President Donald Trump likes to play the game big — big hotels, big deals and big promises of the things he wants to accomplish, both in his previous life as a real estate magnate and his current iteration as the head of state.

When it comes to trade, though, the president is in the uncomfortable position of having to play small ball, a baseball term referring to moving runners around the bases in a slow, deliberate manner instead of trying to hit the ball out of the park.

So it comes with his latest China trade endeavors, in which the president's hopes to obliterate a $375 billion trade deficit are proceeding not with grandiose game-changing home runs but with the equivalent of check-swing singles.

Trump scored a run this week with China's pledge to reduce tariffs on imported autos. But at this pace, it's going to be a long game, and even he conceded that he wants more from the talks.

"For President Trump, it's about the direction, it's about the message. He can say, 'Look, I'm making America great again,'" Neil Dwane, global strategist at Allianz, told CNBC. "But it's taken 20 years for America to get this trade deficit to this level. It's going to take them 10 or 20 years to redress it, even if they possibly can."

Indeed, the president's hopes to erase the deficit with China never had a chance of happening, and it's likely he knows that.