Byron Buxton keeps saying he’s staying put, and the trade chatter still won’t die.
The Minnesota Twins outfielder has made his position plain: he does not want to waive his no-trade clause. Even so, his name keeps surfacing as the deadline approaches, with ESPN’s Jeff Passan once again placing Buxton near the top of his revised list of the 100 most likely players to be moved. In that ranking, Buxton came in second behind Detroit Tigers ace Tarik Skubal.
Passan noted that “some of the players listed are unlikely to be dealt but at least are being discussed in potential deals,” but his explanation for Buxton suggests the message from the player is still being brushed aside.
“Buxton told reporters ‘I’m a Twin’ on June 18 and Twins general manager Jeremy Zoll followed up by saying ‘it’s not something we’re exploring. It’s not something we plan to explore,’” Passan wrote. “So, while we’ve dropped the odds from unlikely (30%) to extremely unlikely (10%), removing Buxton from the board altogether discounts the possibility of a team blowing away Minnesota with an offer that’s too good to refuse.”
That kind of speculation has followed Buxton for a while now, but it runs into the same wall every time: he has a no-trade clause in the contract that runs through the 2028 season, and he also has 10-and-5 rights, giving him the ability to veto a deal. That doesn’t make a trade impossible, but it makes his own words matter a lot more than the rumor mill seems willing to admit.
This isn’t the first time Buxton has shut the door. Ahead of last year’s All-Star Game, while in his home state of Georgia, he said, “I’m a Minnesota Twin for the rest of my life,” and made it clear he wasn’t interested in waiving the clause for the Atlanta Braves or anyone else. A few weeks later, when the Twins sold at the deadline, he stood by that stance.
“Where I come from, your word means everything,” Buxton said via Dan Hayes of The Athletic. “My track record of how I’m still here and how I got here is different.
You’ve gotta have a lot of people behind you. Not just the family, but everybody.
Minnesota, they did that. That’s home.”
The rumors picked up again after Passan reported Buxton might be open to waiving his no-trade clause if the Twins moved Joe Ryan and Pablo López last winter. Buxton also voiced frustration in Spring Training over the front office’s communication. Still, when his name showed up on Passan’s original list, Buxton repeated that he was a Twin and answered “I don’t give a f***” when asked about the latest speculation.
Zoll has already said the Twins are not planning to trade Buxton at the deadline, and that lines up with Minnesota still hanging around the playoff picture, even in a weak American League.
Passan isn’t the only one chasing the possibility. Carlos Correa also said he would not waive his no-trade clause before last year’s deadline, then changed course when the Twins launched a full sell-off. Correa also tried to leave Minnesota twice as a free agent after the 2022 season, but both long-term deals fell apart over health concerns.
If the Twins go into another fire sale, that could change the conversation again. But Buxton has been saying something different all along, and unlike the rest of the noise around him, that part has been consistent.
For Twins fans, the speculation is wearing thin. Buxton has made his position clear, and until that changes, the idea of him being moved looks a lot more like wishful thinking than reality.
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