Bleacher Report’s Zachary Rymer floated one of the more interesting ideas of this year’s trade deadline season, pitching a scenario that would send Francisco Lindor back to the organization that originally drafted him. Rymer’s list of eight wild trade proposals for the Mets included a Cleveland scenario in which the Guardians would acquire Lindor and $80 million in cash relief, sending back Brayan Rocchio and MLB’s No. 34 overall prospect, Angel Genao, in return. Lindor spent the first six seasons of his career in Cleveland after being drafted eighth overall out of Montverde Academy back in 2011, developing into a five-time All-Star and two-time Gold Glove winner before a trade sent him to New York ahead of the 2021 season.
Here is Rymer’s trade proposal.
Cleveland Guardians Get: SS Francisco Lindor ($185.8M), $80M cash
New York Mets Get: SS Brayan Rocchio, SS Angel Genao (MLB No. 34)
“While a guy like Rocchio can help you through a 162-game regular season, a proper World Series pursuit deserves a better shortstop. And in this case, having the Mets pay down basically half of Lindor’s remaining contract would lower the risk to a level more in line with Cleveland’s notoriously stingy spending habits. It’s losing Genao that would really hurt, but the Guardians would be able to get over it if Lindor’s return paid off with a Fall Classic berth. And with the American League as wide-open as ever, the chances of that would be pretty good,” Rymer wrote.
Lindor himself is hitting just .233 with six home runs through 100 games with the Mets this season, a rough showing for a player still owed $185.8 million through 2031 and protected by a full no-trade clause, both factors that make this kind of deal exceedingly unlikely to actually happen before the Aug. 3 deadline. Rymer acknowledged as much, noting the Mets would need the Guardians to absorb real value beyond payroll relief alone, pointing to New York’s decision to eat a significant chunk of Justin Verlander’s contract in a 2023 trade as the closest recent precedent for a team taking on that kind of financial hit.
For Cleveland, giving up a prospect of Genao’s caliber alongside a productive everyday shortstop in Rocchio would be a steep price even for a proven star like Lindor, and the Guardians’ notoriously conservative approach to spending makes absorbing a contract of this size an unlikely path forward regardless of how much cash New York would kick in. Still, the idea of Lindor returning to Cleveland at some point, even in a much different form than the one described here, remains a storyline fans continue to circle back to given his history with the organization.
For now, this kind of proposal is better categorized as an interesting thought exercise than a realistic scenario as the deadline approaches, with Rocchio’s continued strong play making any such move even harder to justify for a Guardians front office focused on building around its current young core.
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