Mason Miller drawing trade interest, A’s demanding huge return

It’s Miller trade rumor time.

Teams around the league are expressing interest in trading for Oakland Athletics flamethrowing closer Mason Miller, according to Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic. However, the A’s are indicating they won’t trade him for anything less than a huge return.

That asking price, as reported by Rosenthal, could be something along the lines of San Diego Padres rookie centerfielder Jackson Merrill, who came into the season as a consensus top-20 prospect. Or it could be a package of multiple top-100 prospects, such as the Baltimore Orioles’ Coby Mayo and Enrique Bradfield Jr.

The A’s are in a precarious situation with the team overperforming, in large part due to Miller’s contributions at the end of games. While the team’s not scoring many runs, when they do have a tight lead, Miller is as automatic of a save as it gets. He’s converted all 8 of his save opportunities so far and owns a miniscule 1.10 ERA in 16 ¹⁄₃ innings along with a laughable -0.15 FIP. On top of that, he’s struck out more than 2 batters per inning and has only allowed 11 baserunners. Disregarding role, his 100+ mph fastball and deadly slide make him one of the most unhittable pitchers the league has seen in years.

Contenders are naturally asking about his availability, despite the fact that he won’t be eligible for arbitration until 2026 at least. He’d instantly become the best reliever and improve the 9th inning situation for pretty much any team.

I saw Miller pitch in person during the first game of yesterday’s doubleheader against the Texas Rangers, who have the league’s 10th-best offense and scored 16 runs on 24 hits across both games. For 2 innings, the fearless 25-year-old made the reigning champions look like a Little League team, mowing them down with just 32 pitches, of which 24 were strikes.

From the A’s perspective, there’s no reason at this point to consider any package that’s not an overpay. With the young core starting to come together and more help on the way — we’re looking at you, Jacob Wilson — Miller could easily be a key piece of their next competitive team.

Whether or not they see him returning to a starting role, however, will factor into how they value him internally. They already saw last season that, health permitting, his stuff plays in a starting role. In just his third major league start, he pitched 7 no-hit innings against the Seattle Mariners offense, which ranked 9th in the league.

As much as I absolutely love Miller, both for his skillset and performance but also his magnetic bulldog presence on the mound, the opportunity to turn one young stud into several is admittedly enticing. Factoring in his shaky injury history — he’s still yet to throw 100 professional innings — it could be smart, albeit heart-wrenching, to sell high now when he’s not only dominating but doing so without any health issues. If the A’s hold onto him and he does get hurt again, that’ll further entrench the perception, fair or not, that he’ll always be injured.

Of course, the bar for any players in a potential trade package are and should be extremely high. Not only should they be elite talents, at least one or two would have to be either in the majors already or close to it. The A’s are in the phase of their rebuild where they’re trying to come out of it, not go deeper into it. Would any team actually find a reliever, as good as Miller is, worth that kind of return? Unclear, but it only takes one crazy and/or desperate team or GM — *cough cough* AJ Preller — to get a more than fair package.

There isn’t any sort of traction towards a deal — “no team has come close to meeting the A’s asking price,” according to Rosenthal — so this is all more of a thought experiment for now. However, as we get closer to the trade deadline and the buyers become solidified, the possibility of a Miller may become realer and David Forst could be faced with a franchise-altering dilemma.