Will Dodgers steal $56 million Cy Young winner at trade deadline due to struggles?

Starting pitching injuries are once again playing a role in the Los Angeles Dodgers' season.

It's still only April, but the Dodgers currently don't know when Blake Snell and Tyler Glasnow will be available again. Meanwhile, Shohei Ohtani still isn't close to returning to the mound, and there's no telling how long Clayton Kershaw's eventual return might last.

The Dodgers are always active at the trade deadline, and unless everyone gets healthy between now and then, they may very well go after starting pitching again--as they did when they landed Jack Flaherty from the Detroit Tigers last July.

This time around, the Dodgers, like many teams, could be after the Miami Marlins' Sandy Alcantara. And because the former Cy Young winner is off to a slow start this season, one baseball writer believes the Dodgers may stand a better chance to get a bargain.

On Sunday, Katrina Stebbins of FanSided wrote that the "price is dropping" to trade for Alcantara thanks to his 6.56 ERA through five starts, potentially opening the door for the Dodgers to make a splash.

"Alcantara still wouldn't be a terribly easy get — he'll continue to be regarded as a top arm, and the Marlins would cite his Cy Young in order to get his price as high as it can possibly go," Stebbins wrote.

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"But if he has a 6.00+ ERA by the trade deadline, it's going to be really hard for the Marlins to ask for much... It'd be incredibly characteristic for (the Dodgers) to trade for a struggling but formerly great starter and get him right back to winning form. That could be Alcantara."

One has to imagine that if Alcantara did still have an ERA that high, the Dodgers either wouldn't be all that interested, or the Marlins would wait until the offseason or next trade deadline to make a deal, since he's under team control through 2027 including a club option. 

But it's certainly conceivable that the righty could find his best form on a new team as opposed to the rebuilding Marlins, and there's no better team to play for these days than the reigning World Series champions.

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