The best move the Dodgers made was getting rid of Juan Encarnacion and his .288 on-base percentage. Eliot J. Schechter/Getty Images

The Yankees cut payroll, the Red Sox unceremoniously dumped a local legend, the Mets acted as if they were in a pennant race, Billy Beane did nothing and the Marlins claimed to actually want Juan Encarnacion, but the most repeated question among all the trading deadline weirdness was this: What the heck are the Dodgers doing?

Say this for GM Paul DePodesta: He cuts his own path.

No team in the nine-year history of the wild-card era has ever made it to the World Series by turning over their team the way the Dodgers did at last Saturday's trading deadline. Rolling (20-6 in July), solidly in first place, and singing sweet songs of clubhouse chemistry, Los Angeles changed its catcher, center fielder, first baseman, rotation and bullpen with the additions of Brent Mayne, Steve Finley, Hee Seop Choi and Brad Penny and the departures of Paul Lo Duca, Dave Roberts and Guillermo Mota.

Such change is unprecedented among the past 20 pennant winners. Of those teams, only two of them acquired as many as three players who would be on their World Series roster in the week leading up to the trade deadline. The 2000 Mets added Mike Bordick, Rick White and Bubba Trammell and the 1999 Braves picked up Greg Myers, Terry Mulholland and Jose Hernandez. Not exactly jaw-dropping stuff there.

Here's the scorecard for players added July 24 through 31 since 1993:

Ten World Series champions -- 6. (Biggest additions: Rickey Henderson for the 1993 Blue Jays, Craig Counsell for the 1997 Marlins).

Ten World Series losers -- 13 (Biggest additions: Aaron Boone for the 2003 Yankees and Kenny Lofton for the 2002 Giants).

Recent history suggests you don't win a pennant at the trade deadline. The past 20 World Series teams added a total of 19 major league players in the week leading up to the trade deadline -- and no impact players since Henderson in 1993.

Maybe this comes up heads for the Dodgers. Maybe Penny is a legitimate stopper, Darren Dreifort is the new Mota and Choi is better than his past two clubs thought he was. Finley provides more offense than Lo Duca. And the Dodgers, who need to win a playoff series, not just get to one, host the NLCS opener.

Then DePodesta will have launched a whole new paradigm, copied only by those with no aversion to risk. October will decide the ultimate winners and losers of the last-minute dealing, but why wait? Here are my first impressions:

Winners

Marlins
 I'd be willing to sacrifice the 11 starts left for Penny to have Mota available for about 45 games. Otherwise, it's not a clear-cut win. I like Lo Duca, but he's 32 and prone to wear down in the second half, especially in the Florida heat. Still, he is a huge upgrade over what they were running out there behind the plate.

Cubs
 Yes, they added an iconic player without disrupting their major league roster and upgraded a black hole of a position, shortstop. Good for them. But let's remember something, kids: They are not getting the Nomar Garciaparra of 2000, when he posted an on-base plus slugging percentage of 1.033. Since then his OPS suggests he may never be that prewrist injury hitter again: .822, .880, .870, .858. He was having an awful defensive season and claimed to still need frequent down time to rest his sore Achilles. Once part of The Big Three, where does Nomar rank now among shortstops? Is he better than Michael Young, Carlos Guillen or Edgar Renteria, to say nothing of Derek Jeter and Miguel Tejada?

Red Sox
 Wait a second. The team that gets Nomar and the team that trades him are both winners? I told you this trade stuff was weird. Boston needed to get something for a guy who had mentally checked out of Boston, who could not play every day, who had become a defensive liability and who was gone at the end of the season. Yes, they gave up some offense, but the infield defense is much tighter now, and the trade was exactly the kind of bold move this lethargic team needed.

	MAILBAG Tom Verducci will answer select questions from SI.com users in his Baseball Mailbag. Your name: Your e-mail address: Your home town: Enter your question:

Mets
 The first thought must be, What parallel universe are they living in? But the Mets added two youngish starters with stuff to a staff that was too old and pitched too much to contact. Now, they'd better re-sign Kris Benson. The thought of watching Al (Pitch Count) Leiter, Steve (Four Corners) Trachsel and Victor (Ball One) Zambrano make 60 percent of your starts should boost coffee sales at the concession stands. Ty Wigginton was a spare part, few people expect Matt Peterson to head a rotation and Scott Kazmir is a 5-foot-11 left-hander with power stuff -- a mold that is virtually non-existent when it comes to ace starters. (After Ron Guidry a quarter of a century ago, where do you go next?)

Braves
 Under the radar, they picked up Tom Martin -- a typical Atlanta move of buying low (Martin had not been nearly as effective this year as last) and then getting the most out of a pitcher (see Mike Remlinger, Jaret Wright, Juan Berenguer, Rudy Seanez, Mike Bielecki, etc.) With Martin, Juan Cruz and Chris Reitsma, GM John Schuerholz has done a nice job reworking his bullpen on the fly since the start of spring training.

Losers

Giants
 Maybe the rest of baseball is hip to the Giants. From 1997-03, San Francisco traded 17 young pitchers in the last week leading up to the trade deadline. The best of them? Keith Foulke and Nate Bump. That's it. In other words, the Giants know the right guys to keep (Jerome Williams) and the right ones to move (Jason Grilli, Damian Moss, etc.). This time they needed a pitcher, and not only did they not get one, they lost two: Felix Rodriguez, sent to Philadelphia for the useful Ricky Ledee, who might help a little in the Giants' problems against right-handed pitching, and Williams, who went down with a triceps strain. The Tigers asked for too much for Ugueth Urbina, though an August deal is not unlikely.

Dodgers
 DePodesta is either shrewd or a lousy gambler. He blew up a team that put people away with a killer bullpen. His moves seemed designed to get Randy Johnson and Charles Johnson, but he whiffed on both. Penny, a 48-42 pitcher at age 26, is the key to the deal. Good luck down the stretch with Brent Mayne and David Ross as your catchers and one of the best setup relievers in baseball, Mota, no longer available.

Yankees
 It's this simple: They didn't get Randy Johnson, although shipping Jose Contreras out of town for anyone who can still fog a mirror was a victory.

Rockies
 They're stuck with Charles Johnson and Larry Walker.

Sports Illustrated senior writer Tom Verducci covers baseball for the magazine and is a regular contributor to SI.com.