Ozuna, Yelich could go, too

THE MARLINS have completed two trades that were, at their core, salary dumps by sending Dee Gordon to the Mariners and Giancarlo Stanton to the Yankees. They would like to clear out some more salary by moving Martin Prado, Junichi Tazawa and Brad Ziegler, in particular.

But their main focus now is marketing Marcell Ozuna, a terrific outfielder who should fetch a strong return. The complication is that just about any team interested in Ozuna would want Christian Y eli ch more, and regardless of what the Marlins say publicly about potentially keeping Yelich, outside clubs believe Miami is in anyone-who-makes-any-money-must-go-mode and that both will be traded.

Ozuna, who turned 27 last month, just had his best season with 37 homers, a .924 OPS and a Gold Glove. But he is two years from free agency, will conservatively cost $27 million without injury or a severe dip over the next two seasons and has Scott Boras as a rep, meaning he most likely will test the market following the 2019 season. Still, teams are very interested, perhaps led by the Cardinals, who failed in their full-court press to get Stanton.

Th e problem for the Marlins is that the Cardinals and many other clubs would want to push for Yelich first.

Yeli ch turned 26 this month and actually pushed Ozuna out of center field. He has a team-friendly f ive years at $58. 25 million worth of control left. And the sense in the game is that Yelich, a very good player now, would blossom to perhaps superstar level if liberated from what has been a horrid situation in Miami.

Besides the Cardinals, clubs with deep systems such as the Astros, Braves, Dodgers, Padres and Phillies would have to look upon Yelich as worth a big haul.