Atlanta Braves Morning Chop: All you ever wanted to know about waiver trading

The Basics – Starting from August 1st

Players made eligible for trade are placed on “revocable waivers“. This is routinely done for most of the 40-man roster of most teams.

Teams may place as many as 7 active players per day on waivers, and that process begins immediately.

Normally, players on the Disabled List cannot be placed on revocable waivers. However, the Indians did so in the deal that brought Nick Swisher to Atlanta 2 years ago. This is legal if the player is eligible to come off of the DL (rehabbing in the minors, for instance), and both teams agree.

Why is this done ‘routinely’?

• The rules require waiver requests be done for individual players – not as a blanket request for the whole team.
• It provides maximum flexibility for their GMs for future considerations – we’ll get to the meaning of that later;
• It helps to gauge interest that other teams might have in a player;
• It can mask whatever a team’s true trade intentions might be;
• It doesn’t single out individual players as possible trade bait — which can get players bent out of shape (witness Andruw Jones‘ complaints from several years ago when the Braves put him on waivers – he didn’t read this tutorial!).

Teams get a report of the previous day’s waiver requests at 2pm EDT each day.  At that point, there is a 48-hour claiming period, during which any team may put in an claim on a specific player – a claim which objects to his team’s request to waive the player-movement rules for that player…that’s what it means to place a waiver claim.

To prevent every team from claiming every player out there and causing utter chaos, there is a token price ($20,000) attached to waiver claims.

[ This is why the process helps gauge the interest of others – you have to put up some funds to put in a waiver claim ]

If a team fails to make a claim, it is effectively saying: “we have no objection to you moving this player to another team”, and thus they are rendered powerless in whatever happens after that point.

Thus, if you don’t object, you give up the right to complain later.

Next: The 'Gotchas' to the Rules