As many have so aptly described in the comments section of a previous post, placing a player on waivers at this time of year (say, Gary Sheffield, according to an ESPN.com report) is a procedural move that teams do with several players. It allows teams to see if there’s any interest in players, and to see whether a trade is feasible. It does NOT mean that a player is about to get claimed on waivers, though they have 48 hours to do so once a player goes on there. In Sheffield’s case, a claim is not going to happen, not with Sheffield under contract for $14 million next year. The truer test would be if any team would want to trade for Sheffield, a .219 hitter whose average has barely budged since coming off the disabled list. That’s also unlikely, given that — again — he’s under contract for next year.