That was an amazing trade deadline, wasn’t it?

The major league trading deadline was Thursday, 4 PM EST, and the flurry of trades was pretty amazing. Jon Lester, David Price, Asdrubal Cabrera, Yoenis Cespedes, John Lackey…. it was an exciting day.

Erik and his epic collision with Chipper Jones
Erik and his epic collision with Chipper Jones

Did you know that two former Valley Leaguers were also traded before the deadline? Both Erik Kratz (Waynesboro 2000, Harrisonburg 2001) and Stephen Kohlscheen (Harrisonburg 2010) found themselves with new organizations when the dust had settled.

First of all, Kratz, a long-time friend of this blog, was trade from the Toronto Blue Jays to the Kansas City Royals as part of the deal that sent Danny Valencia north. Erik has played in 34 games in the majors this year, and he’s hitting 198/226/346. In triple-A, he was hitting 299/354/517 in 87 at-bats. The Royals have placed Erik on their major league roster, where he will be the primary backup for Salvador Perez.

Secondly, the Seattle Mariners traded 6-foot-6 righty reliever Kohlscheen to the San Diego Padres as part of a package that brought Chris Denorfia to the Pacific Northwest. Stephen, a 45th round draft pick in 2010, has been performing well in the minors, and had reached triple-A Tacoma just a few weeks ago. His combined stats for double-A and triple-A look like this: 3-1, 2.70, 6 saves, 53 hits, 10 walks, and 55 strikeouts in 56 2/3 innings pitched. I saw at least one report that said Kohlscheen has a strong chance to be a major league reliever.