Two Mariners trade deadline nuggets from MLB insiders

The days following the MLB trade deadline can bring some additional insight on what went down in the days and hours leading up to the cutoff for trades.

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Two prominent MLB insiders on Friday shared some interesting nuggets in regards to the Seattle Mariners, which includes how they impacted the trade that sent two-time Cy Young winner and former Seattle U standout Tarik Skubal to the Los Angeles Dodgers.

First was a report from ESPN’s Jeff Passan going inside the trade negotiations for Skubal, the former Detroit Tigers star left-hander. It turns out that George Kirby was a factor as to why Detroit pulled the trigger on dealing Skubal last Saturday – two days before the deadline – for a return package that some deemed as questionable.

Per Passan’s reporting, the Tigers earlier in the day Saturday caught wind that the Mariners were listening on Kirby. And although Kirby hasn’t performed at the same level as Skubal, his additional club control (through 2028 compared to expiring contract for Skubal) had Detroit fearing he could tank the market for Skubal if they waited too long to strike a deal.

Those fears were “well-founded,” according to to Passan, as “teams were reluctant to stake their entire deadline on the possibility of acquiring Skubal.”

In a report for The Athletic, Ken Rosenthal said one official from an unnamed club said Seattle’s discussions involving Kirby “never advanced past the 50-yard line.” Rosenthal noted the M’s could pick up those conversations about Kirby, as well as ones had about right-hander Emerson Hancock, during the offseason.

Rosenthal also had the other interesting trade-deadline nugget involving the Mariners, which was that they were one of the teams to express interest in Los Angeles Angels shortstop Zach Neto, who has three years of club control remaining beyond this season.

However, the teams never exchanged names and the Mariners never received an asking price.

The Angels are one of three teams the Mariners have not made a trade with since president of baseball operations Jerry Dipoto was hired as Seattle’s general manager following the 2015 season. Dipoto was the general manager of the Angels for five seasons (2011-15) before being hired by the Mariners.

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