MLB free agency: Latest on Dylan Cease trade rumors, fits - ESPN

From the first day of the offseason, right-handed starter Dylan Cease has been among baseball's most talked-about trade candidates. Executives around the league expected the Chicago White Sox ace would be on the move, after new Chicago general manager Chris Getz was clear about his intentions to make significant changes to the 102-loss team he inherited.

But it's Jan. 10 and Cease is still in Chicago.

Plenty of other starting pitchers around baseball — including Tyler Glasnow, Robbie Ray and Chris Sale — have been traded, and the looming end of Shota Imanaga's free agency could ignite another round of dominoes. So are the White Sox still waiting for the perfect time to deal the best trade candidate remaining — or will the 2022 AL Cy Young runner-up stay put?

«It's ever-evolving in terms of the urgency of other clubs,» Getz said in a Tuesday videoconference with reporters. «It could be in the offseason, it could at the deadline, it could be in May. There's just so many different factors when you're talking about 29 other clubs.

»In the case of Dylan, I don't think there's a club out there that hasn't expressed some level of interest in him. All their situations are different."

Getz spoke in generalities but never intimated the option of keeping him in Chicago long term was on the table. It's one reason why suitors are lining up, according to league sources.

Cease's trade value is far greater than a quick look at his 4.58 ERA in 2023 might suggest. At 28 years old, he's just a year removed from a dominant 2022 season in which he posted a 2.20 ERA while striking out 227 batters in 184 innings. While 2023 didn't go nearly as well for him, he still whiffed 214 hitters while throwing 177 innings thanks to a slider that ranks