MANKATO — Baseball’s annual midsummer hype-and-rumor orgy misknown as the trading deadline has now passed.

Let the waiver wire machinations — the kind of deals that last August brought Carl Pavano and Orlando Hudson to the Twins after the trading deadline — begin.

And in the meantime, let us review the divisional landscape, bottom to top.

Cleveland: The Indians moved out Kerry Wood, Austin Kearns, Jake Westbrook and Jhonny Peralta, the latter to a division rival. It appears that the major return for the Tribe in most of these moves is financial. The prospects gained are not particularly well-regarded.

Moving Wood out does have a side benefit: Chris Perez gets to remain the closer.

Kansas City: Gone are Rick Ankiel, Kyle Farnsworth, Scott Podsednik and Alberto Callaspo. The only one who ever made any sense on the Royals roster was Callaspo.

They did get a usable reserve outfielder in Gregor Blanco (a pretty good match for Podsednik, but younger and cheaper) and an intriguing young pitcher in Tim Collins, a hard-throwing lefty whose major drawback is that he’s about a foot and a half shorter than Jon Rauch.

Detroit: Peralta plugs one of the holes opened by the Tigers’ wave of injuries, and he did homer twice in his first game.

But the Tigers continue to slide anyway. They entered Sunday one game above .500 and six games behind the White Sox (5.5 behind the Twins).

They aren’t sellers. Yet. I’m not convinced they should be buyers either.

Minnesota: The acquisition of Matt Capps was greeted by speculation/demands in these parts for something more.

That didn’t seem too likely, as Wilson Ramos was supposedly their best trading chip — and he wasn’t regarded highly enough elsewhere to bring in a stud starter. (No-trade clauses for Roy Oswalt and Dan Haren may have had something to do with that also.)

In a nutshell: The bullpen is deeper, I expected more from trading Ramos and those expectations may have been overblown. For details, see my blog.

Chicago: The White Sox wanted a hitter. They got a starting pitcher — and maybe a front office grudge against another organization.

Kenny Willlams had a deal for Lance Berkman, but he exercised his no-trade rights (and went to the Yankees instead). He made a low-ball bid for Manny Ramirez and was turned down.

And then there’s the Adam Dunn fiasco.

Here’s how it supposedly went: Williams offered a package featuring pitching prospect Daniel Hudson for Dunn. Mike Rizzo, Williams’ counterpart in Washington, wasn’t interested in Hudson but indicated interest in Edwin Jackson.

Williams traded Hudson and another prospect for Jackson — only to have Rizzo turn Jackson down as well.

This may not be a total disaster for the Sox. Jackson is an intriguing arm, and the White Sox have a pitching coach, Don Cooper, who might be able to carve a pitcher out of the talent.

But they still lack the bopper Williams sought.

Of course, there’s still waivers. The moves aren’t done yet.



Edward Thoma is a Free Press staff writer. He is at 344-6377 or at ethoma@mankatofreepress.com. He also has a baseball blog at www.mankatofreepress.com.