The Athletic has live coverage of the 2026 MLB Trade Deadline.
The final day leading up to the MLB Trade Deadline is producing deals at a furious rate. Here’s a look a three trades involving big-league pieces and intriguing prospects:
Trade 1: Milwaukee Brewers acquire RHP Dustin May and LHP JoJo Romero from the St. Louis Cardinals for OFs Alexander Frías and Josiah Ragsdale
In this deal, the Brewers traded one of their top prospects (Frías) to get short-term pitching help for both the rotation and the bullpen. It’s an understandable move as they try once again to get to the World Series. Meanwhile, the Cardinals do very well in trading May, a starter they signed to a one-year, $12.5 million deal with a mutual option and helped to the best season of his career.
May has always had an outstanding arm, but his 2025 season was the first time he even threw 100 innings in a big-league season. He’s built on that, with 109 innings already this year and a lower ERA, as the Cardinals have had him move from the sinker to the four-seamer as his primary fastball, which in turn has kept the ball in the park far more often. He’s also throwing harder this year, averaging 96.9 mph on the four-seamer, up 1.5 mph from 2025, with his sweeper up 0.8 mph as well.
He does give up a lot of hard contact when hitters do put the ball in play, and hasn’t been as good the last month-plus as he was to start the year, which could be randomness but is more concerning with a guy who’s had durability issues.
Romero has been an above-average left-handed reliever for the last three and a half years for the Cardinals, dominating lefties for most of that time while getting righties out enough to be a full-inning guy. Milwaukee’s bullpen is pretty right-handed, with Aaron Ashby their only good lefty, so Romero fills an immediate need once he returns — he’s on the IL now after undergoing an emergency appendectomy a few weeks ago.
Frías signed 18 months ago for $350,000, but has already blasted through the Arizona Complex League and moved to Low A even though he only turned 18 in March. He’s a center fielder now but will move to right field eventually. He has the potential for a plus hit tool and plus power, with eight homers in 60 games this season between the two stops. He hit one ball in the ACL at 117 mph, which isn’t a pure indicator of power but is really unusual for an 18-year-old.
Ragsdale is also a center fielder now who’ll end up in right. He’s hit 19 homers in his first full pro season after the Brewers took him in the seventh round in 2025 out of Boston College. He’s selling out a little to get to that power, with a 29 percent whiff rate in Double A that comes from a swing designed to lift and pull the ball as much as possible. I’m not sure this production will hold up at higher levels, but he has raked at two stops this year, including Double A, and could still end up a regular in a corner even if his OBP starts dropping against better pitching.
Trade No. 2: The Pittsburgh Pirates acquire RHP Luke Weaver and cash considerations for SS Sammy Stafura
Weaver has been outstanding for the Mets this year, looking more like he did in his big 2024 season in the Yankees’ bullpen but improving on it with a lower home-run rate. He changed his cutter grip this offseason, resulting in a pitch with more slider-like tilt. He gave up eight of the 10 homers he allowed last year on his four-seamer, so using that less and the cutter more is part of how he’s kept the ball in the park this season. The Pirates’ bullpen might be their biggest weakness, so adding Weaver is an immediate boost, and he can step into a high-leverage role right away.
Luke Weaver jumps into a Pittsburgh bullpen that has struggled all season. (Dylan Buell / Getty Images)
The Mets land Stafura, a breakout prospect who has hit .301/.365/.656 in hitter-friendly High-A Greensboro this year for the Pirates. Pittsburgh picked up Stafura at the 2025 deadline from Cincinnati for Ke’Bryan Hayes, at which point Stafura was a high-OBP but low-power bat who swung and missed too often for that profile. He has done more damage at home, with 13 of his 20 homers at Greensboro’s launching pad, but he’s still hitting a very respectable .270/.385/.514 on the road.
Unfortunately, he is still selling out to get to that power, with a 37 percent whiff rate on the season that’s an alarming 34 percent on fastballs. That’s not a sustainable formula and he’s going to have to give back some of that power to be able to put the ball in play at an adequate rate to even be an everyday player. He’s a plus runner and potentially a plus defender at short, although he’s mixed in some time at second base this year, as well.
Trade No. 3: San Diego Padres acquire LHP Robbie Ray from the San Francisco Giants for RHP Miguel Mendez and SS Joniel Hernandez
Since his return from Tommy John surgery at the start of the 2025 season, Ray has thrown 305 innings with a 3.42 ERA/4.10 FIP, limiting hard contact enough to be a fourth starter for just about any team. The Padres have only one healthy starter who’s better than Ray right now, and Ray is an upgrade over Walker Buehler or the bullpen-game approach they employed on Sunday in what might previously have been Griffin Canning’s turn.
Hernandez just signed with the Padres out of Cuba for $1.4 million back in January and has hit well in his pro debut, with a .303/.424/.503 line in the Dominican Summer League. The OBP is a little above the league median, while the slugging percentage puts him in the top 20 percent of qualifying hitters, to give some context.
He’s lean and very projectable, with excellent bat speed already and the potential for future plus power. He’s also 17 and hasn’t played in the U.S. yet, so he’s probably quite a ways off, and will probably be a level or two behind the Giants’ pair of elite shortstop prospects currently in Low A, Josuar Gonzalez and Luis Hernández.
Mendez is a three-pitch starter who hasn’t had much success this year, missing time with a shoulder injury and returning just last week to make a pair of rehab appearances in High A. He’s projectable as well and has the arsenal to end up in a rotation, but walked 11.1 percent of batters he faced in Double A before the injury and averaged only three innings per start.
