As good of a trade deadline as Jon Daniels had, he was overshadowed this year by Kansas City Royals general manager Dayton Moore, who was honored as the game’s Best Executive last night at the Winter Meetings in Nashville.

The Best Executive award is a combination of balloting by fans, the media, front-office personnel, former players, and member of the Society for American Baseball Research.

Moore turned around baseball in Kansas City, won a World Series on the strength of some shrewd drafting and trading. He rebuilt the franchise from the ground up, and turned it into a model organization on a budget.

In other Jon Daniels-not-winning-executive-of-the-year-award news, according to T. R. Sullivan of MLB.com, “The Rangers, limited financially to what they can do on the free-agent market, are being thwarted in their attempt to trade for starting pitching.”

It seems Daniels is actively trying but has yet to be successful in getting Jose Fernandez from the Marlins, Shelby Miller from the Braves (before the Diamondbacks successfully landed him), Drew Smyly from the Rays, or Trevor Bauer, Carlos Carrasco or Danny Salazar from the Indiana.

The Rangers aren’t interested in depleting the farm system much further after the Cole Hamels/Sam Dyson on July 31.

So, if they aren’t willing to spend the money and aren’t willing to trade prospects, it seems highly unlikely that the Rangers will do much of anything. Expect them to come back home with a haul similar to what they brought back last year: Ross Detwiler, Delino DeShields, and Scott Barnes.

Scraps. And with two of those players you can remove both letter Ss from that word.

Late breaking news: According to reports from last night, the Rangers appear intrigued by Cliff Lee. See above paragraph.