OAKLAND, CA: According to a report from Jeff Passan of ESPN, the Athletics are receiving a lot of trade interest in left-hander JP Sears. However, Passan also notes that the A's are unlikely to move Sears.
Mason Miller, their breakout closer, is in a similar scenario. Passan reports that the A's are open to hearing bids but don't seem inclined to move Miller. This is consistent with earlier coverage of Miller by Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic, who stated approximately a month ago that the A's were open to talks but had a high asking price.
Sears, 28, was apart of the 2022 deadline trade that sent Lou Trivino and Frankie Montas to the Yankees. Since then, other Oakland pitchers have either been injured or have not performed up to par, making Sears the team's most dependable and consistent pitcher.
Last season, he pitched 172 1/3 innings with 32 starts, easily leading the team in both categories. Ken Waldichuk, who had 22 starts and 141 innings, came in second in both categories.
He has once again been the rotation's rock in 2024. Alex Wood, Paul Blackburn, Ross Stripling, and Waldichuk are the current injured list members for the A's.
With twelve starts and six and a third innings pitched, Sears is once again leading the staff. Although the A's undoubtedly value the volume of effort, the quality has been only mediocre rather than exceptional.
Last season, Sears had a 4.54 earned run average, a 21.9% strikeout rate, and a 7.2% walk rate. All of those figures were rather close to average.
It remains to be seen if it will be valued highly enough by another team to lure Sears away from the A's, who shouldn't be in a haste to trade him. He had served for one year and eighteen days going into this season.
Accordingly, he won't even be eligible for arbitration until after 2025, and free agency won't happen until after 2028. As they progressively attempt to emerge from this rebuilding phase, which seems to be the most likely scenario at this point, they can simply retain him around as part of the rotation core if they don't find any particularly alluring offers at this time.
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