With all the MLB Trade Deadline rumors swirling about, one that has caught many off-guard circulates around Trevor Story and the Colorado Rockies.

The Rockies sent their rebuilding plan into motion when they traded Nolan Arenado to the Cardinals before the year started. Now, with Story set to be a free agent at the end of the year and Colorado nowhere close to contention, it seemed to be common sense that they would part ways via a trade. According to Jeff Passan of ESPN, the Rockies may take a different route.

(Trevor) Story isn't in the same category as Turner, Berrios, Buxton or Ramirez. His free agency is nigh and thus his outcome binary. If the Rockies trade him, they'll get prospects. If they don't, Story will reject a qualifying offer and the Rockies will get a compensatory draft pick after the first round — whom they need to pay a couple million dollars to sign.

It's confusing to executives, then, that even among those who have been in touch with the Rockies, there's a sense Story doesn't move.

So it's pretty clear what the Rockies are trying to balance at this moment. If they trade Story, they will get an array of prospects in return in what should be a solid haul. If they hang onto him, they'll make a qualifying offer in the offseason which he will likely decline to head elsewhere. In that case, Colorado would get a compensatory pick.

It still seems like trading him and getting multiple prospects in return would be greater than one pick but who knows, maybe the Rockies view this differently.