With Ubaldo Jimenez off the market, a number of teams looking for starting pitchers cast their covetous eyes toward Houston, where the trades of Hunter Pence and Michael Bourn made it clear that Astros management is blowing things up and starting over. Might Wandy Rodriguez be available?
He certainly was ... but only for the right package. And with the trade deadline come and gone, Rodriguez remains an Astros, no doubt because he's still owed $25.5 million after this season, and probably isn't worth quite that much. It's likely that a deal was there to be made, but only if the Astros were willing to send along a few million dollars, too.
Which doesn't mean a deal won't eventually get done. Rodriguez will be placed on revocable waivers tomorrow, and most teams will be scared away from claiming him by his contract. It takes only one, though. If somebody gets just a bit more desperate for a starting pitcher in August, something still might happen.