Five Dynasty Risers and Five Fallers from the 2025 Trade Deadline

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The Trade deadline has come and gone, and with it, new players are getting more opportunities with their new clubs. In some players’ cases, they’re seeing fewer opportunities on the field with their new or current club, because of who has been added or the roles they’ve been slotted into. Who are five players for dynasty leagues to be watchful of as additions to their rosters, and which players should they avoid keeping with the new additions to certain clubs?

 

Prospects on the Rise After the Deadline 

 

Mick Abel, RHP, Minnesota Twins

One of the two top 100 prospects returned to the Twins by the Phillies for lights-out closer Jhoan Duran, Mick Abel has already appeared in the Majors this season, making five starts with the Phillies before being dealt. Abel made his debut in the Twins organization on Sunday with the St. Paul Saints, throwing five shutout innings, striking out seven batters, and allowing three to reach on two walks and just one base hit.

Abel and his flamethrowing fastball are not up to the same par as Duran, but he is a front-runner in the Twins system to convert into a full-time reliever with his stuff if the starting rotation does not work for him. With the Twins out of contention, they’ll take their time for the remainder of the season, trotting Abel out every fifth day for a start.

With the start of his Twins tenure beginning in Triple-A St. Paul, don’t expect him to stay there for the remainder of the season. The Twins will need both him and fellow trade deadline acquisition Taj Bradley to make starts before the season is over. Even if his usage with the Twins is limited for the remainder of 2025, his role with them moving forward will be crucial to their pitching staff and will be a prospect to have stashed as a dynasty owner for the long term.

 

Alan Roden, OF, Minnesota Twins 

Roden is the biggest wild card among the group of risers, but he joins a Twins outfield that is filled to the brim with left-handed hitters. Roden has appeared in all three games with the Twins post-deadline and has only gone 1-for-10 at the plate. He struggled mightily with the Blue Jays in the Majors this year, putting up a .204/.283/.306 slash line with just one home run and eight RBI over 113 plate appearances.

His numbers at Triple-A have been a different story altogether as he’s put up a .331/.423/.496 slash line with three home runs, 18 RBI, 16 walks, and 14 strikeouts over 142 plate appearances. Roden fits into the Quad-A player label right now, but the Twins’ putting him on the active roster immediately shows their commitment to let him ride out his highs and lows in the Majors for the time being.

At least until Byron Buxton returns from the 10-day IL, which he’ll be eligible for when they return home to face the Royals on August 8, Roden will rotate between the corner outfield positions. The Twins have regularly used both Trevor Larnach and Matt Wallner as DH options, which will allow Roden to fill in on the field for whichever of the two is penciled in at DH.

The last two months of the season will be the test for Roden to see if he can sink or swim as a full-time Major Leaguer, and the Twins roster being depleted from this deadline gives him a much better chance to prove it one way or another than the Blue Jays ever could have.

 

Eduarniel Núñez, RHP, Athletics 

The only prospect in their trade with the San Diego Padres that sent away Mason Miller and JP Sears, Eduarniel Núñez jumped right into the Athletics bullpen, taking over the vacant spot left by Miller. Núñez is already 26 years old and just made his MLB debut with the Padres at the beginning of July.

A 6’2 righty with a fastball that averages 98 MPH with a slider and curveball to complement it, Núñez enters an ever-changing Athletics bullpen that will need some new stability after the departure of Miller. He may not throw as hard as Miller, but Núñez offers plenty with his fastball velocity and off-speed pitches to be a high-octane reliever going forward.

Núñez’s biggest flaw is a lack of command in the strike zone, but if the A’s can manage to get him in control of the ineffective delivery he currently has. He can be an under-the-radar setup man for dynasty owners by the end of the year and a name to keep tabs on for 2026.

 

Tyler Locklear, 1B, Arizona Diamondbacks

Tyler Locklear was going to have a hard time getting in the lineup regularly once the Mariners acquired Josh Naylor from the Diamondbacks on July 25. So when they went all in again on a trade with Arizona to reacquire Eugenio Suárez back to Seattle, it only made sense that the D-Backs would get Locklear in the deal to fill in their vacant role at first.

Locklear made his MLB debut last season, but spent all of 2025 in Triple-A Tacoma before being acquired by Arizona. In 98 games with the Rainers, Lockler put up a respectable .316/.401/.542 slash line with 19 home runs, 82 RBI, a 10.8% walk rate, and 21.9% strikeout rate. He’s gone 2-for-10 so far with a couple of walks and four strikeouts over three games with the Diamondbacks, which can just be a sign of adjustment back to the Big Leagues.

As of now, the D-Backs’ acquisition of Locklear sets him up to be their first baseman of the future. He’s still only 24 years old and offers up the prototypical first baseman pop with almost double the strikeout numbers compared to walks. Playing in the Pacific Coast League all season certainly helped his numbers, even in a hitter-friendly ballpark such as Chase Field. Locklear may not expect to see the same power numbers as he’s had in the Minors.

Still, Locklear has plenty of upside power with his swing, and if the strikeout and walk numbers begin to balance themselves out more. He will be a first baseman dynasty owners should grab hold of for the 2026 season and beyond.

 

Rafael Flores, C/1B, Pittsburgh Pirates

The crown jewel return for trading away longtime reliever and Pittsburgh native, David Bednar, Rafael Flores is one of the better under-ranked catching prospects in baseball, and exactly what the Pirates needed in return from the Yankees this deadline. Flores is a decent defensive catcher, but where he really shines is with his bat, which is a trait in catchers that has been harder and harder to find in recent years.

He’s spent the majority of 2025 in Double-A, but has a cumulative .282/.355/.481 slash line with 16 home runs, 61 RBI, six stolen bases, a 9.9% walk rate, and 25.5% strikeout rate over 423 plate appearances this season. The strikeout-to-walk rate is the widest gap he’s ever had in his career so far, at 15.6. In just 11 games at Triple-A, Flores has managed to bring up his walk rate much better, to 12 walks compared to 14 strikeouts.

Flores is the most unlikely to play in the Majors before the 2025 season is over among this group, but he is a great rookie catcher to have in mind for the 2026 season. If he can maintain similar numbers with Triple-A Indianapolis through the remainder of the season, he will be one of the most exciting breakout candidates in the Pirates system for next season for dynasty owners to cash in on.

 

Major Leaguers Falling in Dynasty Stock 

 

Mason Miller, RHP, San Diego Padres

The Padres’ bullpen has become much stronger with Miller added to it, but with Robert Suarez staying with the team, he falls into a setup role behind Suarez, who is leading all of MLB in saves with 31. Miller recorded 20 with the Athletics this season before he was traded to the Padres, while he will be missing out on save opportunities for the majority of the games left on the schedule. He should see other numbers, such as his ERA and opponents’ average, drop considerably, pitching more frequently at Petco Park, versus the Triple-A Stadium in Sacramento.

Miller will also need to work on his walk numbers, with his walk rate sitting at 11.6% on the season. It’s far from terrible, but up 3.2 points from where it was during his phenomenal rookie season last year. He’s off to a good start with the Padres, not allowing any walks in his first outing with them Friday, but giving up two hits.

Dynasty owners should by no means give up on Miller just because he’s no longer in a closer role. Miller still has fantastic upside in the Padres bullpen, but the change in how he’s used in games puts him in a spot where he’ll provide owners less value.

 

Griffin Jax, RHP, Tampa Bay Rays 

Griffin Jax may be a reliever that dynasty owners could walk away from for the rest of the season. Jax made his debut with the Rays on Sunday and gave up a walk to the Dodgers’ newest outfielder, Alex Call,  a double to Shohei Ohtani, and then a sacrifice fly to Mookie Betts without getting any strikeouts.

Jax has had several late-inning meltdowns with the Twins this season, including one last Wednesday in a blowout loss to the Red Sox. He entered the game when the Twins were already trailing 8-1, but he allowed all three batters to reach on base hits, and all eventually came around to score when position player Kody Clemens replaced him on the mound and gave up a home run to Romy González.

His first outing with the Rays against the Dodgers wasn’t a step in the right direction, though the Rays had already been trailing 2-0 by that point. Before the trade deadline, Jax had his FIP at 1.49, the lowest at any point during the season. Since his last two outings against the Dodgers and one against the Red Sox, it’s risen to 2.10 on the year.

Jax still has significant upside as a high-leverage reliever, but the cracks have started to reveal themselves more and more as the season has gone on. Hopefully, with the Rays’ pitching development factory being what it is, Jax can turn things around for the rest of 2025. But until he proves otherwise, expect his value to decrease as an effective dynasty reliever.

 

Kumar Rocker, RHP, Texas Rangers 

With the Rangers acquiring Merrill Kelly from the Diamondbacks at this deadline, one of their young starters is due to see less time in the rotation down the stretch, and as of now, that appears to be Kumar Rocker. Rocker has posted a 5. 74 ERA and 1.46 WHIP on the season in 64.1 innings over 14 starts.

He was optioned back down to Triple-A Round Rock on Friday, following the Rangers’ move to put Kelly on the active roster. Rocker’s weakness this season has been allowing too much contact in the zone and not getting enough swings and misses on pitches that have proven effective in the Minors. He owns an opponent’s BABIP of .311 on the year, while only striking out 19.5% of hitters compared to a 39.6% strikeout rate and .179 BABIP in the Minors last year.

Rocker is still young, turning only 26 in November, and still has plenty of upside with his stuff. But unless the Rangers opt to use him as a reliever down the stretch, he’ll likely be in the Minors for the remainder of 2025, hoping to retool his stuff to be extremely effective next season.

 

Anthony Volpe, SS, New York Yankees 

The Yankees gave clear indications they’d be stepping back on putting Volpe in the lineup frequently when they went out and acquired José Caballero from the Rays only an hour before the deadline. Volpe has been hitting decently at the plate of late, a .280/.315/.720 with seven home runs and 11  RBI since the All-Star Break. But he’s committed five errors in his last 10 games at short, which forced the Yankees’ hands to bolster their defense this deadline.

While the power is coming more and more into play with Volpe, Caballero has much more significant upside than him, given his speed on the base paths. Caballero led the American League with 44 stolen bases last season and currently leads all of MLB with 35 on the season. Volpe only has 14 stolen bases and is seeing his strikeout rate rise, currently sitting at 23.6% on the year.

The Yankees still have faith in their homegrown shortstop, but they want to do everything they can to get back to the World Series this year, and they cannot rely only on Volpe at the position. Expect more from Caballero down the stretch than Volpe for dynasty teams.

 

Chase Burns, RHP, Cincinnati Reds

 Chase Burns has had an up-and-down start to his MLB career, but he’s been on a good run of late, striking out at least 10 in his last three starts. The 22-year-old is still struggling against big league hitters as they have accumulated a .394 BABIP against him through his first seven MLB starts.

Unlike Rocker, Burns is riding things out on the Reds’ active roster for the time being, but he may see fewer starts in the rotation with the Reds’ addition of Zack Littell from the Rays this trade deadline. Littell will slot into the Reds’ rotation behind Nick Martinez, Nick Lodolo, Brady Singer, and Andrew Abbott. While the Reds do have a great success story in Burns making the Majors within a year after he was drafted, the young righty may not be quite ready to make crucial starts for the Reds in their push to make the postseason for the first time since 2020.

He still has a respectable 36.4% strikeout rate and 9.3% walk rate to start his MLB career, but Burns shouldn’t burn his arm out down the stretch for the Reds with veteran pitchers holding their own against opponents. This is by no means an argument for dynasty owners to dump Burns, only a reminder that he could be used less frequently down the stretch and not provide as many starts as one would like from one of the game’s most exciting pitching prospects.




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