Many teams looking, but few find players available

NEW YORK -- John Schuerholz knows how to read a market.

"There are more of us trying to elbow each other out of the way to get what we want," the Atlanta Braves general manager said this week. "You're shopping at the same store and looking in the same window a lot of times. There's not a lot of what everybody's looking for."

As the 4 p.m. Sunday deadline approaches to make trades without passing players through waivers, the buyers were waiting for the sellers' asking prices to come down.

One trade was completed Friday when Colorado sent outfielder Eric Byrnes to Baltimore for outfielder Larry Bigbie.

Pitchers A.J. Burnett and Sidney Ponson were among those who could move. Boston said it will investigate dealing unhappy outfielder Manny Ramirez, although the World Series champions doubted there would be much interest, not with $64 million and change owed to him through 2008, the final guaranteed year of his contract.

Second baseman Alfonso Soriano, first basemen Phil Nevin and Kevin Millar, third baseman Mike Lowell, outfielders Mike Cameron and Randy Winn, and relievers Danys Baez and Jose Mesa are among the players linked to trade talk.

"I'm sure it's going to go on 'til the last day," Burnett said after leading Florida over San Francisco last weekend. "I was ready for that to get over the second day I heard about it. Hopefully, I will stick around and see this team win."

Heading into the weekend of the trade deadline, about 20 of the 30 teams still had somewhat of a chance of reaching the playoffs.