A recent round of MLB trade rumors included the name of Dylan Cease, the San Diego Padres right-hander who will become a free agent after the 2025 season. At least one published report linked the Minnesota Twins to the Padres about Cease, who twice has finished in the top four in Cy Young voting.
Cease has weathered trade rumors before, with the White Sox dealing him to San Diego a year ago in March, and the Cubs moving him to the White Sox when he was in Class-A ball at the trade deadline in 2017.
Padres general manager A.J. Preller this week downplayed the likelihood of Cease being traded, at least soon; he expects his team to compete for the postseason and Cease would help to anchor San Diego's strong starting rotation. While most projection systems foresee the Dodgers winning the NL West (perhaps by a lot), the Padres have been given reasonable odds to make the postseason field by ZiPS at Fangraphs (51.2%) and PECOTA at Baseball Prospectus (60.6%).
PECOTA likes the Twins to win the AL Central, by the way, with ZiPS giving a small edge to the Guardians.
Preller didn't rule out moving Cease, or anyone on the club, should proper circumstances arise. The Padres also have been going through uncertainty with the future of club ownership. Peter Seidler, who died in November 2023, set clearer (and higher?) parameters regarding payroll.
"You’ve always got to listen," Preller said of fielding trade offers.
It's likely that a number of MLB teams are going to continue calling Preller — and call his bluff — about acquiring Cease. What are the pros and cons of the Twins adding him?
PRO:
Only a handful of pitchers have performed as well as Cease since 2021, his first full season. In that span, he came close to winning a pair of Cy Young Awards, finishing second ('21) and fourth ('24) in the voting. Only a handful of pitchers — Zack Wheeler, Corbin Burnes, Kevin Gausman, Aaron Nola and Logan Webb — earned more fWAR than Cease (17.2). Those he outperformed include the likes of Gerrit Cole, Zac Gallen, Max Fried and Sandy Alcantara.
Among qualified pitchers, only Cole had a better K% than Cease, only three pitchers allowed a lower batting average, and nobody made more starts. Adding him to the top of a rotation that already has Pablo López, Joe Ryan and Bailey Ober could make the Twins a favorite in (almost) any hypothetical postseason series.
CON:
Long story short: Scott Boras represents Cease, and his clients typically skip contract extensions (but not always) and enjoy free agency, where the highest bidder tends to win. No matter how effective Cease pitches in 2025, his impending status as a free agent in 2026 makes it tricky to gauge his actual value.
Presumably it would shrink the closer we get to the trade deadline July 31, when about a third of the regular season remains.
Imagine: It's late July and the Twins lead the division by three games and have the second-best record in the AL. It's reasonable to expect the Twins next ownership group, if it's in place by then, would be more willing to pay the price in prospects for a rental in order to win now, but the move still would come with long-term risk.
PRO:
Cease is capable, in any given start, of being unhittable. He threw a no-hitter against the Nationals on July 25 that followed a pair of one-hit starts. He added three more one-hit starts in '24, and five more starts where he allowed two hits.
Blessed with one of the league's best sliders, Cease threw it 1,421 times in 2024. Only Chris Sale's slider was more effective, per MLB Statcast. Only a handful of anyone's best pitch scored better: the cutters of Emmanuel Clase and Burnes, along with the four-seamers of Cade Smith and Tarik Skubal. That's it.
One of the reasons Cease's slider presumably works is because he throws fastballs with 90th percentile speed.
CON:
None of his other pitches were nearly as effective as the slider in 2024, with Cease's fastball (-3), curve (-2), change (-2), sweeper (-1) and cutter (-1) all finishing in negative run value, per Statcast. In 2022, when Cease's slider was by far the most valuable pitch in the league at +36, he also threw a plus four-seamer and sinker.
Being grounded with a better variety of pitches makes Cease the best he can be, but it's been three years since he was able to put it all together in that way.
PRO:
Cease had Tommy John surgery in 2014 as a high schooler and it cost him, by some reports, being picked in the first round of MLB’s draft. Cease said he has since "cleaned up his mechanics" and added strength in order to stay healthier long term. His injury reports since then have been remarkably clean, which is most relevantly reflected in Cease leading the league in starts three times since 2021.
He occasionally has gotten an extra day of rest, but Cease hasn't missed a turn in the rotation because of an injury — ever.
CON:
Cease walks more people than is ideal, leading the league in raw totals with 290 and 9.7% BB% since 2021. Only Charlie Morton (269 total, 9.3%) was close. Cease also throws more wild pitches than anyone else, having led the league twice. Certainly this is the root of inconsistency; among qualified pitchers, Cease made 54 quality starts in 130 starts, which ranked 15th of 18. Wheeler, the leader of the pack in quality starts, did it 83 times in 122 games in the same span.
PRO:
Cease's command generally has been on the upswing. His BB% in 2024 improved to about league average, 8.5%, easily the best of his career and nearly 2 percent better than 2022.
CON:
For the price in trade (probably someone like outfield prospect Emmanuel Rodríguez) Cease might not be the best pitcher available in San Diego's rotation. Right-hander Michael King, also a free agent in 2026, doesn't have Cease's track record or durability.
But he broke through in 2024 after coming from the Yankees in the Juan Soto trade, earning the same bWAR as Cease, posting a lower ERA by 21 percent, and striking out a similar amount by percentage. He's older than Cease by just six months. If the Twins are angling for a playoff spot while keeping an eye on consequences for 2026 and later, they instead could turn to King, who could produce as much as Cease while costing less.
PRO:
Guardians star José Ramírez for his career is 5-for-27 with three strikeouts and zero home runs against Cease, producing a slash line of .185/.185/.259.
CON:
Projecting the Twins roster for 2025, their biggest needs are likely to come on the offensive side. Historically, their top hitters are also their most vulnerable players to injuries. Assuming this is a contender, it very likely will make more sense for the Twins to put their minor-league resources into the lineup.