Mets rumors: Giants want top prospects in any Blake Snell trade

The day has arrived. The MLB trade deadline is Christmas for many baseball fans. Whether your team is contending or pretending, it’s a day to break your finger hitting the refresh button on Twitter. One of the latest New York Mets rumors puts a wet rag on the idea of trading for Blake Snell.

The idea of trading for Snell came about courtesy of Jon Heyman who noted the San Francisco Giants are hoping to get out of paying his deal next season.

Naturally, the Mets make sense as a team owned by a man with endless wealth, a will to win, and a need in the starting rotation.

The Giants wanting top prospects for Blake Snell could put an end to these Mets rumors

The Mets haven’t given up any significant prospects yet this month. Even dating back to the Phil Maton trade, they’ve been cautious. The power of Steve Cohen’s wallet has yet to be put to use. For Snell, it potentially could be.

A $30 million base salary for next year is a lot of money for one arm. It’s hardly the priciest paid by the Mets in recent years. Jacob deGrom, Max Scherzer, and Justin Verlander all took home more. And next season the money they’re still paying the latter two will be off the books. Trading for Snell makes too much sense if this was more of a salary dump. It doesn’t appear to be so.

The Mets strategically managed to trade Scherzer and Verlander at last year’s trade deadline while paying a large portion of their contracts this season in order to increase the return for each. The situation is much different with Snell who has only recently begun to pitch well and could always choose to leave at the end of the season.

It’s a complicated trade scenario. Offering the Giants Luisangel Acuna for Snell seems like it would work, but maybe not if they hold true to these Mets rumors reported by Andy Martino. At the price of multiple top prospects, the Mets will probably balk at the idea. How desperate could the Giants become, though?

The rush to trade Snell for a less satisfying return just isn’t there for the Giants. In the offseason, more teams could consider him. It would be a bold addition for the Mets in any case to flip the switch and get the reigning Cy Young winner. After all, it’s the one thing this year’s club didn’t have on the staff. For a good decade and a half, the Mets have employed at least one future or past Cy Young winner (deGrom, Scherzer, Verlander, Bartolo Colon, Rick Porcello, R.A. Dickey, Johan Santana, etc.). It’s one box they have yet to check off.