Braves linked to a former rival ace in a trade Alex Anthopoulos would never make

A lot can change in a year. For as frustrating of a watch as the Atlanta Braves have been at times, at least they are not the Texas Rangers... The defending World Series champions are well below .500 and are currently eight games out of the third and final AL Wild Card spot. It is why Jon Morosi of the MLB Network said that Texas might be sellers at the trade deadline. Boy, will they have some assets.

One such player Morosi listed was former Braves nemesis Max Scherzer. While he has looked like his hall-of-fame self in his first two starts this season, he is 39 years old, coming off major offseason back surgery and carries a $43.3 million salary for this season. Yes, he could be a huge boost to the Atlanta rotation, but Scherzer would be purely a rental. Therefore, the Braves must say no, thank you.

While I would be the first to admit that the Braves need to do something to bolster its roster at the deadline, I am not sure anything they will do will be good enough to get past someone like the Philadelphia Phillies in the NLDS should Atlanta even get that far. Yes, they need a starting pitcher and an outfielder in the worst way imaginable, but you don't want to completely deplete your farm system.

Here is Morosi appearing on MLB Network to discuss sellers like the Rangers and the Chicago Cubs.

There are suitable trade partners to be had for Atlanta, but the right deal will have to manifest first.

Atlanta Braves could be linked to Max Scherzer, but should pass on him

I think about other teams who acquired hall-of-fame arms at the deadline in my childhood. The two that really stand out are the Houston Astros getting Randy Johnson from the Seattle Mariners. They were fun while he was there, but didn't get it done in October. He then signed with the Arizona Diamondbacks and won a World Series championship a few years later. His number is retired there.

The other came several years later when the Milwaukee Brewers acquired C.C. Sabathia from Cleveland. While he did help the Brew Crew get to their first postseason since the 1982 Fall Classic in 2008, he signed with the damn New York Yankees that offseason. He spent the rest of his illustrious playing career in pinstripes, winning his only World Series championship a year later with New York.

Yes, Scherzer is much older than what Johnson and Sabathia were when they were traded, but I don't know if Anthopoulos is really all that down with adding a huge arm at the deadline on stricly a rental basis. Oh, he will trade for pitchers, alright, but recent history has shown us that he prefers to rent position players than starting pitchers. To give up a top-three prospect for Scherzer would be rich.

Given that he used to star with the Washington Nationals would make this move harder to stomach.