{"id":126424,"date":"2026-07-21T20:33:41","date_gmt":"2026-07-22T00:33:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/?p=126424"},"modified":"2026-07-21T20:33:41","modified_gmt":"2026-07-22T00:33:41","slug":"athletics-injury-crucial-opportunity-trade-deadline","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/2026\/07\/21\/athletics-injury-crucial-opportunity-trade-deadline\/","title":{"rendered":"Athletics’ Latest Injury May Spoil Crucial Opportunity At MLB Trade Deadline"},"content":{"rendered":"

As the MLB Trade Deadline<\/a> nears, the market is shaping up to favor selling teams. One of the franchises that appears to be out of the playoff hunt is the Athletics<\/a>, which could result in them trading away several key pieces in exchange for younger talent. Recently, there has been some buzz surrounding Shea Langeliers<\/a>, their star catcher, as the market behind the plate is looking very thin. While his name has only been mentioned in speculation, one player that seemed likely to be dealt was Mark Leiter Jr<\/a>., but that plan may have just been spoiled.<\/p>\n

Mark Leiter Jr.’s Injury Hurts Athletics’ Trade Deadline Plans<\/span><\/span><\/h2>\n

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Leiter Jr. was just placed on the 15-day injured list with right hip impingement<\/a>. That will sideline him at least through the trade deadline, dropping his value tremendously. On top of that, this is the second time this hip injury has flared up this season. The history of this injury and the timeliness of it may make teams hesitant to acquire the veteran right-hander.<\/p>\n

On an expiring contract worth just under $3 million this season, Leiter was definitely a player the Athletics were trying to deal with. While his season was mediocre, posting a 4.28 ERA with a 2.96 FIP, a 10.16 K\/9, and a 1.31 WHIP, Leiter still could have fetched the organization a young prospect with some upside.<\/p>\n

The Athletics don’t have many impending free agents to move, which is why losing Leiter Jr. really hurts what this organization needs to do. With not many teams in selling positions, the demand for players like Leiter Jr. was very limited, which could have given the Athletics some added leverage in trade discussions.<\/p>\n

Time will tell what the Athletics decide to do at the deadline. They are 8.5 games back of a playoff spot, putting them into position to sell, but they don’t have many players to sell. They could still entertain offers for players like Langeliers, but moving core pieces would likely extend their rebuilding timeline. The injury to Leiter Jr. really stings for the Athletics at one of the most important times of the year.<\/p>\n

Main Image Credit:<\/strong> Dennis Lee-Imagn Images<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As the MLB Trade Deadline nears, the market is shaping up to favor selling teams. One of the franchises that appears to be out of the playoff hunt is the Athletics, which could result in them trading away several key pieces in exchange for younger talent. Recently, there has been some buzz surrounding Shea Langeliers, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5893,"featured_media":126444,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[15,2,1071,35],"tags":[28814,29519,2619],"class_list":["post-126424","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-athletics","category-featured","category-mlb","category-news","tag-athletics","tag-injury-update","tag-mark-leiter-jr"],"modified_by":"Matthew Nethercott, Site Editor","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/126424","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5893"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=126424"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/126424\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":126445,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/126424\/revisions\/126445"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/126444"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=126424"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=126424"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=126424"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}