Passan: Rivals believe D-backs could be sellers at trade deadline

The big question in Arizona Diamondbacks land at the moment is, “To trade or not to trade?”

Apart from standing pat, the D-backs could elect to add weapons to their roster to make a playoff push or sell off the ones they have to get assets for next year and beyond. President and CEO Derrick Hall told Doug & Wolf on 98.7 FM Arizona’s Sports Station last week that the D-backs were still in wait-and-see mode. But there was indication more recently that the “sell” side of things may be in the cards.

That is, at least, according to what rival executives told ESPN’s Jeff Passan in a piece published on Monday.

While the Arizona Diamondbacks have not yet hung an open-for-business sign, rival executives believe it’s a matter of days before they declare themselves ready to trade.

Take that for what it is, which could be as flimsy as a gut instinct from people who work outside of the D-backs organization.

But if they’re correct, Passan notes that Robbie Ray, David Peralta, Greg Holland, Alex Avila, Jarrod Dyson, Adam Jones, Andrew Chafin and Zack Greinke are all possibilities to get moved, due to their caliber of play and remaining years of control (the latter of which varies among that group).

The difficulty in moving the last name on that list, Greinke, has been well-documented. The D-backs’ ace is 35 years old and, while posting an All-Star caliber 2.95 ERA in 20 starts this year, is owed a hard-to-swallow two years and $64 million on his contract for 2020 and 2021. A dealing team would have to pick up that plus what’s left of this year’s salary.

Passan had this to say about a potential Greinke deal:

It’s a massive price to pay in dollars alone, and because of Greinke’s excellence, the Diamondbacks also would want a prospect haul in return. They could achieve that by paying down some of Greinke’s salary, but Arizona’s solid core, backed by what is rapidly becoming one of baseball’s best farm systems, makes holding on to Greinke an entirely reasonable proposition.

Ray, Peralta and Chafin have team control remaining beyond this year while Holland, Avila, Dyson and Jones are set to become free agents.

Reports have indicated that Ray going to the New York Yankees could be a possibility, though anything explicit or concrete about those suggestions is yet to be seen.

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