Yankeetorial: What was that "trading deadline" anyway?

It's hard to imagine the great Yankee-Redsock rivalry without Nick Punto.

Last game against Boston, Nick at 3B kept knocking balls down, picking them up and tossing our guys out at first - by a bare instant. He was mocking us, deriding us, mooning us. He needs to pay. Now, poof, he's gone. After all the memories, he's a Dodger, and we won't receive our birthright as Yankee fans: Pure unadulterated vengeance.

But I'm wondering about the waiver deal that sent Punto and the Three Stooges to LA. Last month, MLB hyped up something called the "trading deadline" with the ridiculous assumption that teams had to cut deals before it ended. What a joke. Remember the MLB gabfests - for menstral cramp passions, "The View" has nothing on them - breathlessly covering the final ticking moments, as if it mattered?

Now, I'm not sure I understand the rules of waiver deals. They're like the tax code. Way I see it, any team can put a waiver claim on a player, and they go in reverse order of records. So if the Dodgers claimed all four, the Yankees never got a crack at these guys. Still, players often clear waivers and can be traded to anybody. The Yankees let them go.

I sure hope LA grabbed them before we did, because I cannot understand why we'd let Boston refinance so easily. And if LA claimed all four... how could Pittsburgh, the Angels, Detroit, et al, pass on each of them? Adrian Gonzalez wouldn't help the Pirates? Josh Beckett wouldn't be reborn as an Angel? Is nobody else out there even trying to win the pennant?

I'm not sure Boston scored a great deal. These days, young arms aren't what they used to be. But next July, when the ESPN sweatbox starts chattering about the trade deadline, flick its Bic. There's nothing there. Twenty teams punted on Nick Punto. What a joke.