As the trade deadline approaches, several teams will be attempting to make 11th hour deal to improve their team. One idea that I've suggested as well as seen floating around several times is for the White Sox to trade for Roy Halladay. Is this a feasible idea?
Well, let's start with the Blue Jays. Obviously they don't want to move Roy Halladay, but he only has one year after this year remaining on his deal, and he's stated that he wants to play for a contending team. The problem for Toronto is they can't add any payroll, and would prefer to shed some, and they're currently in 4th place in the tough AL East. Ideally if they were going to trade Halladay, they could get someone to take Vernon Wells off their hands and still get a decent return, but in reality, that's not likely to happen, but they probably could get a team to take Alex Rios in the deal.
Now, let's look at the White Sox. They're currently 3.5 games back in the AL Central, they're in somewhat of a transition phase, and they've been looking for an ace RHSP since the beginning of the season. Some think that if Contreras is able to catch lightning in a bottle again, which thus far he seemingly has since returning from Charlotte, that they've found their ace RHSP, but even with Contreras's efforts, the Sox are still 3.5 games back and struggling. They could really use a bat, and of course, an ace RHSP will never hurt things.
So, what would fair value be in such a deal? Well, I think a good place to start would be the offer the White Sox made for Jake Peavy. Granted, San Diego is a tad more desperate to offload Peavy, but keep in mind that it was the first offer they've accepted, and they've been in many trade talks regarding Peavy, who is at the very least a similar caliber pitcher to Halladay, and much younger. The White Sox offered LHSP Aaron Poreda, LHSP Clayton Richard, and 2 PTBNLs. Obviously we'll never know who the PTBNLs were, but we know that neither was Gordon Beckham (thanks to Peter Gammons). Honestly, I think the PTBNLs would have been either draft prospects or C type prospects, like maybe a CJ Retherford or a John Shelby, because I doubt Kenny would have been willing to give up Flowers, Jor. Danks, Viciedo or Hudson in addition to that. Now, consider Toronto wants to offload salary, the White Sox need a bat, and they want to trend toward youth, and Alex Rios makes sense to add in this deal. He'll get a $12 million per year sunk cost off Toronto's books and gives the White Sox a RF to replace Dye with next year (hopefully Dye comes back and plays DH for the Sox), and the White Sox can afford the cost since they have $40+ million coming off the books at season's end.
All things considered, my idea of a fair trade looks something like:
The Chicago White Sox trade LHSP Aaron Poreda, LHSP Clayton Richard, 3B Dayan Viciedo, and (as much as this pains me) RHSP Dexter Carter to the Toronto Blue Jays for RHSP Roy Halladay, RF Alex Rios, and cash considerations (paying the remainder of Rios's salary this year)
Poreda is a big, young arm with 1/2 potential that's MLB ready and pitching in the White Sox bullpen, Richard has been the White Sox 5th starter for some time and has been going through some growing pains, but is still young and has time to develop, probably has 3 potential, Viciedo is (or was at one point) the youngest player in AA and has been learning very rapidly, he's seen his average and power numbers increase steadily, and Dexter Carter is another big, young arm with 1/2 potential who strikes out a ton of batters (120 Ks in 97 IP this season), he's the type of potential boom guy that seems to be in any sort of big deal like this. As for the White Sox, this gives them either a great platoon of 6 players in 5 positions, or a backup plan for when they finally decide to tell Quentin to shut it down for the year, and obviously improves the quality of their rotation, quite possibly to the level of best in baseball. If this trade were to be done, offseason priority #1 would be to sign Halladay to a long term extension. Without an extension for Halladay, the trade becomes a huge win for the Blue Jays, and a huge loss for the White Sox.