Baseball's big, fancy-pants trade deadline is now behind us, but that doesn't mean that teams in contention completely stop being able to address their needs. August trades do happen -- they're just trickier than the pre-August variety. Sometimes they're even pretty big ones, such as the Carl Crawford-Adrian Gonzalez blockbuster the Red Sox and the Dodgers pulled off in 2012. And the ones that aren't are sometimes fairly important; Jeff Bagwell and John Smoltz got to the Astros and Braves, respectively, through the August trade route.
Sneaking someone through waivers isn't something you see happen that often, so a lot of the trades that do occur require some kind of contract situation that would discourage teams from making claims. If the contract is bad enough without money being eaten by the trading team, the player will tend to pass through waivers fairly easily. Nobody would think to have made a claim for, say, Ryan Howard during that last contract, because the Phillies could have simply said "Fine, enjoy!" and let the new team keep him and the boondoggle deal. This has happened before, most notably when the Padres claimed Blue Jays closer Randy Myers in an attempt to keep the Braves from getting him. The Blue Jays let San Diego keep Myers and the latter team spent $13 million to get 14⅓ innings of a 6.28 ERA from Myers.
So, who out there could realistically both move and match a contender's needs?
Ian Kinsler, 2B, Detroit Tigers
Rest-of-Season ZiPS Projection: .266/.325/.418, 6 HR, 23 RBIs, 1.1 WAR