Welcome to The Opener, where every weekday morning during the regular season you’ll get a fresh, topical story to start your day from one of SI.com’s MLB writers.
The timing of Tuesday’s monumental trade of Juan Soto to the Padres was, to the neutral baseball observer, both a blessing and a curse. The deal went down (at least in principle, try as Eric Hosmer might to delay it) early enough that we weren’t forced to wait on pins and needles all day in anticipation of a resolution. But having the most consequential trade of the day (and perhaps ever?) occur before most of the other transactions were revealed cast a long shadow over the rest of the happenings from what was a wildly eventful day of wheeling and dealing.
In case you might have overlooked any of the notable non-Soto trades, fear not: We have you covered. Here’s a look at the five most interesting under-the-radar moves from this year’s deadline.
