This week, front offices across Major League Baseball are facing a series of difficult decisions. The 2026 Trade Deadline is set for Monday, August 3, at 6 p.m. ET, and by the time that clock strikes six, every roster moves a contending team wanted to make either happened or it didn't. Business transactions run on the same brutal physics. In many cases, transactions don't die because the underlying business was bad. They die because timing killed them — and more specifically, because the team wasn't built, or wasn't complete, by the "trade deadline".

In 2007, after 17 years at Ford Motors, I handed in my resignation. My parents thought I’d lost my mind.  “Are you crazy? Do you even know what you're doing?" To be honest, not entirely. But I knew one thing: I wanted to own a business. I purchased several businesses and enjoyed the process so much I eventually started my own M&A firm. I was excited to finally control my own destiny.

Every seller wants a hot deal.  That was the situation I walked into with a medical billing business based in central Pennsylvania — a well-run, profitable business built over two decades serving physician practices and small health systems across the region. When we quietly took it to market, I expected strong interest. Medical billing sits at a sweet spot for buyers: recurring, contractual revenue; sticky client relationships; a fragmented, roll-up-friendly industry; and a service that becomes more essential, not less, as payer rules and coding requirements grow more complex. What I received was interest on a scale I do not see often, even in a hot sector.