Astros fire an obvious warning shot at Mariners with Lance McCullers Jr. trade

Major League Baseball is off for a couple days after the All-Star break, but the race for the AL West is apparently ongoing. And the Houston Astros just gave themselves a leg up on the Seattle Mariners as each tries to catch the Texas Rangers.

In a surprise move, Lance McCullers Jr. is now an ex-Astro following a trade with the Milwaukee Brewers on Wednesday, according to multiple reports. Milwaukee is also getting left-hander Colton Gordon and taking on a little more than $2 million of McCullers' $17 million salary. The Astros are getting minor league infielder Jadyn Fielder, son of longtime slugger Prince Fielder.

McCullers, 32, is in the final year of a five-year, $85 million contract that went bad for Houston as soon as he signed it in 2022. He has 24 appearances and a 6.65 ERA to show for the last four seasons. That's the wreckage of age and the injury bug, which once again landed McCullers on the IL with a rotator cuff impingement in May.

For the Astros, the benefit is that even a small portion of McCullers' salary just went "poof." That can only help them make moves at the August 3 trade deadline, as Brian McTaggart of MLB.com observed:

For Houston fans, the promise here is not an empty one. Despite a 47-51 start, the Astros are only 1.5 games behind the Mariners (48-49) and 3.0 games behind the Rangers (49-47). And even before they cleared payroll space, there was buzz that they had big plans for the trade deadline.

Tarik Skubal and Sonny Gray almost certainly aren't happening, but clearing McCullers' salary could open other doors. As Jerry Dipoto himself has alluded to, the shortage of true sellers on the summer market could result in more buyer-to-buyer trades. And to make those kinds of deals, it helps to have extra spending power.

Mariners now basically have to play catch-up after the Astros trade of Lance McCullers Jr.

Meanwhile in Seattle, it's hard to tell exactly what the front office has planned for the trade deadline. There are even rumors that they won't be as aggressive as they have been in past years, in which case the play would be to go all-in on what they have in-house.

It's an outrageous scenario for a team that's supposed to be "World Series or bust" in 2026, and that's what makes it hard to take at face value. The alternative buzz that the Mariners are eyeing a right-handed bat and a late-inning reliever ultimately rings more true. We also know they have both an elite farm system and a rotation surplus to deal from.

However, McCullers going to Milwaukee means one less landing spot for Luis Castillo, a similarly high-priced yet declining pitching asset. And you do wonder how much flexibility the Mariners have on the market if they don't move him in some way or another. As per MLB Trade Rumors' handy new payroll tracker, the Mariners are already surpassing their 2025 spending level.

In other words, the Astros beat them to the punch. Or at least a punch, anyway. It feels like a warning, and the question now is how Seattle responds.

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