By The Athletic MLB Staff
Jul 29, 2024
By Andy McCullough, Brittany Ghiroli and Stephen J. Nesbitt
The trade
Los Angeles Dodgers get: UTIL Tommy Edman, RHP Michael Kopech, RHP Oliver Gonzalez
St. Louis Cardinals get: SP Erick Fedde, OF Tommy Pham
Chicago White Sox get: 2B/LF Miguel Vargas, INF Alexander Albertus, 2B Jeral Perez
Andy McCullough: Early in his Dodgers tenure, Andrew Friedman had a knack for facilitating three-team trades. He helped execute another the day before this year’s trade deadline, filling a crucial void on his roster and adding a big arm to the bullpen. These deals can often qualify as a victory for all three parties. In this case, the Cardinals added a pair of useful performers, including one of the best starters on the market, without sacrificing any prospects. And the White Sox added a player once considered one of the better prospects in the game.
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If he can stay healthy and maintain his usual pace as a league-average hitter, Edman is close to a one-man panacea for some of the Dodgers’ woes. A former Gold Glover at second base, Edman can also credibly play shortstop, third base and center field, some of the positions that have been vacated by Dodgers starters due to injuries to Mookie Betts, Max Muncy, Miguel Rojas and Chris Taylor. Edman is a switch hitter. He can play every day, at different positions, depending on the club’s needs.
The biggest caveat, though, is Edman’s own health. Edman has not appeared in a game this season. He underwent offseason wrist surgery and then sprained his ankle during his recovery. He will have a couple months to knock off the rust as the Dodgers approach the postseason.
Kopech is striking out 12.2 batters per nine innings, a rate similar to the one he displayed as a reliever in 2021. He returned to relieving this season after a failed stint as a starter. Kopech can still generate hellacious fastball velocity. If he can throw strikes, he can be a weapon in October. That, of course, is a sizable “if.”
Unlike Kopech, who never reached his potential in Chicago, Fedde represents an organizational triumph for the White Sox. Chicago risked a two-year, $15 million deal on him last winter after Fedde, a former first-round pick of the Nationals, spent the previous season in Korea. While overseas, he improved his command. He has been a durable stalwart for the White Sox, somehow departing the Windy City with a winning record despite playing on the worst club in the sport. His $7.5 million salary in 2025 offers St. Louis some flexibility if they decide to decline options on veteran starters Kyle Gibson and Lance Lynn.
With the Cardinals in the thick of the wild-card race, Fedde will improve their rotation. He also should benefit from a change of scenery. It cannot have been easy to maintain optimism while playing for the White Sox this season. The same calculus applies to Pham, who played a crucial role for the Arizona Diamondbacks last postseason. Pham is most productive as a platoon player. He can wallop left-handed pitching. It will be interesting to see the perspective he brings about his return to St. Louis. He was unhappy with his treatment by the organization before being traded to Tampa Bay in 2018.
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The White Sox, of course, believe better days are ahead. (It would be hard to imagine worse days than these.) Vargas could be part of that future. He entered 2023 as the No. 23 prospect in baseball according to The Athletic’s Keith Law. Vargas possessed excellent plate discipline and gap-to-gap power. The Dodgers made him their Opening Day second baseman. But he failed to take flight despite the team laying out, as manager Dave Roberts described it, a lengthy “runway.” He was demoted in July and never returned to the majors. He has had better results in 2024, but didn’t have a regular place on the roster. He will get another chance with the White Sox.
Miguel Vargas hasn’t managed to stick yet, but his tools remain enticing. (Kirby Lee / USA Today)
The Dodgers dipped into their prospect surplus to finish the deal. Perez represented the Dodgers in the Futures Game earlier this month. Some scouts believe he can stay at second base in the majors, if he can make enough contact. Albertus, another teenage infielder, roughed up pitchers in the Arizona Complex League but has not yet replicated that production after graduating to the next level.
Dodgers: B+
Cardinals: A-
White Sox: B
Rustin Dodd:Fedde was available to every team in baseball as recently as last December. After being granted free agency after the 2022 season following six up-and-down years with the Washington Nationals, Fedde headed to Korea, where he rebuilt his career in the KBO. In 2023, he won the equivalent of the KBO Cy Young Award and was selected league MVP. The White Sox — nowhere near contention — signed him to a two-year, $15 million deal.
Almost nothing has gone right on the South Side this season, but credit general manager Chris Getz for being right on Fedde, who has posted a 3.11 ERA in 21 starts. The White Sox turned Fedde into a piece — along with reliever Kopech and outfielder Pham — who netted them three prospects that can bolster their system as they start over. The deal represents good process — even if the return feels slightly light at first glance.
Tommy Edman to the Dodgers fills a couple immediate holes: shortstop, where they just signed Nick Ahmed as a stopgap with injuries to Mookie Betts and Miguel Rojas, and center field, where they've gotten the third-worst production in the majors: https://t.co/G8QXfsAicL
— Fabian Ardaya (@FabianArdaya) July 29, 2024
Vargas, 24, was a consensus top-40 prospect in baseball before the 2023 season. Perez, a 19-year-old infielder from the Dominican Republic, is posting an .800 OPS in Low A and appeared in the Futures Game this year. He originally signed with the Dodgers for a reported $397,500 in 2022, when he drew high marks for his bat speed and power potential.
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Albertus, a 19-year-old infielder, has bloomed into an interesting prospect after initially signing for just $75,000 out of Aruba in 2022. He has 107 walks against just 75 strikeouts since entering professional baseball and he’s added strength to his 6-foot-1 frame. The plate discipline is a trait to build on.
Edman feels like the kind of versatile, high-floor/low-ceiling player who can thrive in a lineup with superstars — if he can stay healthy. There is some risk in this deal for the Dodgers, but as always, their organizational depth and prowess should mitigate most of the downside.
The Cardinals, meanwhile, get the services of Fedde for this season and next and Pham for the stretch run while only giving up Edman and Gonzalez. Fedde might not be this good.His FIP is 3.76. But if you’re the Cardinals, you might have done a straight Fedde-for-Edman swap. In that way, it feels like a win.
Dodgers: B
Cardinals: A-
White Sox: B
Brittany Ghiroli: I see virtually no downside here from the Cardinals’ perspective. Fedde has been on the Cardinals’ radar for quite a while and his ascent from someone who couldn’t get a big-league job to being a hot commodity coming out of the KBO has been impressive. Fedde has been a revelation with Chicago and while he isn’t going to wow you with his stuff he’s a reliable starter and gives St. Louis exactly what it wanted: rotation depth without taking on significant extra salary. Fedde signed a two-year, $15 million contract before the 2024 season, and is owed $7.5 million in 2025.
Pham figures to platoon against left-handed starters and both additions make the Cardinals a better team on paper than they were this morning. Shedding Edman’s salary helps cover for Fedde and while the Dodgers desperately need Edman’s versatility to plug some infield holes (Edman can also play outfield), St. Louis had a trio of other options in Michael Siani, Brendan Donovan and Alec Burleson.
Under Friedman, the Dodgers generally trade smart, but Edman is a risk considering he’s had trouble staying healthy. Kopech is a fascinating add, a guy people in the game think will flourish under a more data-driven organization than Chicago. In going to Los Angeles, he will go to one of the top — if not the top — analytically driven organizations. Translation: if there’s another level to Kopech, the Dodgers will find it.
Tommy Edman offers genuine versatility. (Sean M. Haffey / Getty Images)
The most difficult assessment here, of course, is the White Sox haul as they’re betting on prospects and taking their proverbial lottery tickets in moving established big leaguers. The Dodgers system remains one of baseball’s best, so rankings of its prospects are deceiving at best. However, Chicago has been a consistently poor organization at drafting and developing talent, and so the question becomes how polished are Vargas, Albertus and Perez, and what confidence, if any, should there be that Chicago will find a way to maximize each talent? Until the Sox — under new GM Chris Getz — can prove otherwise from their pipeline, any trade for prospects, no matter how good, deserves skepticism.
Dodgers: B
Cardinals: A-
White Sox: C+
(Top photo of Fedde: Michael Reaves / Getty Images)
