8/15/16

MLB Waiver Trade Primer

It is this time of the year, and the waiver trade landscape is about to get hot again, the waiver situation is pretty complex and there are several misconceptions (eg. that there is a trade deadline of August 31,) so here is a MLB Waiver Trade  Primer:

- All players unless on the DL, can be put on trade waivers (and most are put through)
-Teams can chose to claim a player or not

-Claims award priority:

a. same league, team with worse record
b. other league team with worse record
(e.g for a Twins' player the best AL team, currently the Rangers, has priority in a claim over the worst NL team, currently the Braves, but the Marlins have priority over the Dodgers)

-Once a player is claimed (there is a 2 day from the claim time limit for these outcomes) :

a. His team can pull him back and keep him
b. Negotiate a trade with the claiming team
c. Let him go for nothing to the claiming team (and the claiming team pays his full salary)

-If a player is not claimed within 2 days after he is placed, the team can trade him to any other team (unless there is a no-trade clause 10/5 rights etc.)  through the regular season; however, players traded after August, cannot be part of a post-season roster (thus the source of the misconception for an August 31st deadline.)

-A team can put a player through waivers multiple times, but can pull him back only once.   So if a player was claimed by a team and then pulled back, if he is put on waivers again and gets claimed, the other team gets him for nothing (other than paying his full salary, ie. option c. above.)

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