2025 World Series odds: Which teams helped themselves with moves at trade deadline?
The 2025 deadline turned into a busy day for both teams looking for an immediate answer to the holes on their roster, as well as teams looking forward to building out their rosters for the future. The Los Angeles Dodgers, New York Mets, New York Yankees and Philadelphia Phillies emerged as the odds on favorites to win the championship after making moves on July 31 to help bolster their rosters.
The defending champion Dodgers added a couple of relief arms and an outfielder to their roster, while the Mets and Phillies added major pieces to compete with one another in a competitive NL East.
Here's a look at the updated odds for the 2025 MLB World Series champion:
REQUIRED READING: MLB playoff rankings: Top eight World Series contenders after trade deadline
2025 World Series odds
Odds via BetMGM as of Thursday, July 31.
Here's a look at the odds for the MLB teams to win the 2025 World Series. The Dodgers are still the favorites, but the Mets, Yankees and Phillies are tied for the second best odds. The Detroit Tigers round out the top five, while the Houston Astros busy day on July 31 helped their odds.
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NBC News
18 minutes ago
- NBC News
Some MLB teams make trades. This one dealt nearly half its roster
A month and a half into this season, the hottest team in Major League Baseball played in Minnesota. When the standings closed on May 17, the Twins had won 13 consecutive games to sit second in their division. It was the franchise's longest winning streak in 34 years, and the longest in all of MLB since 2022. Minnesota had one of baseball's best staff of relief pitchers and an All-Star outfielder in Byron Buxton. Suddenly, a spring training declaration by the team's top baseball executive, Derek Falvey, that reaching the World Series 'has to be the mission from Day One,' sounded more like a possibility. By this week's trade deadline, that mission had changed dramatically. No longer ascending in the standings, the Twins had moved from a buyer looking to bolster its lineup ahead of a playoff run into a seller trying to extract some value from a lost season — the kind of shift in thinking that happens to numerous teams across all professional sports. Yet the scope of the Twins sell-off Thursday, in the final hours before the deadline, was anything but typical. Many teams out of playoff contention sell off key parts; the Twins, however, took it to an extreme. Over nine trades, they dealt away 11 players from a 26-man roster. When Falvey sent a signed message to fans late Thursday, he wrote that 'this wasn't about patchwork or small adjustments." That was an understatement. 'We had been hovering around or under .500 for a period of time and just couldn't quite get things going in the right direction, and we've got to find a new way to do it,' Falvey told reporters. Falvey framed the roster reset as a baseball decision for the future of a team that had gone from six games above .500 on May 17 to six games under. But along with bringing back a collection of prospects, the trade also accomplished slashing its payroll, and making it less expensive to operate. The trade of the highest-paid Twin, shortstop Carlos Correa, was effectively to ensure that another team, Houston, would foot the bill for more than $70 million of his remaining salary. The Twins have historically never been among the top-spending teams, and their decline since May had only further disincentivized adding costs to a team whose ownership has been publicly looking to get out of the baseball business since late last year, when the Pohlad family — which has owned the franchise since 1984 — announced it was looking sell the team. 'The sale process continues to be an ongoing reality for our organization and something that we will work through at the right time,' Falvey said. The intention to sale was announced at a time when labor peace between players and the league, and the attractiveness of owning a franchise in a smaller market, have come under question. Six teams last season had a payroll of $102 million or less, according to Spotrac, less than the amount the Los Angeles Dodgers reportedly paid in taxes alone. The average MLB team valuation at the season's start was $2.62 billion, per CNBC. Minnesota's $1.6 billion valuation ranked 22nd out of 30 teams. The few remaining holdovers include pitcher Joe Ryan and Buxton, who only two weeks earlier had noted the security provided by his no-trade clause. "I'm a Minnesota Twin for the rest of my life," Buxton said at the All-Star game. "So, that's the best feeling in the world." The Twins woke up to a different feeling Friday. To fill out their roster for their first game after the deadline, the Twins were forced to call up eight players from the minor leagues. Gone are five relievers from a bullpen that had shined during the team's winning streak, including top closer Jhoan Duran. Players on longer contracts, such as Correa, and others expiring at the end of the season were dealt with equal measure. On Reddit, one user noted that the roster upheaval had turned the Twins' official Instagram account into a series of graphics announcing either a 'trade alert' or a 'thank you' to a departed player. The extreme teardown took place less than two years after Minnesota won its division and made the postseason for the first time in three years. 'I had some conversations with the front office in Minnesota and we were not moving in the direction that I thought we were after [making] the playoffs [in 2023], and they agreed with me that it was time to move me,' Correa told And 10 others, too.
New York Times
18 minutes ago
- New York Times
Kirby Yates hits the IL with back injury as Dodgers' bullpen depth tested again
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Yahoo
21 minutes ago
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Dombrowski: Phillies got what they needed in trades for Jhoan Duran, Harrison Bader
The Phillies talked to everybody. Likewise, anybody the Phillies have, including their top and perhaps untouchable prospects, earned inquiries from opposing teams. 'Basically, I can't tell you there was any club over the last time period that we did not speak to,' Phillies president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski said after the MLB trade deadline had passed the evening of July 31. 'There was no stone unturned.' Underneath they found what all agreed were their greatest needs — a relief pitcher and a right-handed outfield bat. Jhoan Duran, who'll likely settle into a closer role, and versatile outfielder Harrison Bader both came from the Minnesota Twins and will be in uniform when the Phillies open a three-game series against the Detroit Tigers on Aug. 1 at Citizens Bank Park. DURAN JOINS BULLPEN: Phillies acquire Twins closer ahead of MLB trade deadline How their additions alter the 26-man roster will be revealed sometime before that game. In the trade deadline's final stages, the Phillies then added to their pitching depth by acquiring right-hander Matt Manning from the Detroit Tigers for 18-year-old outfielder Josueth Quiñonez. Though he made 50 starts for Detroit the past four years, Manning had been at Triple-A Toledo this year and will report to low-Class A Clearwater. Duran did cost the Phillies two of their top prospects. But they held onto the top three — pitcher Andrew Painter and outfielder Justin Crawford at Triple-A Lehigh Valley and Double-A Reading shortstop Aidan Miller. 'We had a lot of conversations still today,' Dombrowski said. 'We could have made other trades, like anybody could make more. We're very comfortable. We've added where we think we needed to add.' Dombrowski added that the Phillies "weren't enticed to trade the big names, although some of the top prospects people still asked about." Painter, he said, "has the potential to be a No. 1-, No. 2-type starter for a long, long time for us." The Phils did deal two of their better prospects — pitcher Mick Abel, now at Triple-A Lehigh Valley, and High-A Jersey Shore catcher Eduardo Tait — to the Twins in the Duran deal. OUTFIELD HELP COMING: Phillies trade for Twins Harrison Bader Duran is a hard-throwing 6-foot-3, 230-pound right-hander from the Dominican Republic. He is 27 with two years of team contract control beyond this season. He is 6-4 with a 2.01 ERA and 16 saves in 49 games this year. Duran is 17-23 with a 2.47 ERA and 74 saves in 223 games over four years, all with Minnesota. His velocity has been down a tick this year, however, and his 9.7 strikeouts per nine innings are a career low. But his addition allows the Phillies' most reliable relievers Orion Kerkering and Matt Strahm to be set-up men. Jose Alvarado will also return to the bullpen soon from his 80-day PED suspension but cannot pitch in the postseason. To get Bader the Phillies parted with Double-A Reading outfielder Hendry Mendez, who had been the organization's 12th-rated prospect according to and 16-year-old Venezuelan pitcher Geremy Villoria, who plays for a Phillies team in the Dominican Summer League. The right-handed-hitting Bader, 31, is batting .258 with 12 homers, 38 RBI and a .778 OPS with nearly identical figures against both left-handed (.774) and right-handed (.779) pitchers this year. It's been his most productive season offensively since 2021. He also has a career .809 OPS and five home runs in the postseason. DEADLINE DAY: Phillies, others makes big moves Bader won a Gold Glove with the St. Louis Cardinals in 2021 and can play all three outfield positions quite adeptly with center field likely his best spot. He is on a one-year contract that includes a mutual option for 2026, meaning he'll likely become a free agent. 'He's gonna play a lot,' Dombrowski said. 'The lineup will be Topper's (manager Rob Thomson's) decision, of course. We're happy to get him. He's played well this year offensively and defensively. He's hitting the ball with some pop. We think he's going to help us.' Contact Kevin Tresolini at ktresolini@ and follow on Twitter @kevintresolini. Support local journalism by subscribing to and our DE Game Day newsletter. This article originally appeared on Delaware News Journal: Phillies trade deadline: Dombrowski talks Jhoan Duran, Harrison Bader
