ST. LOUIS -- Starling Marte seems to think he'll be available at Major League Baseball's trade deadline, at least judging by the number of separate occasions on which he mentioned that -- three -- through the Pirates' three-game set with the Cardinals this week at Busch Stadium.
That means next to nothing, of course. It's not as if Neal Huntington's consulting him on the matter. And for what it's worth, other than one whisper about the Phillies being interested, I haven't heard anything additional on that front, either.
This, on the other hand, does matter: This team values this player.