Giants taking plunge on Rafael Devers trade is only a dream for Mariners fans

It wasn't that long ago that we were openly musing about the Seattle Mariners acquiring Rafael Devers in a blockbuster trade with the Boston Red Sox. It was nothing if not a fun exercise, and the idea seemed just realistic enough to be worth the effort.

Things feel a little different now that Devers has actually been traded.

It was kind of a big deal on Sunday, with FanSided's own Robert Murray being the first to break the news that the Red Sox had traded their star slugger — formerly a third baseman and currently a very unhappy designated hitter — to the San Francisco Giants. Somewhat paradoxically, the sheer impact of the deal is heightened by the apparent lightness of the return for Boston.

Jordan Hicks, Kyle Harrison, James Tibbs III, and Jose Bello? Is that really it? Not exactly Herschel Walker-tier as far as trade packages go, which surely has Mariners fans wondering if Jerry Dipoto could have crashed Buster Posey's party with a better offer.

The Mariners could have beaten the Giants' offer for Rafael Devers, but it wouldn't have been enough

Truthfully, the Mariners absolutely could have offered Craig Breslow and the Red Sox a more impressive haul of players for Devers, a three-time All-Star who's still only 28 years old.

To recap, Hicks is a failed starter in the second year of an albatross $44 million contract, Harrison is in no man's land after beginning 2024 as one of MLB's top prospects, and Tibbs and Bello are solid prospects who nonetheless don't rank within MLB Pipeline's top 100.

The Mariners have nine prospects in said top 100, not to mention a hypothetical excess of pitching. Both things came into play in the deal we pitched in May, which is worth repeating for posterity's sake:

• Mariners get: DH Rafael Devers, RHP Richard Fitts, RHP Luis Perales, $48 million cash
• Red Sox get: RHP Luis Castillo, C Harry Ford, 1B Tyler Locklear

Solid deal, right? Would you take that deal? We'd take that deal. It even rated as "Fair" for Baseball Trade Values, which can't actually be said of the actual trade struck by the Red Sox and Giants.

There's a reason for that, though, and it's not what you might think. According to their model, it is the Giants who massively overpaid for Devers, and not the Red Sox who gave him away for nothing:

At the heart of the issue here is the dollar exchange. Hicks is still owed about $28 million, but Devers has over $235 million coming to him through 2033. It's a $200 million absorption for the Giants, and they may come to regret it once Devers' bat declines and he becomes the most useless of all players: a DH who can't do the "H" part.

Getting rid of that money is what this trade is all about for Boston, and it seems reasonable to assume that Breslow was never going to give a thumb's up to any deal that didn't result in Devers' contract getting the same heave-ho as his attitude. Both simply had to be gone.

While we don't know if the Mariners ever had discussions with the Red Sox about Devers, it likewise seems reasonable to assume that they would not have gotten far if his contract indeed had to go. Taking on Devers would have meant adding a $29.5 million salary just to this year's books, and that was never going to happen.

The Mariners are already operating with a payroll $13 million over what they spent in 2024, and it puts them almost even with the franchise's all-time high of $157.9 million from 2019. This is the team's comfort level, if not a little over it.

The day may come when the Mariners expand their comfort level, but it's hard to imagine it coming while John Stanton is still in the owner's box. As frustrated as fans can (rightfully) get with Dipoto, it's not his budget that is guiding his moves. For this, nobody said it better than Justin Turner.

“I think Jerry catches a bad rap for a lot of these trades and how crazy some of these trades have been," Turner said in that fateful interview with Bob Nightengale of USA Today in March. “But now being a part of it, I kind of understand. He doesn’t have any money to spend, so he’s got to create money. Like, OK, is it really Jerry’s fault?"

Not a single lie is detectable here, which ultimately brings us to a dizzying reality of the Devers trade for Mariners fans: It is simultaneously nice to know that the Mariners didn't swing and miss, and utterly frustrating that this is because swinging was never a real option.

Which is a shame, because the Mariners really could have used Devers. Say what you will about his attitude, but he's an extra-base hit machine with a .938 OPS for his career at T-Mobile Park. He is Charles Darwin's perfect hitter, his adaptability matched only by his tenacity.

Alas, all that really matters right now is that Devers is not a Seattle Mariner. They'll just have to beat on without him, with fans left to wonder if the big swing they've been wanting will ever come.