Joel Shirman of the New York Post wrote today that
"An executive familiar with Tampa's thinking said if the offers for Santana grow to a substantial level, then the Rays would test to see what they could get for Scott Kazmir. The thinking is that because Kazmir is three years from free agency as opposed to one year for Santana, he might bring nearly as much in return."
If that turns out to be true there will be PLENTY of teams lining up to try and land the young pitcher. In my mind Kazmir would command even more than Santana on the trade market. Not because of talent or abilities, rather simply for the fact that Santana is a free agent next year. Any team that might consider putting a package together to pry Santana away from the Twins is going to do so knowing full well that they will have to pay the man a boat load of cash to keep him past this year. I haven't seen a team yet that really enjoys giving away prospects and players for rentals so in my mind Kazmir would be the MUCH safer bet. Teams interested would likely include the Mets (which Shirman points out would be more than a bit ironic) and just about every other team that needs pitching (read as: all of them).
That being said, I'm not sure why Tampa would even consider a trade involving their ace. If they want to be competitive at all, or gain any kind of respectability in this league they are going to have to win at some point. They are already stocked with a lot of young talent and if they trade away their best pitcher 3 years before he can hit the open market, I don't think their fans would appreciate it. The Oakland A's have perfected the craft of developing and then trading away talent but at least they wait til the players' walk years to make the trade.
Either way, it makes for a very interesting rumor. I told you these GM meetings would be fun. 
