Winter meetings

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In Major League Baseball, the Winter Meetings are an annual event, held each December, in which the general managers from each team meet for three and a half days during the off-season. This is a time when many off-season trades and transactions are completed. The Rule 5 draft, where players (generally younger and not too experienced) who are not on a team's 40 man roster can be drafted by another team, is held on the shortened last day of the meetings. The meetings are one of the favorite events for people who participate in the so-called Hot Stove league.

An example of a highly active winter meetings came in 1988 when the Texas Rangers, with their general manager Tom Grieve, used the winter meetings to trade Pete O'Brien and Oddibe McDowell to the Cleveland Indians for Julio Franco. They additionally traded Mitch Williams, Curtis Wilkerson, and Paul Kilgus to the Chicago Cubs for Rafael Palmeiro, Drew Hall, and Steve Wilson during the same winter meetings.

The 2007 winter meetings were held in Nashville, Tennessee. The biggest blockbuster trade during the meetings involved the Detroit Tigers receiving starting left-handed pitcher Dontrelle Willis and third baseman Miguel Cabrera from the Florida Marlins in exchange for prospects Andrew Miller, Cameron Maybin, Mike Rabelo, Eulogio De La Cruz, Dallas Trahern and Burke Badenhop. There was also much discussion about the Minnesota Twins possibly trading ace pitcher Johan Santana, who was eventually traded to the New York Mets for prospects Carlos Gómez, Deolis Guerra, Kevin Mulvey and Philip Humber^[1] and a possible trade of Baltimore Orioles ace Erik Bedard who would later be traded to the Seattle Mariners. The 2008 edition will be held in Las Vegas, Nevada.