We’re thumb-twiddling as we wait for tonight’s arbitration deadline. Top-tier or “type-A” free agents who don’t get offers of arbitration from their old teams can sign with new ones without the old team getting draft pick compensation.

But you knew that. You also know that after the deadline, we might see a flurry of deals, a break in the logjam, if you like. Only two free agents have signed so far, one of them being Jeremy Affeldt with the Giants. Perhaps the Giants have a contract ready to go for Edgar Renteria, just waiting for the Tigers to decline making an arb offer.

[3 PM UPDATE: Detroit made it official: no arb for Edgar. Baggs of the Merc says the Giants, wary of Furcal’s health, and Renteria “appear to be gravitating toward each other.” Very space-age.]

My guess, though, is the deadline’s passing won’t trigger a bunch of significant deals. Not giving up draft picks is a nice bonus — Brian Sabean actually said it would be a consideration in his free-agent shopping this year — but other factors are gumming up the market and will for a while. CC Sabathia must set the pitchers’ market, sluggers like Adam Dunn and Pat Burrell have to wait for Mark Teixeira to price out, and Rafael Furcal will be a bellwether for middle infielders. The never-ending Jake Peavy drama is also holding up deals, no doubt. Add to the mix the devolving economy, which is probably scrambling budgets and making it harder to settle on prices.

It seems silly to quibble over a few million bucks in professional sports these days, but no one knows how thick the oncoming shitstorm will be. The Giants just announced a cut or freeze in every season ticket price except the best box seats, which are going up $2 per ticket. Even if they get everyone back on the bus, I assume revenues from tickets will be down. And we’re in one of the better markets; imagine how many season ticket holders will take a pass in Detroit, with its auto-driven economy, or Texas, with oil prices in free fall, or New York, which has lost tens of thousands of financial jobs. (Although the new Gotham stadia might be enough of a lure to pry open wallets aplenty. It’s an interesting case study to watch, for sure.) 

Trades are affected, too. Why take on Jake Peavy’s $52 M guaranteed salary and surrender a wealth of talent if you can buy a perfectly suitable Derek Lowe for…well, who knows? $35 M over three years? You won’t get a Cy Young winner, but you’ll get a guy likely to give you something like 75% of Peavy’s worth, and you’ll keep your prospects and draft picks. But is Lowe available for $35 M? $40 M? $50 M?

Remember, one reason for the banking system implosion is not that the so-called “toxic debt” from mortgages has zero value. It’s that no one can agree on the value. Same goes for these nasty unregulated (or should I say deregulated?) credit default swaps. When buyers and sellers don’t have enough information to settle on a price, markets freeze. Granted, Sabathia and Teixeira are not toxic assets. They’ll get theirs. But A.J. Burnett? Ben Sheets? Pat Burrell? I’m not sure benchmarks of previous years will apply this time around.