MLB Trade Rumors is a clearinghouse for relevant, legitimate baseball rumors. The site focuses on the hot stove – trades and free agent signings. Rumors come from established journalists, and always include a link to the source material. All 30 teams are covered. MLBTR is written and maintained by Tim Dierkes. Tim can be reached at dierkes@gmail.com.
Mark Travis: Ok, as a blogger, I am in awe of what you able to do. Give me a rundown of your daily schedule.
Tim Dierkes: As described by me, it’s not too exciting-sounding. I wake up, check email, and set my fantasy team rosters. If there are any pertinent links in the inbox I’ll post about those. Then I read everything I can get my hands on and stop to post on the website as stuff comes up. So, the day is mostly spent reading. In the afternoon there is always a ballgame on in the background.
MT: Do you have any inside sources that help you get information or do you just use the info that is out in public? If you do have sources, how did you maintain them?
TD: I have a handful of sources. They are mostly friendly people who came to me offering to help if I have questions about rumors. But as you can see on the site, the vast majority of content comes from the beat and national writers.
MT: You also run a fantasy site, Roto Authority. Which do enjoy working on more, MLB Trade Rumors or Roto Authority? Why?
TD: It’s hard to pick one. RotoAuthority is more like a hobby, where it’s OK if I miss a day and if I don’t care about a topic I won’t write about it. I am always going to love both fantasy baseball and the hot stove side of the real game. Sometimes I enjoy MLBTR more when it’s slow and I have some latitude to do an interview or feature piece.
MT: On a fantasy note, rank these OFs, Matt Holliday, Ryan Braun, Alfonso Soriano, Carl Crawford and Carlos Quentin. I own all of those guys(a lot of moves went into it) in an 8-team keeper league, but I can only start 4.
TD: Braun, Holliday, Soriano, Crawford, Quentin were my preseason rankings. It seems wrong to change them so soon. But I do worry about Braun’s slow start and I think Quentin is quickly erasing concerns about his wrist. It seems like you should make a trade with your surplus.
MT: A lot has been made about the move you made in purchasing an ad on Matt Holliday’s Baseball Reference page. I recently bought an add on Pedro Martinez’s page, before realizing it wasn’t that Pedro. What do you hope to gain out of the ad? Where do you think Holliday will be on July 31st?
TD: Sorry to hear that about the Pedro page. Also watch out for the wrong Jose Reyes! I think when I sponsored Holliday and Rich Harden at b-ref the hope was to get a decent amount of traffic from the ads and bring in some new readers. That has not happened…since I booked those ads b-ref is #525 on my list of referring websites. So I guess it’s more of a branding thing. Maybe those people will just type in my URL later or google it. I think those might be the only ads I’ve taken out in years, and I’d book more of them just because it’s cool to have. My guess is that Holliday will still be in Oakland past the trade deadline.
MT: Who do you think will be traded at the deadline that is considered a big name, but would come as a shock to many?
TD: At this point almost every big name has been discussed extensively by hot stove junkies. One name Jayson Stark threw out there a few months ago is Justin Verlander. He would be appealing to a lot of teams and he’s getting more expensive.
I agree with the order of the OF’s except I would switch Holliday and Braun. I can see Hudson getting traded if Braves are out of contention, also C. Jones. McLouth will probably be traded, maybe even Jack Wilson. There are a few players from the Tigers that might be traded, such as Cabrera, and others. Maybe Ichiro. The Giants are going try to get rid of Rowand for something if he can start playing better. Also Lee of the Indians might be traded. I can also see Burnett getting traded.