Minnesota Twins catcher Kurt Suzuki was placed on trade waivers according to Mike Berardino of the Pioneer Press. Suzuki’s waiver claim will expire mid-day Sunday.
If no teams claim him by then, Minnesota is welcome to trade him to any of the 29 other teams in baseball. If he is indeed claimed, that team will have an additional 48 hours to construct a trade with the Twins.
What’s waivers?
Waivers can be tricky to understand but here’s how they work. After the Aug. 1 traded deadline, if a team wants to trade a player, he must pass through waivers.
When a player is on waivers, a team can submit a claim for a player. The teams with the worst record in their respective league get the first chance to claim him.
So for example, the Tampa Rays (46-69) will be the first team that has the chance to claim Suzuki with the the Texas Rangers (69-48) being the last team in the league that has a chance.
If no team from the American League claims him, he’s then sent through the National League teams.
So if he’s claimed, now what?
So let’s say a team does claim Suzuki, the Twins will essentially have three options:
- The Twins could simply pull Suzuki off waivers and he’d remain the Twins’ property with absolutely no penalty.
- The Twins could negotiate a trade with the claiming team.
- The Twins let the claiming team have him scot-free, but the claiming team must pay the player’s remaining salary, which in this case is $1.64 million for the rest of the season.
