Sep 18, 2024; St. Louis, Missouri, USA; St. Louis Cardinals third baseman Nolan Arenado (28) dives but is unable to field a ground ball hit by Pittsburgh Pirates center fielder Billy Cook (not pictured) during the ninth inning at Busch Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Jeff Curry-Imagn Images
Update 10:45PM ET: According to John Denton of MLB.com, Nolan Arenado has narrowed the list of teams he is willing to waive his no trade clause down to six teams. The Phillies are one of those six.
The others are the Los Angeles Dodgers, San Diego Padres, Los Angeles Angels, New York Mets and Boston Red Sox.
The Padres have Manny Machado at third and the Mets have Mark Vientos.
Dodgers GM Brandon Gomes poo-pooed the idea earlier Tuesday:
The Dodgers aren't expected to pursue a trade for 3B Nolan Arenado nor have they considered it a possibility, according to @FabianArdaya.
This report comes a day after the teams general manager Brandon Gomes confirmed Max Muncy as their third baseman moving forward. pic.twitter.com/KdRnbsHZYG
— Dodgers Tailgate (@DodgersTailgate) December 10, 2024
The Angels are open to adding a third baseman despite having the albatross contract of Anthony Rendon on their roster. The Red Sox have Rafael Devers, but reports are that they are willing to move him off of third base.
And the Phillies have Alec Bohm, who has been the center of rampant trade speculation, even though Manager Rob Thomson called him Monday to tell him he's not being shopped.
Arenado is a bit of a high-risk, high-reward, bounce back candidate. If he can find the 2022 version of himself, he'd be a great addition to the Phillies offensively. He's been in a bit of a decline back to league average over the past two seasons at the plate but remains one of the greatest defensive third basemen the sport has ever seen.
It'll be interesting to see if the Phillies actually engage the Cardinals on this in the coming days, or if they are just a name on Arenado's wish list.
Original Story
Trade deadlines. The start of free agency. Draft day. Baseball's Winter Meetings.
Each and every one of these segments of the sports calendar is silly season. So much stuff gets thrown at the wall. Sources, real and fake, are tossed around like king salmon in Seattle's Pike Place fish market.
We're neck deep in this here at On Pattison. Our Tim Kelly is holed up in his bunker with just a flashlight, his laptop and the social media, furiously noting every possible link to the Philadelphia Phillies.
I'm sitting here taking the overflow today, allowing us to feed the ever-hungry beast with sugar rush content.
The latest comes from national rumormonger Bob Nightengale from USA Today, suggesting the Phillies have some level of interest, although not specifically stating if its serious interest or tire-kicking, but hey, even a scuff mark on Dave Dombrowski's wing tips is worth noting these days.
“[Nolan Arenado’s agent Joel Wolfe] has directly spoken to several teams who have shown varying interest in Arenado, including the Boston Red Sox, San Diego Padres, Philadelphia Phillies and Houston Astros.”
-@BNightengale pic.twitter.com/3UMzODXymP
Now, a little context behind this tweet:
It's well known that the St. Louis Cardinals are looking to take a step back in 2025 and reduce payroll a little bit as they look to retool for 2026 and beyond.
As such, moving the 34-year-old Arenado seems to be a priority. Heck, John Mozeliak, the Cardinals president of baseball operations, told several reporters at the present at the winter meetings that "It's my intention to try" to trade Arenado.
The sticking point is Arenado has a no-trade clause, but Mozeliak has told Arenado's agent, Jeff Wolfe, to reach out to teams and see if he can find a fit of Arenado's liking that would entice him to waive that clause in his contract.
The other hurdle teams would have to consider is what's left on Arenado's contract. He has three years remaining on his deal at a total of $74 million, although $10 million is covered by Colorado as part of te original trade from the Rockies to St. Louis.
Still, that's a lot of cheddar.
Would the Cardinals have to take on another less-than-desirable contract as part of a trade to make it work? Possibly.
If Arenado were still in his prime, that wouldn't be a consideration, but he had a down year in 2024 and considering his age, that's concerning.
Tim did a deeper dig last month into what this would look like for the Phillies to trade for Arenado.
The truly comical thing in this entire rumor is that this report from Nightengale comes out publicly within a couple of hours of Phillies manager Rob Thomson telling reporters that he called Alec Bohm on Monday to tell him the Phillies aren't shopping him.
Rob Thomson says the Phillies aren’t shopping Alec Bohm.
pic.twitter.com/xdu0cHIGxk
They can't be interested in Arenado and not shopping Bohm. It doesn't add up. As such, either Thomson is blowing smoke for the Phillies organization, or someone is feeding information to NIghtengale to try to drum up more interest in Arenado.
Either way, if you haven't been with us for the past two months, welcome to silly season.
