Jake Peavy has the power to block the Padres' efforts to trade him with the no-trade clause in his contract. For now, he is playing along, and has presented San Diego some guidelines. He'd prefer a National League team to an American League team, because the man likes to hit and run the bases. He'd prefer to play for the Houston Astros, or the Atlanta Braves, or the Dodgers or the Cubs or the St. Louis Cardinals. He'll listen if the Padres have other ideas, such as dealing him to the Yankees.
But in the end, there will be a price for his agreement, as his agent indicated Monday evening.
Barry Axelrod, the agent, was asked the question about whether Peavy will require some concessions to agree to a proposed trade. "Yup," he responded. "If Jake gets traded, then his 10-5 rights will disappear somewhere along the way. If he gets traded, we'll certainly require that he'll get a no-trade provision [with his next team]."
When a player's been in the big leagues 10 years, and five years with the same team, he has the right to veto a deal. If he were to stay with the Padres, he'd get those rights sometime in 2012. If he were traded to Atlanta, for example, it would take him another five years to build up the no-trade equity -- and under the terms of his current deal with the Padres, his ability to block trades will begin to slowly disappear in the years ahead -- he can block trades to 14 teams in 2011, and eight teams at the outset of 2012.
There may be other considerations, as well, Axelrod said, without elaborating. But Peavy certainly would have the leverage to extract more guaranteed money from his next team. Players in a similar situation as he is in have asked that a contractual option be exercised in return for waiving a no-trade clause, and Peavy has a $22 million option for 2013, with a $4 million buyout; he could just ask for more money in the buyout.