Brian Cashman was not done after agreeing to a trade for Lance Berkman. Hours later, he went out and grabbed Cleveland Indians’ outfielder Austin Kearns for a player to be named later or cash. This trade isn’t as sexy as the one for Berkman, but is it as practical or just a busybody maneuver?

The Yankees have used Marcus Thames as their right-handed hitting backup corner outfielder. The key word there is hitting because while Thames’ defense is undesirable, his offense mostly makes up for it. His wOBA this season is .364 through more than 100 plate appearances. That’s good, but his line is propped up by a .369 BABIP that seems wholly unsustainable given what we know about Thames.

Kearns is the better fielder but the lesser hitter. Even against lefties, Thames has held the advantage recently and for their careers:

2010: Thames .373 (64 PA) | Kearns .315 (112 PA)
2009: Thames .345 (124 PA)| Kearns .287 (66 PA)
2008: Thames .369 (135 PA| Kearns .240 (99 PA)
Career: Thames .361 (755 PA)| Kearns .353 (1,021 PA)

It’s a false dichotomy to say the Yankees must decide between Thames and Kearns. Given their roster’s switch-hitting capabilities, they can afford to send down Juan Miranda and Colln Curtis and keep Kearns and Thames with Berkman arriving too. Maybe they choose against that route and simply like Kearns more than Thames. Whatever the Yankees decide to do shouldn’t change the opinion on this deal too much. They get a potentially useful player off the bench for the stretch run without giving up anything of great value.

Deadline day kicks off with a small trade that might have been a bigger deal in years past. MLB.com’s Steve Gilbert reports that the Rays have acquired right-handed relief pitcher Chad Qualls from the Diamondbacks for a player to be named later. The Rays will pay the remainder of the $1.48 million left on Qualls’s contract.

A lot of things stick out about Qualls’s numbers this year, most of them bad. His ERA sits at 8.29, his WHIP is an even 2, his BABIP is all the way up at .434, and his strand rate is just 51.4 percent — and that’s just by glancing at his dashboard. His WXRL — wins expected above replacement, Baseball Prospectus’s reliever stat — is -2.407, last among 588 qualified major leaguers. He has allowed three of six inherited runners to score. Opponents have taken extra bases on 19 of 61 hits allowed, a career-high ratio. His whiff rate is at a career low by a significant margin. He’s been pulled from a game 15 times — he was the closer until mid-June. I could go on, but the point is clear.

Why the Rays’ interest, then? The move appears to be based on Qualls’s history. He was a good to excellent reliever from 2005 through 2009. While his 2010 has been horrible, he still sports a 4.30 FIP and 3.84 xFIP, and the latter approaches his career mark of 3.48. He has held opponents scoreless in 18 of his appearances, which is not good, but of those 18, 10 were perfect appearances. So maybe they see something in him. He did undergo knee surgery in September, so there is also hope that he’ll heat up a bit in the final two months.

The good news is that his stuff appears in tact. His fastball sits at the same velocity as it has in the past, and he’s using it at just about the same rate. Looking at this PitchFX page, everything appears to be in line with his past performance. It’s a bit dicey comparing PitchFX from year-to-year — I’ve noticed a number of pitchers who have “lost” horizontal movement this year, so there are definitely some consistency issues at play — but there don’t appear to be too many differences for Qualls.

He’ll be joining a Rays bullpen that ranks among the best in the league. They have the third lowest bullpen ERA in the majors, the third lowest OPS against, and the second highest WHIP. With quality setup men like Grant Balfour and Joaquin Benoit in addition to role pitchers like Dan Wheeler and Andy Sonnanstine, the Rays can afford to take a gamble with Qualls. If he returns to his old form he gives the Rays an indomitable bullpen. If he doesn’t, the Rays have other options.

If you had to guess which team in baseball had played the best overall game so far this season, who would you guess? The Yankees? The Rays? The surprising Padres? How many teams do you guess before the Twins?

The Twins host the Mariners this weekend for a three game set and while previewing that series over at a local Mariner blog, I took notice of just how good the Twins were ranked across the four team categories –hitting, defense, starting pitcher, relief pitching—that I break teams down by. By my rankings, I have the Twins as the second best offense, sixth best defense (rated by UZR) and fourth best in both starting and relief pitching. The WAR rankings here at FanGraphs agree exactly on the position players but differ slightly, to third in starting and 11th in relieving, on the pitchers. Even still, both of our rankings agree, there has been no better team in baseball this season than the Minnesota Twins.

So how come they are only 56-46 and currently out of the playoff picture? Partly they have been unlucky in allowing runs. Despite a very good defense and a home park that, while too early to tell, seems to be leaning toward pitcher friendly, the Twins have an ERA that is 17 points higher than their FIP.

On the hitting side, Minnesota has also been hurt by some unclutch performances at the plate. Their team -1.40 clutch rating is 11th worst in baseball. They have also been unlucky when it comes to turning runs into wins. According to BaseRuns, the Twins should be expected to have about a .586 winning percentage to date worth between three and four extra wins over their current record. That would put them on par with the Rangers and just a few games behind Tampa and New York, which is more in line with where they belong.

The Twins were a preseason favorite for a reason and even with the loss of Joe Nathan they have played up to the level expected of them. All that is left is for the wins and losses to catch up to the individual at bats performances.

Details aren’t official yet, but Lance Berkman will be a Yankee within 24 hours, according to Joel Sherman. Berkman will ostensibly become the DH for New York, supplanting Marcus Thames and Juan Miranda, and will also be able to fill in for Mark Teixeira at first base.

Berkman is in the middle of a down year right now, mostly due to a career low .279 BABIP. His power is down as well, as his .191 ISO is his first ISO below .200 since his first season in the big leagues, 1999. As such, 2010 has been Berkman’s worst full major league season. Still, he’s been productive. His wRC+ of 123 is solid, even at first base, as evidenced by his 1.9 WAR in 385 PAs. The plate discipline is as good as ever, as Berkman is walking a remarkable 16.8% of the time – 195% of the league average.

It’s not likely that Berkman will ever repeat his 162 wRC+ seasons of 2008 and 2006, given that this is Berkman’s age 34 season. However, there is reason to believe that he will improve. Power numbers can fluctuate wildly over the course of even half a season. ZiPS projects that Berkman will put up a line of .268/.386/.486 for the rest of the season – a roughly 140 wRC+. That’s a major improvement over the below average hitters that the Yankees are currently running out as DHes in Juan Miranda and Marcus Thames, and it also beats the projection for Jorge Posada, who has actually seen the most PAs at DH of the entire Yankees squad.

This one’s exceedingly simple for the Yankees. With Nick Johnson injured, DH was a bit of a weakness. Apparently, the cost for Berkman is minimal in terms of prospects, and the Yankees can easily absorb the roughly $6M remaining on his $14.5M contract – Buster Olney even reports that the Astros will pick up a significant portion of the money remaining. Berkman should be able to add roughly a win over Thames and Miranda over the course of the season, and there’s a chance that he sees a rebirth of his power in New Yankee Stadium, particularly batting left handed. Between the switch hitters Berkman, Mark Teixeira, Nick Swisher, and Jorge Posada, the Yankees will also have a lineup that won’t be susceptible to specialist relievers. The Yankees used their cash reserves to effectively buy another hitter for the stretch run, and an impressive Yankees lineup will only get better now.

Last Saturday night, the Houston Astros hosted the Cincinnati Reds. They lost by seven runs and failed to score. When they take the field tomorrow the players will be a week older and the season a week closer to ending, but that is true of all teams. What makes the Astros’ week so special is the all but guaranteed absence of their most well known players. Roy Oswalt started that game, and so did Lance Berkman. Now, it appears, neither will be a member of the only organization they have known. Oswalt is the Phillies’ newest addition and making his debut tonight; Berkman is on the verge of heading to the Yankees.

Reportedly, the return in the Berkman deal is minor with the Astros essentially dumping his salary while giving him the chance to participate in a pennant race. For their part this week, the Astros will walk away with Brett Wallace, J.A. Happ, Jonathan Villar, whatever may come from the Yankees and without Oswalt, Berkman, and the $11 million sent to Philadelphia. Their payroll sat at more than $90 million entering this season and now the Astros appear ready to shed the following contracts:

– $10 million of Roy Oswalt
– $2 million buyout of Lance Berkman
– $5.5 million of Kazuo Matsui
– $4.5 million of Pedro Feliz
– $3 million of Brian Moehler
– $1.5 million of Geoff Blum
– $0.8 million of Jason Michaels

Some players will be signed and others given raises, but that’s nearly $30 million off the books for a team that should have a low payroll based on the lacuna of elite talent. You can debate the quality of the returns and question whether Drayton McLane is setting this franchise back even further by meddling into Ed Wade’s responsibilities. Those are legitimate concerns. What is worth pointing out is that there was never going to be a panacea. Never a magic bullet. The term “salary dump” has an ugly connotation but sometimes salary dumps are legitimately fruitful moves; especially when applied to erase mistakes.

Berkman and Oswalt are fine players and put in commendable service with Houston during the glory years. On this team, though, on this 2010 team their salaries and presences were nothing shy of onuses. By having those two, McLane forced himself and his management alike into thinking they were fringe contenders when they were nothing of the sort. Some ill-timed hot streaks catapulted the Astros into a state of naivety on their own limitations.

This is painful for Astros fans and it may only get worse. The team has lost its face in one brisk swoop. A deck sealer company used to rain commercials about a torture test. That is exactly what McLane is about to endure. Can he exercise better judgment and see this process through or will he venture for a scapegoat and keep his franchise locked in the jaws of mediocrity. This is the first cut; more will come because more have to come.

As for what’s next; the most obvious question is whether McLane will put the team up for sale. Beyond that, the Astros should try like heaven to move hell – Lee’s contract – even if it means engulfing the disaster for next season in order to free up cash for 2012. Wade is by no means a great General Manager, but one has to feel sympathy for him. He’s performing with the sword of Damocles overhead.

Note: And moments later Buster Olney tweets that the Astros are picking up a lot of money owed to Berkman. So much for a salary dump.

With Ian Kinsler being placed on the Disabled List yesterday with a strained groin, the recently free-wheeling Jon Daniels wasted no time finding a temporary replacement, trading currently unknown prospects for veteran middle infielder Cristian Guzman according to MLB.com’s Bill Ladson. While the Kinsler move to the DL was more precautionary than potentially serious, the Rangers are taking no chances.

Guzman will also give the Rangers needed insurance up the middle, as backup infielders Andres Blanco and Joaquin Arias are not very slick with the bat. ZiPS projects Arias for a .292 wOBA going forward and a .295 mark for Blanco. Although Guzman only has a .304 wOBA on the season, ZiPS likes him for a .319 rate the rest of the way. The main issue for Guzman this season has been his power; after slugging .440, and .390 over the past two seasons, he has dropped down to .361 in 2010, his lowest total since his horrendously terrible 2005. The combination of summer and Arlington may give Guzman a little power boost.

Defensively, Guzman has adjusted decently to second base this season according to UZR (although Baseball Info Solution’s Defensive Runs Saved does not think as highly). Guzman shouldn’t be called on to spell Elvis Andrus very often, as the former’s range at shortstop is well below average.

For Washington, they’re capitalizing on an aggressive market that is lacking in the available stars of recent years. After snagging Wilson Ramos from Minnesota for Matt Capps, the prospects they get back from Texas could be pretty good considering that the Rangers are overpaying in farm talent for salary relief in lieu of their recent bankruptcy. However, we’ll wait and see if the bigger dominoes (Adam Dunn and Josh Willingham) fall before tomorrow’s deadline.

The Arizona Diamondbacks were panned last week for shipping Dan Haren and his team-friendly contract to the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim for an underwhelming return. While that trade could come back to bite the organization, the D-Backs managed to get good value today in sending Edwin Jackson to the Chicago White Sox for Daniel Hudson and David Holmberg.

Jackson, 26, was picked up by Arizona this past off-season (along with RHP Ian Kennedy) as part of a three-team trade that cost the club Max Scherzer and Daniel Schlereth. The former Dodger, Ray and Tiger signed a two-year deal in February that bought out his two remaining years of arbitration eligibility — Jackson’s earning $4.6 million this season and he’ll pull in $8.35 million in 2011. With Arizona buried in the standings, the team has decided to blow up the current roster instead of trying to fix weak spots around a strong nucleus of young talent. Jackson’s year-and-change of service time is being converted into cost-controlled talent in the form of Hudson and Holmberg.

A fifth-round pick out of Old Dominion in the 2005 draft, Hudson shot from Low-A ball to the majors in 2009 and rated 66th on Baseball America’s top 100 prospects lists prior to this season. The 6-4, 220 pound right-hander comes equipped with 92-93 MPH heat, a mid-80’s slider and a low-80’s changeup, as well as an occasional mid-70’s curve. Though the 23-year-old hasn’t found success in a small sample of big league pitching over the past two years (a 5.41 xFIP in 34.1 innings), he has 10.1 K/9, 3.1 BB/9 and a mid-three’s FIP in 117.1 IP at the Triple-A level.

Hudson doesn’t project as a top-of-the-rotation stud, and there are concerns over his fly ball tendencies (39.2 GB% in Triple-A). Still, the Diamondbacks get six seasons of team control over a MLB-ready starter who might not perform all that differently than Jackson right now. These projections came prior to the trade, but consider Hudson and Jackson’s rest-of-season forecasts from ZiPS:

Hudson: 7.02 K/9, 3.73 BB/9, 0.88 HR/9, 4.06 FIP
Jackson: 6.78 K/9, 3.62 BB/9, 0.94 HR/9, 4.16 FIP

Hudson might give up more homers than that — according to Minor League Splits, his work at Triple-A translates to more than a HR per nine and a 4.36 FIP in the show. Is that worth years of service time and millions of dollars to the Pale Hose, though? Perhaps the White Sox will use Jackson as part of another deal to acquire a bat. In this trade, they got the guy with greater name value and a bigger salary without necessarily getting much better.

In addition to Hudson, Arizona added a 19 year-old lefty in Holmberg. The 6-4, 220 pounder was Chicago’s second-round pick in the 2009 draft. Holmberg doesn’t get rave reviews for his physical build (BA compared him to a young David Wells in that regard) or his fastball, which sits in the upper-eighties. He does, however, possess a sharp curveball and changeup. Holmberg’s professional experience is scarce, as he has tossed 80.1 innings in rookie ball over the past two years with 7.4 K/9, 3 BB/9, a 4.38 FIP and a ground ball rate slightly above 50 percent. He’s not a great prospect, but Arizona could have something if his velocity creeps up a bit.

The Diamondbacks have to be pleased with their haul for Jackson — they got younger and cheaper, perhaps without surrendering anything in terms of on-field performance in the present.

In the blockbuster to end all blockbusters, the San Diego Padres acquired Miguel Tejada for double-A pitcher Wynn Pelzer on Thursday night. Damn hot tub, it’s not 2004 any more, and now this is more of a back-pager in the newsrag of the 2010 trade deadline. In fact, it’s such a snoozer, you wonder why the Padres even bothered.

It’s not like San Diego gave up too much – Pelzer has a 4.54 FIP on the back of a 7.84 K/9 and 4.91 BB/9 in San Antonio this year, and that number only gets worse if you neutralize it for park and luck effects relative to the rest of the relatively pitching-friendly Texas League. Then again, his career FIP against righties is exactly a full run lower (3.54), so he may have a future as a reliever if he can’t iron out his splits. In fact, he just recently moved to relief, perhaps in order to recover some of the lost zip on his fastball. Going into the season, he was Baseball America’s #7 prospect, but as Dave Cameron just reminded us today, it’s important to remember that was before he went out and put up a 1.675 WHIP in double-A and took some of the shine off. Bryan Smith has more on Pelzer here.

The bigger question is actually if Tejada is an upgrade for the Padres. Starting with defense, the answer is unclear. His career UZR/150 at shortstop is -3.6, and that number drops further if you count only his last three attempts at the position, from 2007-2009. This year, he’s even been poor at third base, with a -7.3 UZR/150 and 15 errors in what has generally been described as lackluster-at-best defense. The current thirdbaseman for the Padres, Chase Headley, sports a 9.9 career UZR/150 at third and half the errors and really shouldn’t be pushed anywhere for the veteran.

Of course, the Padres’ current shortstop, Everth Cabrera, has a negative career UZR/150, but has shown better defense in the small sample that is this year. But do the Padres really want to go with a 36-year-old who hasn’t played shortstop in a year, and hasn’t played it well in two, probably four years? Especially since Cabrera is somewhat similar offensively (.241 wOBA, .287 ZiPS RoS wOBA) to Tejada (.296 wOBA, .324 ZiPs RoS wOBA)?

Short of playing Tejada at a completely new position – second base – and pushing Jerry Hairston, Jr to shortstop (career 2.4 UZR/150), the only other option is for Tejada to serve as a utility player, which seems like the plan. At least it’s not going to cost the Padres much long term in order to strengthen their bench for the stretch run.

One of the league’s most active teams when it comes to the trading deadline, the Chicago White Sox have acquired Edwin Jackson from the Diamondbacks for pitchers Daniel Hudson and David Holmberg.

Jackson is now in his fifth organization since he made his major league debut in 2003. Either he’s a very valuable commodity, or someone that teams views as easily acquired rotation filler.

While Jackson is a White Sox for now, do we know if he will be one on Saturday evening? There has been rumored interest in a three-way swap between the Diamondbacks, Nationals and White Sox, with Adam Dunn ending up in Chicago and Jackson landing with the Nats.

While Jackson’s strikeout and walk rates haven’t been great this year, he’s made up for it by getting ground balls. His GB% has been hovering around 40% most of his career, but he’s brought it up to an impressive 50.5% this season. This made up for the possible detriment that is Arizona’s home park, and should help keep balls from flying out of The Cell. Since Jackson has pitched in the AL Central before, his numbers shouldn’t unexpectedly decline (or increase for that matter).

Jackson is under contract for $8.35 million next year, thanks to a two-year deal from the D’Backs that was heavily back loaded. While Jackson isn’t a stud, he’ll be worth his contract and a little more. After next season, Jackson will be a free agent and should be able to command about $10 million a year on the open market.

As for what they gave up, Hudson was the team’s top pitching prospect, but there are questions about his long term role. He’s got a decent fastball and change-up, but his breaking ball is inconsistent. While he showed some good GB rates in the minors, he’s been an extreme flyball guy in his brief time in the big leagues, and the White Sox may have decided that he gives up too many balls in the air to succeed in their park, especially since he doesn’t have a knockout pitch to rack up a ton of strikeouts. Still, he’s a decent young arm, and one that will be under team control through 2016.

Kenny Williams likes to deal, but this is not one of his better ones. One may expect the price for Jackson to be lower than what the White Sox paid, given what the returns were for superior pitchers in Roy Oswalt and Dan Haren. Instead of keeping Hudson and letting him fill the rotation spot that Jake Peavy vacated, the White Sox decided to go out and fill it with a more expensive source. While Jackson probably won’t be enough by himself to change the direction of the White Sox’s season, he is a good piece for this year and beyond. All that remains to be seen is if he will stay a White Sox for long.

In almost every mainstream write-up of a trade involving a minor league prospect that is consummated, the author will reference the prospects off-season ranking by Baseball America, and for good reason – BA is the market leader in prospect analysis. John Manuel, Jim Callis, and the rest of the crew over there do really good work, and have established themselves as the best source of information on prospects around.

However, I’m beginning to feel like the reliance on a ranking compiled months ago is carrying too much weight when discussing current trades. Let’s use last night’s Wilson Ramos/Matt Capps trade, for instance. The normal reaction is that the Twins overpaid, trading a “top catching prospect” for a useful but not elite reliever. Many Twins fans are outraged that they would give up such a valuable trade chip in exchange for a one inning guy, especially after he was rumored to be part of the package that would bring them Cliff Lee a month ago.

A lot of the perception of Ramos’ value comes from the fact that BA rated him #58 on their pre-season Top 100 and #2 overall in the Twins system. However, since those rankings occurred, baseball has been played, and Ramos’ value has diminished. He hasn’t hit at all in Triple-A this year, as more advanced pitchers are taking advantage of his aggressive approach. He also hasn’t shown much in the way of power, as only 19 of his 67 hits have gone for extra bases.

If BA were to do re-do their Top 100 today, I guarantee you that Ramos wouldn’t rank #58. I’m guessing that he wouldn’t even be in the Top 100. He’s has a bad year, and the things that were questions about him last year are problems this year, giving teams reasons to think that his bat might not be enough to make him more than a defensive-minded backup. So, his pre-season ranking does not really reflect his value at the moment. Things have changed.

We saw this last year as well, when Tim Alderson (#45 pre-season prospect) was traded to the Pirates for Freddy Sanchez. The reaction at the time was that the Giants were crazy to give up a top pitching prospect for a decent, but not great, infielder. However, Alderson had spent the previous four months without any velocity, showing almost none of the stuff that made him a first round pick to begin with. The Pirates received a significantly lesser version of Alderson than had been assumed based on his prospect status, and that’s continued to carry over as Alderson has fallen off the prospect map at this point.

In prospect land, things can change a lot in a short period of time. A year ago, Mike Trout went 25th overall in the draft, but if you gave teams a do-over today, he’d go #2, as he’s now the consensus best prospect left in the minors. His stock has risen dramatically in the last four months, and his pre-season Top 100 ranking of #85 is now as outdated as shag carpet.

The guys at BA do great work. You should subscribe to their magazine and follow them all on twitter. But, don’t be slaves to pre-season rankings when trying to determine a player’s value. Things change between the time those lists get made and the time those prospects become trade chips.