope that he would clear waivers and the Marlins would trade him out of the division?

[RealityChuck]

Shrug. Cespedis cleared waivers earlier this year, too. Means absolutely nothing other than, "if you blow us away, we might make a deal."

[Frayed Knot]

What the (theoretical) team would take on if it claimed and was awarded Stanton

- the remainder of the $14.5M for this season, then $25M, $26M, $26M, $29M, $29M, $32M, $32M, $32M, $29M, $25M, and then either $25M club option or a $10M buyout for the [u:32eb6i59]2028[/u:32eb6i59] season
- can opt out of contract after 2020 season
- he also has full no-trade protection -- so not only can the team kill any claim (by pulling him back) but the player can too.

[Ceetar]

What is the purpose of waivers anyway? where did they originate? It seems like it's mostly just a way for teams to trade guys in August, with a lot of 'good faith' of not claiming guys you don't want. But why not just push the trade deadline back in that case? Who benefits this way?

[Frayed Knot]

The idea is that the bad/poor clubs can't just trade/sell their players wholesale to the top teams at the tail end of the season without at least giving the other contenders a crack at them first, hence
the worst-goes-first order.
If the chasing clubs want to play the gentlemen's game of not claiming anyone then they've got no one to blame if the top dog scoops up all the good talent as they had their chance.

The trading deadline used to be June 15 so the waiver period was much longer.

[Ceetar]

Sure but like, they could've signed them two, three weeks ago. Unless it's just linked to the rosters expanding? Like out of it teams just dumping guys to make room so let the worse teams have a shot at them first? I dunno that this is still an advantage in this day and age.

[smg58]

As good a year as Stanton is having, the fact that he missed significant time in each of the past two seasons makes the size of that contract daunting.

[Frayed Knot]

smg58 wrote: ... that he missed significant time in each of the past two seasons makes the size of that contract daunting.

Four of the last five seasons really. Only in 2014 did he play north of 125 games (since 2012)