Los Angeles Dodgers should flip Kenta Maeda for this reliever

There appears to be a decent chance that Keenta Maeda gets traded from the Los Angeles Dodgers this winter and the team should flip the starter into a reliever.

The Los Angeles Dodgers have a surplus of starting pitching heading into 2020 and that may lead the team to trade one of the most consistent members of the starting rotation the last four seasons, Kenta Maeda.

Maeda has been great for the Dodgers since 2016, ranking second in innings pitched and fWAR on the team, only behind Clayton Kershaw. However, with the arrival of better, younger arms and Maeda’s greatness out of the bullpen, the team has transitioned him to a reliever in both of the last two seasons.

Like the last two seasons, Maeda probably would have started this year in the starting rotation and would have found himself in the bullpen late in the year as the rotation shrinks to four guys. This is a problem for Maeda, whose incentive-based contract is solely based around incentives that rely on him being a starter.

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Maeda is reportedly unhappy with the situation, which led to him and his agent discussing a trade with the Dodgers. The Dodgers are not going to simply sell Maeda for a low value, but if they can flip an asset in a deep area of the roster for another asset then we all know Andrew Friedman will jump on it.

A team that makes sense for Maeda is the Cleveland Indians. We included him in a potential trade for Francisco Lindor if that ever happens, but there is a trade that makes even more sense for both parties.

That is flipping a starting-pitching asset in Maeda for a relief asset in Brad Hand, who teams reportedly think the Indians will deal this winter.

The Indians will not take a one-for-one trade as they traded their top catching prospect for Hand and will ask for some sort of prospect return in the package. However, it should be noted that the Indians have less leverage than the Padres have as Hand has not been as good in Cleveland as he was in San Diego.

There are two routes the Dodgers can trade in making a deal like this. First, they can include several prospects alongside Maeda that are not elite prospects but are promising and give the Indians quantity over quality.

All of which have to be prospects that are hard to find a roster spot for. A good trio of prospects that the Dodgers could look to trade are Edwin Rios, DJ Peters and Connor Wong.

Rios is big-league ready and showed positive signs in his limited chances with the big-league club, the problem is that third and first base is already crowded and could get even more crowded. With a slew of left-handed bats already in the lineup, Rios is expendable and is someone who could actually make an impact on Cleveland.

MLB Pipeline ranks Peters as the 12th-best prospect in the Dodgers organization. He is a power-hitting outfielder with above-average fielding and a good arm and is nearing being big-league ready himself, the problem is that the outfield is crowded and there may be no immediate spots for him.

Finally, Wong is one of several talented catching prospects in the Dodgers’ organization and is actually the third-highest catcher in the farm system and the 28th in the Dodgers’ system. With Will Smith, Keibert Ruiz and Diego Cartaya ahead of him, he becomes easily expendable.

The other path the Los Angeles Dodgers could take, which is a worse one, in my opinion, is to include one elite prospect. In this scenario, the most likely prospect that could get traded is Jeter Downs.

Right now, the future of the middle infield looks to be Corey Seager and Gavin Lux, making Downs expendable. Downs was acquired in the Yasiel Puig trade and was not even a top-100 prospect before he blossomed in LA’s farm system. He now ranks 87th.

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What do you think? Would you want to see the Los Angeles Dodgers flip Maeda for Hand and which package would you prefer to see? Let us know in the comments and on our social media pages!

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