Trade talk back in fashion with baseball’s free-agent crop thin – San Francisco Chronicle

The sport’s main offseason showcase once was about general managers making trades in hotel lobbies, huddling in a corner or behind a potted palm and chatting over cocktails deep into the night until a deal was done.

As free agency took over the game, agents took over the winter meetings. The biggest signings became the biggest news. Trades seemed smaller scale.

This year’s meetings could be a throwback because trades might rule again, and the reason is simple: a mediocre free-agent class.

No elite starting pitchers. No elite hitters in their prime now that Yoenis Céspedes took himself off the market and re-signed with the Mets for four years and $110 million.

When the deepest segment of free agency is closers, you know it’s time to make a trade.

That is, unless you’re the Giants and need a ninth-inning savior. Mark Melancon still makes the most sense and remains more likely than Aroldis Chapman or Kenley Jansen.

The top free-agent starter: Rich Hill, who played independent ball two years ago and turns 37 in March.

The top free-agent hitter: Edwin Encarnacion, who turns 34 next month and is best served as a designated hitter.

It’s no wonder the biggest names to find new teams this winter could be moved in trades. It doesn’t get much bigger than pitchers Justin Verlander and Chris Sale and hitters Andrew McCutchen and Joey Votto, and all have been mentioned either in serious trade discussions or at least legitimate rumors.

Blockbuster trades wouldn’t be surprising with so many teams willing to move big chips with the intention of collecting top prospects, especially after watching the Cubs win the World Series with a bunch of young’uns.

Because the A’s can’t go to the winter meetings without being linked to trade talk, we’ll hear about Sonny Gray. Ditto for the Rays: Chris Archer. Aside from Verlander, the downsizing Tigers are open for business with J.D. Martinez, Victor Martinez, Ian Kinsler and perhaps even Miguel Cabrera. The Brewers keep trying to dump Ryan Braun.

The Giants need an outfielder and have been linked to J.D. Martinez and Jay Bruce, both of whom are free agents after next season. Dare we mention McCutchen? The A’s want a center fielder, and Carlos Gomez and Rajai Davis are intriguing.

It’s not as if the free-agent market is dry. Plenty of players are out there, just not franchise players. Teams still can improve by adding Justin Turner, Dexter Fowler, Ian Desmond, Mark Trumbo, Matt Wieters or Wilson Ramos.

Chris Carter and Tyson Ross became free agents when non-tendered by the Brewers and Padres, respectively. Brad Ziegler and Derek Holland are options for teams who don’t get any of the top three closers.

Bigger names are those mentioned in trade talk, but GMs won’t be cutting deals in the lobby. That’s history. Too many reporters, job seekers and fans, all with phone cameras. Executives stay in their suites these days and text. It’s a different manner of negotiating, but the old exercise of wheeling and dealing could be fashionable again.

Wishful thinking: If Giants fans could pick any available outfielder, it would be an easy call: McCutchen.

By all accounts, the Pirates are ready to move their center fielder, who’ll make $14 million in 2017 with a 2018 club option for $14.5 million, and the question is whether the Giants have what it takes to make a trade.

The Pirates want young pitchers whom they can contractually control for several years, but the Giants don’t have the young starters who fit the bill, which means any package might need to include Gold Glove second baseman Joe Panik.

Longtime Pittsburgh-area reporter John Perrotto, who covered Barry Bonds as a pup, lists the Giants among three teams as possible trade partners and mentioned Derek Law and the possibility of converting Kyle Crick to the bullpen.

The Giants’ top prospects are Christian Arroyo and Tyler Beede, but it’s questionable whether the farm system is attractive enough for them to engage in serious trade talks for any star.

McCutchen’s price has dropped, which works in other teams’ favor, because he’s coming off his worst season. Until further notice, the Nationals lead the McCutchen sweepstakes.

Rays, A’s malaise: The A’s will be losing their revenue-sharing checks over the next four years, and the Rays, the other team desperately seeking a new ballpark, have their own gripes with the new collective bargaining agreement.

The Rays were hoping for a draft overhaul that would benefit lower-revenue/smaller-market teams by providing higher or more picks.

“Disappointed in what we’ve seen so far,” Rays baseball operations president Matt Silverman told the Tampa Bay Times, citing the revenue gap in the AL East that keeps widening. “I’m not optimistic about the CBA in terms of helping us as a lower-revenue club.”

We still wonder how the baseball landscape would have been different had the Rays not drafted Tim Beckham with the first overall pick in 2008 and instead took the guy who went four picks later: kid named Gerald Dempsey Posey III.

Never made sense: One final word on the silly rule, thankfully canned, that gave home-field advantage in the World Series to the league that won the All-Star Game: aboutfriggin’time.