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Thanks to two separate reports, one from Jayson Stark, and the other by Jon Morosi, we may finally have some legitimate trade negotiations brewing.
A sign the #BlueJays are going to be all in at the deadline: There were 12 scouts watching their triple-A team in Buffalo this week!
— Jayson Stark (@jaysonst) July 22, 2015
That news alone would be enough to reach the conclusion that there were at least preliminary talks going on with the Blue Jays and some unknown teams; however thanks to Morosi, we know that at least one of those teams is the Padres. They were linked to San Diego earlier this month in a report from Ken Rosenthal, which also suggested that Alex Anthopoulos could solve his bullpen and rotation issues with just one trade; and that appears to still be the case.
#BlueJays and #Padres have had recent discussions about San Diego pitchers -- both rotation and bullpen.
— Jon Morosi (@jonmorosi) July 22, 2015
A.J. Preller has a lot of pieces to deal, and he's expected by at least one rival executive to tear the team down as quickly as he built it. From a pitching standpoint, Toronto's greatest need, the Padres have reportedly made Tyson Ross, Andrew Cashner, James Shields, Ian Kennedy, Joaquin Benoit, and Craig Kimbrel available in trade talks.
According to that earlier report from Rosenthal, the Padres were specifically scouting Daniel Norris, as well as a quickly rising prospect named Jeff Hoffman. Knowing those players, as well as the fact that the Blue Jays would like to acquire both a starter and a reliever at the same time, a package of either Tyson Ross or Andrew Cashner, and Craig Kimbrel would make a lot of sense.
They could also look to trade for James Shields, and a lesser reliever like Benoit, but the Padres would probably have to include more cash in that hypothetical trade than they would for one that included Kimbrel. GM's have seemingly been waiting for something to happen so that the market could be set, but we're now just nine days away from the deadline passing and there's no more time to wait around.