One team found a gem amid trade deadline scramble

Milton Bradley has sparked the Padres with his bat while staying out of trouble. AP

Also in this column:
• Where the Astros went wrong
• White Sox want to keep Ozzie
• It's comeback week for pitchers
• More news and notes

This summer's trade deadline was predicted to be something of a dud. The reality is, it turned out to be far less than that.

So far, only one player or pitcher acquired at the July 31 deadline is making a tremendous impact on the pennant race. And it's not any of the players anyone thought it would be.

It's definitely not Eric Gagne, who has a neat-but-poor 9.00 ERA for Boston. Mark Teixeira has done everything asked of him in Atlanta, but unfortunately for the Braves, he can't pitch (or for that matter, bat in Andruw Jones' place). And as we all know by now, a lot of name players who appeared to be on the block stayed put, from Jermaine Dye to Mark Buehrle to Jose Contreras to Sammy Sosa.

The Braves' startling fall and likely exclusion from the postseason derby blunts Teixeira's considerable contributions. He has hit 10 homers and driven in 32 runs, and he even won the NL Player of the Month award for August. But Atlanta's unremarkable 14-18 record since Teixeira arrived, through no fault of his own, has left the Braves on the fringe of the race.

Thanks to a number of factors -- the increasing aversion to trading top prospects, a lack of urgency on the part of prosperous clubs to dump money, a feeling on the part of all but the worst of teams that they are still in a race -- the deadline turned deadly. This was one summer where the minor-league callups -- from Joba Chamberlain to Rick Ankiel to Kyle Kendrick -- are making a much greater impression than veteran trade acquisitions.

The one truly pivotal acquisition by a playoff-bound team is -- drum roll, please -- the Padres' unheralded, and yes, mostly panned deal for the much-injured, oft-angered Milton Bradley, who 1) was dumped by Oakland as a prelude to his trade south, 2) already had been on the disabled list three times this year, 3) was swapped for the second time in his career for the very same player, unproven pitcher Andrew Brown, 4) is still being paid, in part, by the A's, and 5) has been known in past stops to be more trouble than he's worth.

The Padres' front office combines an unusual mix of scouts and stat men, and it has served them well in recent trades and pickups. Excellent scouting has enabled them to find several diamonds in the rough, especially among pitchers -- guys like Cla Meredith, Justin Germano and Kevin Cameron. But it has to be their heavy Moneyball influence that led them to Bradley, who looks good on paper. With an eye on their strict budget, the Padres employed a scattershot approach in their attempts to improve a sagging offense, and while other outcasts such as Michael Barrett, Morgan Ensberg and Shea Hillenbrand (now with the Dodgers) haven't panned out, Bradley made the strategy pay.

This time Bradley's productivity goes beyond pad and paper and right to the Padres' pennant push. The team that badly needed offense found it in abundance in Bradley, who has hit .328 with 10 home runs and 29 RBIs in 37 games. According to reports, he's also fitting in nicely in a tight clubhouse.

Another bonus is that he hasn't created the wrong kind of headline. It doesn't hurt, of course, that San Diego isn't exactly a headline kind of town; Bradley's occasional boasts and putdowns (he did needlessly deride the A's front office), along with most everything else that happens there, are received casually in this laid-back coastal community.

Beyond Bradley, trades that have had any sort of effect are few and far between. The Dodgers, who determined that they were never going to deplete perhaps baseball's best-stocked system, still improved their rotation with Padres castoff David Wells and A's waiver-wire pickup Esteban Loaiza. Both are 1-0 after Brett Tomko and Mark Hendrickson combined to go 6-18 (2-11 from the departed Tomko, and 4-7 from Hendrickson). In addition, Scott Proctor, overused in the Bronx, is 3-0 out of the pen since arriving for utilityman Wilson Betemit. Kenny Lofton, in his third tour of duty with the Indians, is doing about what's expected, batting .300 and scoring 17 runs in 34 games.

Joel Pineiro (3-2, 3.71 ERA) has enhanced a weak Cardinals rotation. Tadahito Iguchi (three homers, 11 RBIs, .315) made a decent placeholder while star Chase Utley was on the shelf. Kyle Lohse has won two games for the same Phillies. And Luis Castillo has solidified the Mets infield.

I still have a problem with Houston

MAILBAG Got a question or comment for Jon? Your name: Your e-mail address: Your home town: Enter your question:

Several e-mailers -- many from Houston -- disagreed with my defense of fired Astros GM Tim Purpura after owner Drayton McLane canned him and manager Phil Garner. One even said I should "stick to the big-market teams you know.''

I'll take that as half a compliment. But I'll still contend that Purpura had no more than half a job. And probably not even that much.

While quite a few Astros moves obviously didn't work, McLane is known by everyone in the game to have his hand in everything -- including, I might add, the very fact that he has employed six GMs and five managers in his 14 seasons.

As an example, Purpura was taken to task by many e-mailers for, among other things, failing to sign the Astros' top two draft choices this year, third-rounder Derek Dietrich (an infielder) and fourth-rounder Brett Eibner (a right-handed pitcher). But as was the case with a lot of the big calls, the inability to sign high draft choices has much more to do with the owner. In this case, McLane likely is hoping to get back into the good graces of his friend, commissioner Bud Selig, after the signing of DH-to-be Carlos Lee for $100 million. That signing followed years of complaints by McLane about alleged overblown contracts bestowed by competing owners.

It is McLane's close ties with Selig that will surely lead him to retain interim manager Cecil Cooper, a longtime Selig friend from the Brewers' glory days (so you know it's been a long time). The new GM in Houston will have to know going in that just one of many decisions he won't get to make is who'll be the next manager: That'll be Coop.

Around the Majors

• Good to see Carlos Zambrano apologize for snapping at the great Cubs fans after they booed him. I'm not going to say he apologized because I told him he was wrong for ripping the fans, but it didn't hurt, I'll put it that way.

• WMVP-AM 1000 in Chicago is reporting that Jerry Reinsdorf intends to give manager Ozzie Guillen an extension. That should be no surprise to anyone reading between the lines in Reinsdorf's recent remarks that Guillen deserves an "A'' for his performance this year.

• It's Comeback Week. Pedro Martinez did fine in Cincy. Kenny Rogers pitches tonight, then comes Mark Mulder.

• Mariners manager John McLaren got a little giddy, telling Mark Patrick and Buck Martinez on XM's Baseball This Morning that the Mariners are aiming to win the AL West, not just the wild card. Though can you blame him? They'd won one in a row at the time (after losing nine straight).

• It's good to see Alberto Gonzalez bounce back with a new job. He was called up yesterday by the Yankees. Oh, different Alberto Gonzalez? Sorry.

• Can you believe the Cardinals had to give up a player to be named later for Mike Maroth? What's fair value for a guy with an 11.08 ERA?

• Wild-card hopefuls Detroit, the Yankees and Seattle are all about equal in starting pitching -- the Tigers' and Yankees' starters have a 4.77 ERA (tied for ninth in the AL) and the Mariners are 12th at 5.11.

• In listing Seattle's Yuniesky Betancourt and Toronto's John McDonald as Gold Glove candidates for AL shortstop in Tuesday's column, I forgot another good one, the Angels' Orlando Cabrera.

• Who ever said the Mariners made a bad deal signing Ichiro -- who now has 200 hits for seven straight seasons -- for $90 million over five years is cracked. There, I said it.