Boy, the poor Mets. I have a feeling the Black Friday trades aren't going to help those numbers any

Give credit to Mike Carminati of Mike's Baseball Rants, too.

-- MWE

Well, the Mets may be the all-time chumps, but I'd still put my 1960-1975 Giants up against any team in any 15-year period for Giving Away The Store honors.

Well, the Mets may be the all-time chumps, but I'd still put my 1960-1975 Giants up against any team in any 15-year period for Giving Away The Store honors.


Yea...the Cap Peterson for Mike McCormick was a killer...:")

Well, the Mets may be the all-time chumps, but I'd still put my 1960-1975 Giants up against any team in any 15-year period for Giving Away The Store honors.

It would interesting to see the data based on GM rather than team.

I'm suprised to see the Cards in the middle of the pack. With Studes method of calculation, I thought that they would have cleaned up. THT had an article a few months ago abotu how they built up some championship teams despite a barren farm system. Jocketty has pulled some real nice trades as well. Ones that would have looked especially favorable adding WS-after trade.

Well, damnit, we may be the all-time chumps, but we'll always have this one:

December 20, 1996: Acquired John Olerud and cash from the Toronto Blue Jays for Robert Person.

What's that old saying about a blind squirrel? Oh, and the stopped clock? Either one works here. With teams less than a week from spring training, I choose to focus on the positive. We got Olerud for Person eight years ago!!! Ha!

Hey Sam, that Olerud deal is the second-best one in Met history (87 WSAB), behind the Cone deal (111 WSAB). The Mets's four worst deals were all worse than their two best.

The Mets's four worst deals were all worse than their two best.

Hey, I'll go further and suggest that the Mets's four worst deals were all worse than all their others :)

Other comments: Mike and I are thinking about breaking up the data by GM, if we can find the right data source.

Steve, this analysis is based on the years 1961-2002. The Cepeda deal was in 1960, right? So it wouldn't show up. Another tack might be to break up the timelines and show the best/worst five or ten year periods by team.

Man, the opportunities are endless!

Frank Cashen started out strong.
Keith, Kid, Hojo, Darling, Bobby O.

Then he lost it.

Not the number of Win Shares each player had at the time of the trade, but the number of Win Shares each player would go on to amass during the remainder of his career

Surely, in these post-reserve-clause times, the correct statistic to use would be "the number of Win Shares each player would go on to amass during the remainder of his contract with the team trading him away."

If I trade away six months of a superstar, who was never going to resign with us, you can't damn the trade on the basis of his next ten years as a superstar. They were never mine to trade away.

What trades did the White Sox make that put them so high up? (then looks at Mike's baseball rants: Tommy John? No wonder I forgot. Had almost all his value elsewhere.

If not for Sosa-for-Bell, they'd be #1.

Looking at the link to Mike's baseball rants:

A few hundred years ago the Yankees traded some beads to the Indians for the isle of Manhattan. They even made the Indians eat the bulk of Manhattan’s remaining contract in the deal.

I know I'm getting overly historical here, but: 1) the Yankees didn't make the trade. The Dutch did. 2) They bought the island from the wrong tribe. Tribe A lived in Brooklyn/Bronx, Tribe B lived on Manhatten. The Dutch gave Tribe A $24 for something they didn't have.

Good article overall. Take out the Mets four worst trades, and their still below average. Ouch.

Cubs didn't do as badly as I'd expect: I guess I can thank Sandberg, Jenkins, and Sosa for that.

. . . looking more at Mike's site, the Brock-Broglio trade wasn't the worst one the Cubs have made in the last 45 years. Yeesh. Of course at least the Rangers didn't get much out of Moyer either, while the Cards kept Brock until he retired.

Here's the lnik to Mike's article onThe 20 Worst Trades of the 20th Century. Cash transactions aren't included, so Ruth doesn't win, and someone pointed out in the comments that the Bagwell-Andersen trade is missing.

Outstanding work, guys. A stopgap for the GM survey could be graphs of teams TSAR (Trade Shares Above Replacement) over time, maybe using rolling 5-year averages.

Cepeda trade was in 1966 so it is covered.
Cards in early 70s made a lot of bad trades..Carlton for Wise, etc.
Interesting White Sox are number 2 and Rangers are #4 and neither has won a playoff series in that time.

The 1970s Royals had a ridiculous run of great trades. It's hard to imagine that they are still #1 after all the bad trades they;ve made since the mid-1980s, starting with David Cone for Ed Hearn.

Surely, in these post-reserve-clause times, the correct statistic to use would be "the number of Win Shares each player would go on to amass during the remainder of his contract with the team trading him away."

If I trade away six months of a superstar, who was never going to resign with us, you can't damn the trade on the basis of his next ten years as a superstar. They were never mine to trade away.

You beat me too it. Counting what Jeff Kent is doing for the Dodgers against the Met's (or even the Jays) is silly.

If not for Sosa-for-Bell, they'd be #1.
Do the Sox get credit for Sosa's Cub win shares in the trade they got him from Texas?

Aside from the John trade though, what have the White Sox done that gets them so high on the list?

There is no Post-reserve Claus. That's just Marvin Miller in a red suit.

Thanks to Mike and studes, I have some lunchtime reading.

Do the Sox get credit for Sosa's Cub win shares in the trade they got him from Texas?

I assume they do, but are then debited for Sosa-Bell, so it even out.

Do the Sox get credit for Sosa's Cub win shares in the trade they got him from Texas?

Shazam, they do! Well even still they come out a little behind (Baines got more win shares than Bell did after they were both traded for Sosa).

Be interesting to see a modified form of this article, where teams only get credit for the win shares they actually get out of a player. That would probably slant all teams toward negative though (all future worth off players that get traded away get held against you, while you only get some of the future worth of players you trade for). Still it might be interesting to see, if for no other reason than to see how the rankings of teams are affected, or to see which teams tended to get the most/least of players they traded for before losing them.

Still, a really nice article.

Steve, I looked at the Giants from 1961 through 1975. They traded away a net -795 WSAB during that time! I was way off on the Cepeda deal, what was I thinking? It was in 1966, but it was only a net -35 WSAB, surprisingly. The worst deals were the Foster and Perry deals.

I can't believe the Glenn Davis trade is the worst of all time. arrrrggghhhhh...

The comment about the Schilling trades is dead on. Schlling has been traded 5 times, and in each case the team trading him got very little in return. Remarkable.

Be interesting to see a modified form of this article, where teams only get credit for the win shares they actually get out of a player.

Good point. Teams are probably getting undue credit for trading for 3 months of a soo-to-be free agent superstar. Under this format, do the Astros get credit for what Randy Johnson did for the D'Backs (and now Beltran as well)? After all, they didn't trade them, so there's no debit for their departures.

Be interesting to see a modified form of this article, where teams only get credit for the win shares they actually get out of a player.

I was thinking the same thing. The first trade that popped into my mind was the Randy Johnson to the Astros trade in 1998. If they're getting credit for what he did in Arizona, that seems a little off.

I mean, they should get some credit for recognizing that they were getting a good player, but then lose some credit for that period he continued to be successful after he went away. I know, hard to assign blame there given that (IIRC) they did pursue him as a free agent but simply got outbid, but I'm not sure that that's not more equitable than giving them credit for his accomplishments with the team that beat them out.

You beat me too it. Counting what Jeff Kent is doing for the Dodgers against the Met's (or even the Jays) is silly.

Well, I don't think that's a good example. The Mets aren't the Royals, after all -- they had the resources to choose to sign Jeff Kent if they'd wanted to. It's fair to count Kent's subsequent achievements on the negative side of the ledger, since it was within their grasp to hold onto that value if they'd wanted.

It is, however, a fair point as it pertains, say, to the Royals and Beltran. The vast majority of Beltran's future was really not within their grasp, and so they got what they could for the little part of it they DID own.

Of course, taking that into account would vastly complicate the analysis -- you'd have to make all sorts of judgment calls about whether a given player/team situation is more like Kent/Mets (or, say, Dodgers/Piazza) or Royals/Beltran. IMO, better to keep it simple, and then just keep in mind that the financial/contract issues might explain some part of each team's performance.

I'd agree with the posters who say that you should only count what the player did for the team that traded for him, not what he did for the rest of his career. when the Expos traded Randy johnson for Mark Langston, only Langston's performance in 1989 should count as a plus on the expos side of the ledger.

Actually, now that I think about it, the Expos got 2 draft picks when Langston left as a FA after 1989, and used those picks on Gabe White and Rondell White. It'd be interesting to see how factoring in the draft picks changes the evaluation. 6 years of Randy Johnson for 1 year of Mark Langston is going to be lopsided; 6 years of Randy johnson for 1 year of Langston, 2 years of Gabe White and 7.5 years of Rondell White is still lopsided, but much closer.

You beat me too it. Counting what Jeff Kent is doing for the Dodgers against the Met's (or even the Jays) is silly.

I don't agree. The Mets were not in a "Beltran" situation. They traded away Kent because they thought Baerga would be better over the course of his career (and because Kent was a cancer in the clubhouse). They were wrong about the first point.

I agree about teams that trade away players about to be free agents, but that sort of data manipulation is beyond me. Heck, it took several months to put this data together as is.

Steve, this analysis is based on the years 1961-2002. The Cepeda deal was in 1960, right?

Nope. 1966.

To be fair to the Giants, Cepeda had knee surgery following the 1964 season, missed almost all of 1965 and still wasn't back to 100% in 1966. Willie McCovey, who with Cepeda had alternated between 1B and the OF for several years, was also dealing with an injury (in McCovey's case, a foot/arch problem). As a result, neither McCovey nor Cepeda was capable of playing the OF, and without that option available one or the other was going to sit on the bench. It made sense for the Giants to try to make a deal for one or the other, and Cepeda was the more likely candidate because the Giants had (what appeared to be) a potential replacement ready in "Downtown" Ollie Brown. Ray Sadecki got away to a good start in 1966, and appeared to be back to his 20-game winning form of 1964. Sadecki was just 25, still looked to have a number of good years ahead of him. Like Brock for Broglio, Cepeda for Sadecki didn't "appear" to be that unreasonable at the time.

-- MWE

the poor Mets. I have a feeling the Black Friday trades aren't going to help those numbers any

Speaking of "Black Friday," I did a search to see who first used that term in reference to the Kazmir/Benson trades. It appears to have been used first in the July 31 Game Chatter for the Mets/Braves game, but when I click on the link, nothing comes up. Are the old chatters lost forever?

It'd be interesting to see how factoring in the draft picks changes the evaluation.

Definitely. Good point.

Re: Kent and the Mets

I realized that it's not the same as Beltran. Actually when I started writing the post I had Beltran and the Royals, but for some reason the Kent thing stuck in my head from the article and I put it in. Dumb me.

The comment about the Schilling trades is dead on. Schlling has been traded 5 times, and in each case the team trading him got very little in return. Remarkable.

Actually, the Phillies didn't do too badly when they sent him to AZ: Padilla's still in the rotation, Lee is a decent 1Bman (even if the Phils tired of him), and Daal... well, Daal... uh, yeah, Daal...

<i> It's hard to imagine that they are still #1 after all the bad trades they;ve made since the mid-1980s, starting with David Cone for Ed Hearn. <?i>

They've made some good ones since then too. Jeff Montgomery for Van Snider was a rip-off. Danny Tartabull for Mike Kingery and Scott Bankhead. Chili Davis for Mark Gubicza. Jay Bell and Jeff King for a bunch of Jeffs and Joe Randa. Joe Randa for Juan LeBron. Jermaine Dye and Jaime Walker for Michael Tucker and Keith Lockhart.

The only terrible trades since Cone were Neifi Perez for Jermaine Dye, the Appier deal, and Jon Lieber for Stan Belinda.

Actually, I found a flaw in the database, thanks to the Bagwell/Andersen comment. Players who were minor leaguers at the time of the trade don't factor into the overall outcome, because I use the year of the trade to ID the player. I've got to figure out a way to fix that.

Speaking of "Black Friday," I did a search to see who first used that term in reference to the Kazmir/Benson trades. It appears to have been used first in the July 31 Game Chatter for the Mets/Braves game, but when I click on the link, nothing comes up. Are the old chatters lost forever?

No, I was reading a Mets-Yankee Chatter last night. Seriously.

GREAT WORK BY STUDES & RANTIN' MIKE

If you do get to crunching GMs' individual #s, I suggest only including the ones where the GM+Team relationship lasted 4+ years. In transition years, a GM can inherit a trade that's already in motion, and the outgoing GM can frequently try to glue some pice of manure to the incoming one so he'll look better in the long run.

I also think there will be exceptions -- where a GM is lashed by ownership to funky financial decisions, like Ahab to the Whale, and GM is making moves for a set of reasons outside on-field "value". Like when a team HAS to trade for, say, a third baseman because of a mid-season injury and a farm system void at that position leaves no/few options. Or when an owner decides she needs to trade a high-priced player to trim budget and the market is not receptive at the moment the deal is having to be made.

But great work, both of you. Best study of the off-season, I think.

The 1976 Pirates ran a clinic on how to buy high and sell low: Tony Armas, Doug Bair, Dave Giusti, Rick Langford, Mitchell Page, Willie Randolph, Ken Brett, and Dock Ellis for Phil Garner, Tommy Helms, Chris Batton, and one year of Doc Medich. Anybody want to run the WS numbers on that one?

Steve, I looked at the Giants from 1961 through 1975. They traded away a net -795 WSAB during that time! I was way off on the Cepeda deal, what was I thinking? It was in 1966, but it was only a net -35 WSAB, surprisingly. The worst deals were the Foster and Perry deals.

Attaboy. ;-)

The Foster and Perry deals dovetail beautifully, as well: in June of 1971, the Giants can't live another day without someone to back up Chris Speier, so Foster gets traded for the immortal Frank Duffy. Five months later, Duffy is expendable enough to be thrown in together with Perry in order to capture Sudden Sam ...

So my White Sox are second in the trade standings but haven't been to the World Series since two years before your study begins. I find this depressing.

Vlad, I've got two Pirate deals (in 1975 and 1977) with a total WSAB of -202. The worst was the Randolph for Medich deal (-155) and the other was the blockbuster with Oakland (-52). Their overall record from 1975 to 1977 isn't bad, thanks to the Gossage deal, among others.

So how did the White Sox score so high?

(looking it up) traded Aparicio for Hoyt Wilhelm in the early 1960s. That should gain 'em some.

Trade Juan Pizarro to Pitt for Wilbur Wood. That should've helped their score.

Hey - they were trading for Sany Alomar as early as '67! Kenny Williams has been around longer than I thought!

Got Aparicio for no one I've ever heard of. Should've helped.

Got Tommy Davis in a trade with the Mets for Tommie Agee. Only one year with the ChiSox, but he played another decade.

Hey - the White Sox traded for Tony Muser!

The 1971 Stan Bahnsen for Rich McKinney trade worked for them.

The Dick Allen for Tommy John trade probably hurts them in win shares.

Santo for Stone? Others involved, but that's a neat one. Bad for the Sox, though.

Dick Allen for Jim Essian? Ouch. Are there any former Cubs managers/coaches/announcers they haven't traded for/away?

Stan Bahnsen for Chet Lemon? Another good one. They sure got a lot of win shares out of that Rich McKinney fella.

They trade Kaat for Ruthven and then trade Ruthven for Garr. That helped. (and they got Kaat off of waivers!! Wow).

Heh. They traded Tony LaRussa to the Cards.

Goosage for Zisk? That hurts.

Bucky Dent for Lamar Hoyt & Oscar Gamble? I guess that helps the win shares total. Terrible trade for the Red Sox though. :)

Brian Downing to the Angels for Bobby Bonds (others involved)? Bad move.

Bobby Bonds for Claudell Washington? Good move, though again, almost all his value was on another team.

Getting Tony Bernazard for nothing helps.

The Koosmann trade was a good one for them.

Chet Lemon for Steve Kemp? Not a good move.

Tom Paciorek for Essian, and two other guys? Good move.

Ross Baumgarten & other guy for Ernie Camancho and Vance Law? Good trade.

Rudy Law for an Espy? Good trade.

Scott Fletcher, Pat Tabler, and Dick Tidrow all went there in the Steve Trout trade? Didn't know that. Not sure if Tabler counts in this system.

Pat Tabler for Dybnski? Egh.

well that's through '83 and I'm sick of looking. I guess they just made a slew of good-but-not-great trades and their one royal screw up (Sosa) was mostly counterbalanced by their other Sosa trade.

Thanks, studes. Nice to have confirmation that the deal sucked as badly as I'd thought.

Could've been a lot worse, too, if Martin hadn't burned up Langford's arm.

Pat Tabler for Dybnski? [sic] Egh.

Why don't you just bring up Tito F. Landrum while you're at it? :)

Re: the Chisox, they had two big good deals and only one big bad deal, and the rest of the deals went their way overall.

The two big deals were picking up Agee and Tommy John (+213) and Baines for Sosa (+189).

The worst deal of course, was giving up on Sosa and trading him for Bell (-159).

For a study like this, it's too bad that free agency came along. Without FA, the problem of giving teams credit for receiving players who later produced for other teams would be self-correcting. Like the Sox and Sosa, yes they get huge undeserved credit in getting him from Texas but they get demerits by letting him go to the Cubs, so that one works out. But like Johnson and the Astros, since that wasn't a trade, the Astros are still getting full credit.

On the Mets, to be "fair", three of those really awful trades were over a short period of time (69-72). Whoever the GM was at the time may have been the worst in history -- with what they kept there might have been a Mets dynasty. I know Steve will argue in favor of the Giants' GM and he may be right.

Anyway, obviously the Mets have been better since then. Not great obviously. But their overall suckitude is largely the result of one time period.

Whoever the GM was at the time may have been the worst in history -- with what they kept there might have been a Mets dynasty.

It was none other than Johnny "Grandma" Murphy, I'm pretty sure.

I know Steve will argue in favor of the Giants' GM and he may be right.

Horace Stoneham was old school: he never employed a GM. Chub Feeney and others in the small circle of advisors were all involved, but Stoneham was running the show.

If you throw out the trades involving Sosa, John, and Dick Allen, I wonder how the White Sox play out.

Like Brock for Broglio, Cepeda for Sadecki didn't "appear" to be that unreasonable at the time.

It sure appeared unreasonable to me. Maybe the press praised the deal (I can't remember), but I thought was an outrage.

But like Johnson and the Astros, since that wasn't a trade, the Astros are still getting full credit.

And the Mariners are still getting stiffed, even though their relationship with Johnson had broken down so badly at that point, there was no way the Unit was re-signing with Seattle at the end of the season.

If you throw out the trades involving Sosa, John, and Dick Allen, I wonder how the White Sox play out.

Probably still pretty decent, although not as good, obviously.

Aside from the Bill Veeck years and Kenny Williams, the White Sox have been a very conservative organization, almost to a fault. They really haven't traded away much young talent over the years.

That's actually come back to bite them a few times, when hot prospects they hold onto prove not to be so hot.

It also helps that they've been on the lower end of the success cycle more often than not, so they haven't had much impetus to trade away young talent for veterans to "win now".

Sending LaMarr Hoyt to San Diego for Ozzie Guillen and Tim Lollar helped, even if you don't count Ozzie's Manager Win Shares, of which there must be two or three.

Increasing Hoyt's proximity to Tijuana was, in retrospect, a pretty bad idea.

An interesting article, no doubt, and I'd like to read more. One thing that quickly stikes me, though, is that while certain deals may appear lopsided from a future WS standpoint, they may still be defensible from the post-season standpoint.

Put another way, had the Tigers won the WS in 1987, would their fans be complaining so vociferously about losing John Smoltz? Pennant flags fly forever.

I'm curious about change over time. I'd guess the Phils--who score well--are riding on the big deals of the 1970s and wouldn't score nearly as high on a study of the last 10-15 years. But I'd be interested to know that I am wrong...

If you throw out the trades involving Sosa, John, and Dick Allen, I wonder how the White Sox play out.

Other than giving up Jeff Bagwell, getting Larry Andersen was a coup for the Red Sox.

Johnny Murphy was Met GM for Otis-Foy trade but died a month later. Bob Scheffing with help of M. Donald Grant, did Ryan and Singleton trade. Lots one onesided trades in winter 71-72.
According to Peter Golenbecks' book "Amazins" Gil Hodges pushed for Joe Foy (scouts warned he was a druggie, Mets thought OF of Jones, Agee and Shamsky/Swoboda was young plus Otis was too shy for NYC) and Fregosi (scouts thought he was old 30, Hodges had seen his All-Star days in 60s). Staub had been healthy before and after NY, not during. They traded him for old fat Mickey Lolich who said he would retire in a year so they could put in Mike Vail who had 30 game hitting streak, Vail broke his ankle in offseason. Mets didn't have a hitting coach until 1979, braodcaster Ralph Kiner tried to teach Singleton how to hit like Ralph Kiner. In Montreal Larry Doby worked with him.
I think one problem the Mets had in 1969 was winning 100 games and world series. Winning a world series is a good thing, but the management didn't realize they were severley lucky. They kept tring to make a small trade to push them up a couple of games. In 1968 they refused a Amos Otis for Joe Torre trade because Agee had a dismal season.
Of course there was always the decision to draft Steve Chilcott instead of Reggie Jackson.

Sending LaMarr Hoyt to San Diego for Ozzie Guillen and Tim Lollar helped, even if you don't count Ozzie's Manager Win Shares, of which there must be two or three.

Britt Burns to the Yankees for Ron Hassey and Joe Cowley was one of two positives that Ken Harrelson achieved during his tenure as Sox GM (the other was firing Tony LaRussa).

Cowley had one good season for the Sox (including a no-hitter) before being flipped to the Phillies for Gary Redus and then dropping off the planet.

Hassey went back to the Yankees a couple months later along with some minor-league fodder for Neil Allen and Scott Bradley. The Sox later turned Bradley over to the Mariners for Ivan Calderon.

Britt Burns never threw a pitch for the Yankees.

That's what you call a clear win.

The vast majority of Beltran's future was really not within their grasp, and so they got what they could for the little part of it they DID own.

It gets a little more complicated than that. The Phillies, for example, weren't re-signing Scott Rolen for all the gold in Fort Knox. But there was a good chance Rolen would sign a non-FA extension with his new team, and potential trading partners knew that, thus enhancing Rolen's trade value.

Of course none of that applies to a Boras client.

Put another way, had the Tigers won the WS in 1987, would their fans be complaining so vociferously about losing John Smoltz?

Any Tiger fan who remembers what Doyle Alexander did down the stretch in 1987 and what prompted Sparky's case of "exhaustion" in 1989 isn't complaining about that deal.

Like Brock for Broglio, Cepeda for Sadecki didn't "appear" to be that unreasonable at the time.

It sure appeared unreasonable to me. Maybe the press praised the deal (I can't remember), but I thought was an outrage.

Me too. I wasn't yet 8 years old, and I thought it was insane.

The idea of trading either Cepeda or McCovey wasn't necessarily a bad one. The bad idea was trading Cepeda when his market value was at its lowest. He's just coming back from knee surgery, no one is really sure yet if he'll make it back 100% -- of course no one was willing to offer a lot for him. Sadecki was a stiff compared to a reasonably healthy Cepeda; his "20 game form" of 1964 was a huge-run-support fluke and everyone knew it. In making that deal, the Giants were counting on Cepeda never making a full comeback. Cepeda as a gimpy-legged platoon left fielder would have been as much use as Sadecki; Cepeda at full strength or something close to it was clearly going to be better than Sadecki.

The bad idea was trading Cepeda when his market value was at its lowest.

In hindsight we know his value was at its lowest at the time of the trade. Market value doesn't necessarily follow the plexiglass principle though (I'm looking at you, Fernando Tatis).

In hindsight we know his value was at its lowest at the time of the trade.

Not just hindsight. At the time of the trade, Cepeda couldn't play at all; his value couldn't get any lower. The only way the trade made any sense was if the Giants believed he would never get better.

I can't remember how the trade was viewed back East in 1966. One thing to remember, the Giant pitching Staff in 1965 was all right handed starters and Sadecki was left handed. Wasn't there something about Candlestick park that used to hurt right handed power hitters.? I think they closed off the left field side after a couple of years to cut down on the wind. I still hear people refer to Twins' home as "homerdome" because in their first game a couple of rookies named Gaetti and Brunsasky hit homeruns.
Finishing 2 games behind the Dodgers can make you do a trade for mediocre talent, hoping it will push you over the top. Of course, sadecki was 24 and there is an old saying that lefties develop later. One wonders if there were any other offers on the table..no in season interleague trades then and I don't think teams were as aggressive with waivers as they are now.
In one sense the Giants were right..Cepeda didn't have a long career because of his knees. But it was better than Sadecki's.

In hindsight we know his value was at its lowest at the time of the trade.

In the spring of 1966, Cepeda's market value was the lowest it had ever been (or something very close to it) in his career up to that point. The Giants had the choice of keeping him or trading him then. Trading him ensured that they would get not much in return. Keeping him would have allowed the possibility that his value could rebound, and of course also the possibility that he could get hurt again, and his value recede to nothing.

Trading him then precluded the worst case, but also the best. The Giants converted a risky asset with great potential upside into a known mediocrity with little upside -- and moreover, Sadecki, like all pitchers, also ran the risk of getting hurt and turning into zilch.

One of the ironies is that Sadecki's 1967-1968 seasons were good, certainly as good as the Giants could ever have hoped. (His 1966 was horrendous, and his 1969 rather poor, of course.) All in all Sadecki paid off for the Giants about as well as he possibly could have -- but that value paled in comparison to that which Cepeda brought to the Cardinals, both while playing for them and in yielding Joe Torre in trade.

A true evaluation of the trainwreck of Giants trades really requires going back a little before 1961, when they parted with Bill White and Leon Wagner, and probably some others I've forgotten.

At the time of the trade, Cepeda couldn't play at all

This isn't true. Cepeda was playing semi-regularly as a left fielder-first baseman for the Giants in early 1966, and hitting well.

I've never bought the assertion that Cepeda "could't play the outfield." He could. Even after his knee problems, he wasn't slow. He didn't like to play the outfield, and b!tched and moaned constantly whenever he was asked to play the outfield (quite unlike McCovey, who quietly did whatever he as asked to do). But if Hank Greenberg and Ralph Kiner and Harmon Killebrew and Willie Stargell and Greg Luzkinsi and Rico Carty and Leon Wagner and 40-something Barry Bonds can play left field, heaven knows 28-year-old Orlando Cepeda could have done it.

A true evaluation of the trainwreck of Giants trades really requires going back a little before 1961, when they parted with Bill White and Leon Wagner, and probably some others I've forgotten.

No. The really bad period started in 1962, with the Stu Miller and Manny Mota trades, and continued through with the Felipe Alou, Jose Cardenal, Matty Alou, Randy Hundley/Bill Hands, Ron Hunt, George Foster, Gaylord Perry, Ken Henderson, and Bobby Bonds trades ...

... Garry Matthews, Garry Maddox, George Foster, Dave Kingman...

The most curious trade on the list to me is the McNally trade. As we all know, McNally was one of the pioneers of the free agency. The trade was between the 74 and 75 season and McNally was in the process of challanging the reserve system in 75. He was granted free agency prior to the 76 season. He underperformed in Montreal and never played after'75.

The Orioles maybe sensing a lot of things - age, diminshing performance - but maybe also problems/issues with McNally's option traded McNally to the Expos. I could see this as being a threat to the rest of the team - you are replaceable and if you try the crap McNally did we will send you to the Expos or whatever other backwater we can find. Does anyone know/remember if this trade was premised on dumping the trouble maker McNally - if so what a steal. The Orioles got rid of a problem in exchange for a quality pitcher and allstar OFer.

We should all have such good fortune when we make our problems go away - with that as motivation, I need to go call my wife.

The really bad period started in 1962

Sure, but some of the ones just before that were pretty bad too. I've often wondered what it was that led to the disasters. Did someone leave? Did Stoneham see so many good prospects that he thought the supply would never dry up? Was it a win now strategy that backfired?

Any ideas Steve?

Does anyone know/remember if this trade was premised on dumping the trouble maker McNally - if so what a steal. The Orioles got rid of a problem in exchange for a quality pitcher and allstar OFer.

I could be wrong, but I don't think so. As MLBPA rabble-rousers went, McNally wasn't all that hardcore. There were several trades in that era that were intended to "punish" or get rid of Union leaders -- Joe Torre being traded by the Braves in 1968, Dick Dietz being dumped by the Giants in the spring of 1972 -- but I don't recall the McNally deal as being motivated by that.

his "20 game form" of 1964 was a huge-run-support fluke and everyone knew it.

Everyone was wrong - his RSI was 90 that year. I reckon that he should've gone 22-9 that year with league average run support.

Another fun fact about Ray Sadecki: in 1968 he had four consecutive starts in which the Giants scored no runs for him, one of only 4 times I know of that happening (Paul Derringer in '33, Randy Johnson a few years ago, and some guy on either the Senators or Orioles in the early '60s).

Just one question, why are braves so BAD here? I thought we had made some pretty good trades over the years. Are lofton, Justice, and Schmidt hurting us that much?

Where does one get historical Win Share data of the type used to analyze these trades?

Frankly, I'm a bit surprised.

Regarding the Braves, the killer for them was the 1983 deal with Cleveland, when they traded away Butler and Jacoby (and cash!) for Barker. That's a negative (-182) WSAB.

But the thing that really hurts the Braves is that they have never made a whopper deal in their favor (remember, this only includes win shares through 2003, so you can't judge their most recent deals).

The best deal they made was picking up Bret Boone and Remlinger for Neagle, Tucker and the other Bell, although they lost Boone a year later. WSAB of 85. Of course, they turned around and traded Boone and Klesko for Joyner, Veras and Sanders, which is the third worst deal in their history (-99).

salvomania, drop me an email.

I thought the HoF quiz Studes linked to was cool. I got an 8 out of 10, getting 2 wrong, one of which was really stupid because Studes explicitly referenced it in the article, and another which would have been stupid had I read this thread before taking the quiz, which I hadn't.

Everyone was wrong - his RSI was 90 that year. I reckon that he should've gone 22-9 that year with league average run support.

I'm having trouble with this one. His ERA+ was 104, giving up 232 hits, 60 walks, and 16 homers in 221 innings. That doesn't sound like 22-9 (or 20-11) to me.

I read this article and Mike's one at lunch. Very interesting, but I don't really see a correlation between success at the trading desk and success on the field.

The late 70's seem to be a relative inactive time for trading. Was this because of free agency?

Sure, but some of the ones just before that were pretty bad too. I've often wondered what it was that led to the disasters. Did someone leave? Did Stoneham see so many good prospects that he thought the supply would never dry up? Was it a win now strategy that backfired?

Any ideas Steve?

I just made a long post in response to this that got eaten. Damn!

OK: I had an article in Nine a couple of years ago that addressed this very subject:

http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_hb217/is_200203/ai_n5976266

In short:

- Stoneham for decades demonstrated amazing skill at finding and developing young talent, especially young hitting talent. He came to believe he would always be able to produce more good outfielders than he could ever use.

- By the 1960s and especially the 1970s, he was getting old, and his judgment skills were eroding badly. Teams increasingly were able to outfox him in trade negotiations, and probably by the end they were coming to see him as an easy mark.

I got an 10 out of 10 (altho Bowa is not a current Major League manager) but of course who else here actually saw Amos Rusie pitch.

I'm having trouble with this one. His ERA+ was 104, giving up 232 hits, 60 walks, and 16 homers in 221 innings. That doesn't sound like 22-9 (or 20-11) to me.

A pitcher's W/L record is a product of 3 things: 1) his RA/9IP, 2) his run support, 3) well, that hard to predict thing that can make baseball such an interesting game. Call it luck or overachieving or underachieving or pitching to the score or random variation, or bullpen impact or some/all/none of the above - this third element plays a factor. There's a whole other debate on what that means, but I ain't getting into it.

To go back to my earlier post: you said his W/L record was the result of supersized run support. That just ain't the case. Maybe he just exceedingly lucky (either that or I did the math wrong). At any rate, he won twenty games with lackluster support. With the RSI stuff all I do is adjust solely for run support, and that ain't why he got the record he had. Call it the luckiest season ever or the gritties season ever - whatever. But you can't say it was the result of terrific run support, because he didn't have that.

FWIW, the flip side of this would be Don Drysdale's 1964, where he went 18-16 with an ERA+ of 149 and an RSI of 115. He should've gone 25-9 with his real-life run support. I looked at that season more closely - he lost almost all the 1 and 2 run games he played in. My guess is Sadecki had: 1) really consistent run support, 2) never had his offense score a lot of runs in one game, and 3) won a LOT of close games. Barney Schultz and Bob Humphreys likely had more to do with his record than Curt Flood and Lou Brock.

22-9 with league average run support? Yup. 22-9 with league average [however you define that third factor]? Hell no, not even close. But the subject was run support.

Of course, they turned around and traded Boone and Klesko for Joyner, Veras and Sanders, which is the third worst deal in their history (-99).


God ####### damnit.


Well, i'm glad someone else recognizes it for what it was. Third behind that 83 deal and ____ ?

Don't get any credit for smoltz, huh?

One note on the Braves, I'm guessing that Smoltz-Alexander doesn't show up in the database because of the Bagwell-Andersen flaw.

Yes, I should have mentioned the minor league problem. I'm trying to fix it right now.

My guess is Sadecki had: 1) really consistent run support, 2) never had his offense score a lot of runs in one game, and 3) won a LOT of close games.

One factor that could contribute to a pitcher winning more games than expected based on ERA+ would be if he gave up few if any unearned runs. But that doesn't explain Sadecki's 1964, either, because he gave up a lot of unearned runs that year (14 out of 104 total runs, the second-highest total of his career).

SOB was just lucky.

SOB was just lucky.

Which is the real point. Regardless of how many runs the Cardinals scored for him in 1964, "20-11" was not a good predictive indicator of how well he was likely to pitch in the future. "3.68" was a much better one, particularly when considering that 3.68 was the best ERA he had ever had in six full major league seasons, and he was coming off a 5.21 performance in 173 innings in 1965.

I'm having trouble with this one. His ERA+ was 104, giving up 232 hits, 60 walks, and 16 homers in 221 innings. That doesn't sound like 22-9 (or 20-11) to me.

Sadecki was lucky (or good, whatever) with run distribution - he "pitched to the win".

Of his 20 wins, seven were one-run affairs, four were decided by two runs, and three by three runs.

Also, Retrosheet doesn't have box scores for 1964, so I don't know how many runs he gave up personally in each start, but the Cardinals only gave up more than more than four runs in four of his wins. He must have been bad in his losses.

Well, the Mets may be the all-time chumps, but I'd still put my 1960-1975 Giants up against any team in any 15-year period for Giving Away The Store honors.

The Haywood Sullivan years shine like a arc light in the realm of ineptitude.

Back to the White Sox trade log, starting 1984:

The Drabek trade: not a good one, but doesn't show up in this article's system.

The Ozzie Guillen trade. Prior to this thread I didn't even know the Sox traded for him. Good one. They also got Luis Salazar, who by himself was worth more than Hoyt.

Traded Kid Correa and Scott Fletcher for Wayne Tolleson? Yeesh.

The previously mentioned Britt Burns-Hassey trade.

Here's a good trade: Ivan Calderon from Seattle. Only a short prime, but all they gave up was Scott Bradley.

Steve Lyons for Tom Seaver? Unlikely as the names make it sound, the White Sox may have gotten more win shares out of it.

Bobby Bonilla for Jose DeLeon: bring back Wayne Tolleson.

Kittle, Hassey, Skinner, Tolleson, Carmelo Martinez - it's like a record for the greatest nubmer of sucky players in one trade without anyone of value involved.

Cowley for Redus? Decent move.

Pasqua for Dotson? Good move.

Trade what's left of Floyd Bannister for Melido Perez and Greg Hibbard? Very good move.

Jose DeLeon for Lance Johnson & some other guy? Very good move.

Sosa Trade I: Yea, that worked out pretty well. Say what you will of Himes, he did a great job as Sox GM.

Roberto Hernandez for some guy with 2 career ABs? Yea, Himes was pretty good on the South Side. If only his first round draft picks were better . . . . :)

Good time to dump Calderon - especially in getting Raines in the same move.

Getting Joey Cora's good.

Trading a real ballplayer for Pete Rose Jr. isn't good.

Steve Sax for Bob Wickman, and Melido Perez? Feh.

this is getting old, again. Still, I'd say the Himes era was key to the White Sox high ranking.

SOB was just lucky.

Which is the real point. Regardless of how many runs the Cardinals scored for him in 1964, "20-11" was not a good predictive indicator of how well he was likely to pitch in the future. "3.68" was a much better one,

True.

Hack:

I beg your pardon.

Nah, I'm old but not that old.

The earliest player I remember is Gus Suhr. My dad took me to see the Cubs/Pirates play, and we went to a place after the game where the players hung out. My Uncle Herb ALWAYS knew where the action was which is why my mother hated it when my dad would go visit. Uncle Herb was FUN. Tickets to ballgames, roller coasters, motorcycle rides, horseracing, circus you name it Herb would get you there. That and always with the cash to sponsor your fun.

I can only aspire to be that much fun for my young relatives.

Just for fun, I combed retrosheet for the Giants' amateur drafts from 1950 to 1976, when Stoneham sold his interest in the Giants. The Giants' drafts were spectacular in the '50s, good until about 1970, and pretty bad for the rest of the Stoneham years. (I omitted quite a few marginal major leaguers from the following list.)

1950: Willie Mays
1951: Bob Schmidt
1952: no one of note
1953: Ozzie Virgil, Bill White
1954: Joey Amalfitano, Andre Rodgers, Leon Wagner
1955: Orlando Cepeda, Jim Davenport, Jose Pagan, Willie McCovey
1956: Felipe Alou, Mike McCormick, Bobby Bolin
1957: Matty Alou, Manny Mota
1958: Eddie Fisher, Tom Haller, Ron Herbel, Juan Marichal, Jose Tartabull, Gaylord Perry, Jesus Alou
1959: Bill Hands, Coco Laboy
1960: Dick Dietz, Jim Ray Hart, Randy Hundley, Cap Peterson, Minnie Rojas, Jose Cardenal
1961: Hal Lanier
1962: Ollie Brown, Tito Fuentes, Dave May
1963: Ossie Blanco, Jose Morales
1964: Masanori Murakami, Ken Henderson, Bobby Bonds
1965: Al Gallagher, Chris Arnold, Ron Bryant
1966: Bob Reynolds, Bernie Williams (heh), Don Hahn
1967: Dave Rader, Jim Willoughby, Gary Lavelle
1968: Garry Maddox, George Foster, Elias Sosa, Garry Matthews, Ed Goodson
1969: Steve Stone, Mike Phillips, Steve Ontiveros, Gary Thomasson
1970: Randy Moffitt, Chris Speier, John D’Acquisto, Butch Metzger, Dave Kingman, Jim Barr
1971: no one of note
1972: Bob Knepper, Ed Halicki, John Montefusco
1973: Johnnie LeMaster, Jack Clark, Pete Falcone
1974: no one of note
1975: no one of note
1976: Bob Brenly

I'd guess the Giants had the most former draftees playing in the majors from about 1962 to about 1972.

- Stoneham for decades demonstrated amazing skill at finding and developing young talent, especially young hitting talent. He came to believe he would always be able to produce more good outfielders than he could ever use.

- By the 1960s and especially the 1970s, he was getting old, and his judgment skills were eroding badly. Teams increasingly were able to outfox him in trade negotiations, and probably by the end they were coming to see him as an easy mark.

Not only that, but I think having the best player ever in centerfield colored Stoneham's judgement. The Giants would continually develop great young outfielders who they thought would be the next Willie Mays. Well, no one is the next Willie Mays, and the Giants would get disappointed and dump them. Problem was many of them were still very good players, All-Stars and even MVPs.

The Giants' drafts were spectacular in the '50s, good until about 1970, and pretty bad for the rest of the Stoneham years. (I omitted quite a few marginal major leaguers from the following list.)

Understand that they weren't "drafts" until 1965; those were just amateur free agent signings until the draft itself was instituted.

The Giants would continually develop great young outfielders who they thought would be the next Willie Mays. Well, no one is the next Willie Mays, and the Giants would get disappointed and dump them. Problem was many of them were still very good players, All-Stars and even MVPs.

Good observation. Bobby Bonds and Ken Henderson both suffered from not turning out to be Willie Mays, and so the Giants didn't appreciate how good they really were. Willie Kirkland and Garry Maddox too.

But they gave up Foster and Cardenal before giving them much of a chance at all.

Huh. How do the Brewers end up in the plus column when they have all those years of Gary Sheffield?

Carl Hubbell was the director of the Giants' farm system for most (maybe all -- I can't remember when he retired) of those years. I wonder if he's the one who deserves the credit and Stoneham the blame?

I'd guess the Phils--who score well--are riding on the big deals of the 1970s and wouldn't score nearly as high on a study of the last 10-15 years.

Actually going back 15 years would include the Lee Thomas thefts of Dykstra for Samuel, Kruk for Chris James, and Schilling for Grimsley. Also, the relatively recent Abreau for Stocker trade is a huge one in their favor.