Total Baseball (1994 Edition)/Total_Baseball_1994_Edition_Creative_Multimedia_1994.iso/dp/0017/00177.txt

Text File | 1994-02-14 | 74KB | 1,036 lines

$Unique_ID{BAS00177}
$Pretitle{}
$Title{Free Agency and Trades}
$Subtitle{}
$Author{
Cohen, Eliot}
$Subject{Free Agency Trades trade agent trading Seitz McGraw Frazee salary
salaries Rickey farm system Yawkey amateur draft}
$Log{}

Total Baseball:  The Game off the Field


Trades and Free Agency

Eliot Cohen


     By the late '70s, players were following the lure of the dollars to the
highest bidder. Owners lamented the detrimental effects of player movement on
fan loyalty and competitive balance, unless, of course, those moves were
orchestrated by the clubs via trades.
     That's the 1870s, folks. Ballplayers have been changing uniforms nearly
as long as they've been taking a called third strike. The National
Association of Baseball Players, founded in 1858, allowed players to change
teams provided they gave sixty days notice. Despite that restriction and that
era's patina of "gentlemanly, amateur" competition, paid "ringers" frequently
suited up for different clubs, sometimes serving one club in the morning and
another in the afternoon.
     Players changed teams regularly throughout the five-year history of the
National Association of Professional Baseball, mainly to accommodate
fluctuation in size between nine teams for the 1871 debut, as few as eight for
1873, and 13 in the loop's final season in 1875. The first National League
trade on record took place in the middle of the 1879 season as catcher Lew
"Blower" Brown moved from Providence to Chicago for the soon-to-be proverbial
player to be named later, in this case, shortstop Johnny Peters.
     Since then, players have been traded for Hall of Famers, has-beens, cash,
spite, managers, equipment, announcers, and even themselves. Trades and
player sales are part of baseball's lifeblood, in-season acquisitions boosting
contenders' hopes and winter moves stoking hot stoves. There's hardly a
pennant winner that hasn't used a trade to reach the top or a Hall of Famer
who hasn't been peddled in the flesh mart.
     By the 1890s, a draft system was in place for major league clubs to
acquire players from minor league teams. Teams at every level could pluck
players from lower classifications for a fixed fee. (Today's minor league
draft every December is a remnant of this practice. Players not on a major
league 40-man roster after three professional seasons may be selected by clubs
at higher levels, but must be retained at the higher level or returned.)  It
wasn't long before John Brush, then owner of both the Cincinnati Reds and the
Indianapolis entry in the Western League, realized that he could use the
system to draft players from rival minor league teams for Cincinnati and move
them between the clubs at will, creating a farm in Indianapolis where his
prospects could grow, and a competitive edge at both outposts. Not until the
1920s, however, did Branch Rickey legitimize the farm system concept; despite
opposition from Commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis and other
traditionalists, fearing this return to "Brushism," working agreements with
the majors became the key to survival in the bushes.
     Other changes in the system evolved to address abuses or new situations.
In 1903, to prevent clubs from fattening their rosters with stars before the
first World Series, representatives of the National League's Pittsburgh entry
and the American League's Boston club wrote in a line to their typed agreement
prohibiting participation by any player acquired on or after September 1. The
rule remains in force today for all postseason play.
     Waivers and options arose in tandem with farm systems to prevent the best
clubs from monopolizing talent. The amateur draft was created in 1965 to end
the rich teams' monopoly on the best prospects and allow the worst teams to
get the top choices. Trading between leagues required waivers until the
initial interleague trading period, limited to four weeks, was declared after
the 1959 season and became the principal business of the annual winter
meetings in December. Today, waivers are required only for trades from August
1 to the end of the season. Options, which limit the number of times a player
can be assigned to a minor league roster, were liberalized in 1985, permitting
the Yankees to rev up the infamous Columbus shuttle with their top affiliate.
In 1973, players won the right to veto trades, providing they had 10 years in
the big leagues, the last five with their present team. Ron Santo, a 14-year
fixture at third base for the Cubs, was the first player to exercise his
five-and-10 veto power, canceling a deal that would have sent him to the
California Angels. The Cubs accommodated his desire to stay in Chicago by
shipping him to the White Sox.
     Free agency, established by arbitrator Peter Seitz's ruling prior to the
1976 season, required further changes in the system of player movement. At
first, teams held a re-entry draft to choose which free agents they would
offer contracts. From 1981-1984, a compensation draft was held in which teams
losing free agents selected a replacement player from a pool. The re-entry
draft was abandoned after 1984 as well. Although the new era has given
players devices to change address on their own--including the right to demand
a trade or freedom after being traded in the middle of a multi-year contract,
and the leverage to fill contracts with an array of no-trade clauses and other
disincentives to unapproved moves--trades remain the primary vehicle for
rapidly improving a team.
     Mike "King" Kelly became the first big name player to be shipped out of
town. After he won the 1886 National League batting title with a .388
average, the pennant winning Chicago White Stockings (who later became the
Cubs) sold their star outfielder-catcher to Boston for the outrageous sum of
$10,000. That record stood until the New York Giants paid $11,000 to the
minor league club in Indianapolis for Hall of Fame lefthander Rube Marquard in
1908. Before farm systems were popularized by Branch Rickey's St. Louis
Cardinals in the 1920s and 1930s, ballclubs regularly purchased their players
from these independent operators.
     Occasionally, owners purchased players from themselves. After Christy
Mathewson made an inauspicious debut with the Giants in 1900, they sent him
back to the Virginia League where the Cincinnati Reds drafted him for $100.
Reds' owner John Brush knew he'd soon own a piece of the New York franchise
and recognized the potential of Mathewson. So Brush's Reds accepted Hall of
Fame pitcher Amos Rusie, who had sat out the previous two seasons in a salary
dispute with the Giants, from Brush's future club for Mathewson. Rusie
retired after showing an 0-1 record in three 1901 starts for Cincinnati.
Mathewson went 1-0 for Cincinnati in 1916, 372-188 for the Giants.
     Dirty deals were nothing new for a franchise whose early days featured
close ties with New York's infamous Tammany Hall Democratic Party machine.
The original Mets, New York's American Association entry, won the 1884
championship, but their owner, John Day, happened also to own the Giants--and
transferred the Mets' leading pitcher, Tim Keefe, best hitter, Dude
Esterbrook, and manager Jim Mutrie to his NL entry. The Mets plummeted to
eighth in the nine-team league.
     Similar ethics helped the 1899 Cleveland Spiders compile the worst record
ever, a shameful 20-134. Before the 1899 season, Cleveland's Robison
brothers acquired control of the St. Louis Browns, a 39-111 basket case in
1898. Reasoning that the profit potential of St. Louis outweighed that of the
mistake by the lake, they transferred the Spiders' entire starting lineup,
including outfielder Jesse Burkett, plus Cy Young and Jack Powell, winners of
25 and 24 games respectively for the 1898 Spiders, to St. Louis. Third
baseman Lave Cross, a St. Louis regular in 1898, was appointed Cleveland's
manager, but 38 games into the season, he was summoned to St. Louis, as was
Wee Willy Sudhoff, the Spiders' remaining respectable moundsman.
     In the mid-1950s, the New York Yankees appeared to have a similar
arrangement with the Kansas City Athletics. In fact, before the A's moved to
the midwest from Philadelphia, the Yankees had a top farm club in Kansas City
for 18 seasons. For the rest of the 1950s, the Yankees and A's acted as if
nothing had changed. The Yankees shipped their tired or untried to Kansas
City for pennant-drive help in deals that often smacked of lend-lease. After
New York acquired Enos Slaughter in 1954, they couldn't find him playing time
in 1955, so they shipped him to KC with an end-of-the-line Johnny Sain.
Slaughter got about 500 at-bats with the A's before returning to the Yankees
for the 1956 stretch run and World Series heroics. Pitching prospect Ralph
Terry went to the A's for seasoning in 1957--Billy Martin accompanied Terry to
KC as punishment for his role in the Copacabana brawl--and came back two years
later, ready to win 76 games for the final phase of the dynasty, including a
league-high 23 in 1962.
     Other key Yankee reinforcements from Kansas City included pitchers Ryne
Duren, Bobby Shantz, Art Ditmar, Murry Dickson and Duke Maas, plus outfielders
Hector Lopez, lend-leaser Bob Cerv (he hit 38 homers, drove in 104 runs, and
batted .305 in 1958, and followed up with a 20, 87, .285 season, so the Yanks
decided to get him back), and Roger Maris. KC pried the future two-time MVP
from the Indians in June 1958, and shipped him to the Yankees eighteen months
later.
     The most suspicious of the sixteen deals between the clubs over the last
half of the quiet decade involved Clete Boyer. The A's signed the bonus-baby
third baseman in 1955 and kept him on their roster for the most of the
required two seasons, then shipped him to New York with Shantz and Ditmar
after the 1956 season for a package of junk. The A's later admitted that they
had signed Boyer on the Bombers' behalf. Commissioner Ford Frick ruled that
Boyer had to complete his bonus period with the A's prior to going to New
York, but otherwise neither party was punished for this shady deal.
     A similar "birds-of-a-feather deal" appeared to begin in June 1983 when
the Orioles shipped catcher Floyd "Sugar Bear" Rayford to the Cardinals for
outfielder Tito Landrum. The following March 25, Landrum returned to the
Cards for minor league hurler Jose Brito. Five days later, Rayford went back
to the Orioles for $50,000, the minor league draft price that Brito would have
fetched.
     The Giants became the dominant team in the National League during the
first part of the 20th century, largely thanks to Mathewson and John J.
McGraw. The Giants got more than strong leadership when McGraw joined the New
York club in July, 1902, after selling his interest in the fledgling American
League's Baltimore Orioles. The Little Napoleon's withdrawal from the AL
ended a stormy one and a half seasons characterized by suspensions and feuds
with the league's patriarch and president, Ban Johnson. For revenge, McGraw
conspired with Oriole outfielder Joe Kelley's father-in-law and Andrew
Freedman, who owned the Giants in partnership with Brush, to acquire a
majority stake in the Orioles. Upon taking control, Freedman released nearly
half the Baltimore roster:  catcher Roger Bresnahan, pitchers Joe McGinnity
and Jack Cronin, first baseman Dan McGann, and outfielders Cy Williams and
Kelley, who became manager of the Reds and took Williams with him to
Cincinnati. The other four players joined McGraw's Giants.
     As the new league warred with the senior circuit, players made the best
of the opportunity to switch to the highest bidder. Big-name league jumpers
included Boston third baseman Jimmy Collins and Philadelphia second baseman
Napoleon Lajoie, who both moved from the NL to AL teams in the same city. The
Lajoie jump wound up in the courts--so much for "the good old days when all
the action was on the field."  To circumvent a 1902 temporary restraining
order barring Lajoie from playing with any team in Philadelphia except the NL
Phillies, Ban Johnson arranged to deal Lajoie to the Cleveland Indians, owned
by the league's financial angel, Charles Somers. Six Pittsburgh Pirates, most
notably pitcher Jack Chesbro, agreed to become New York Highlanders for the
1903 season, while AL batting champ Big Ed Delahanty was signed by the NL
Giants from the Senators. The latter move displeased officials of both
leagues, since Delahanty had been property of the NL Phillies prior to jumping
to the AL.
     The leagues made peace after the 1902 season, accepting player jumps
prior to the 1902 season and individually deciding the fates of 16 players,
including Delahanty, Wee Willie Keeler, Wahoo Sam Crawford, Lajoie, and
Christy Mathewson, who had signed with the AL Philadelphia A's after that
date. The leagues also drafted a standard player contract that included the
reserve clause. For more than 70 years, except for the brief intervention of
the Federal League prior to American entry into World War One and the
post-World War Two Mexican League, players would have the choice of playing
for the team that held their contract, accepting whatever trade that club
might make for them, or finding another line of work.
     The war between the leagues spotlighted baseball's reliance on the golden
rule; whoever has the gold, rules. In order to stay afloat, owners of less
profitable franchises have been forced to sell their major assets, star
players. Twice during his half-century stewardship of the Philadelphia A's,
Connie Mack faced this dilemma. In both cases, he chose to keep the
franchise.
     Second baseman Eddie Collins, keystone of the Athletics' $100,000 infield
that won three AL flags from 1910 to 1914, was sold to the White Sox following
the A's 4-0 loss to the Boston Braves in the 1914 World Series. By the middle
of the 1915 season, Mack had sold off pitchers Herb Pennock and Bob Shawkey,
shortstop Jack Barry and rightfielder Eddie Murphy from the defending champs.
By the opening of the 1918 campaign, the last of the $100,000 infield members,
first baseman Stuffy McInnis, had been traded away.
     Frustration influenced Connie Mack's decision to dismantle the A's. So
did the specter of the Federal League, which had already spirited away star
pitchers Chief Bender and Eddie Plank. Ban Johnson, seeking to keep his
league profitable, influenced Collins' destination. The Chicago Federals had
signed Walter Johnson (Washington later signed him back), so President Johnson
wanted an AL star in town to balance the Big Train. Similarly, Shoeless Joe
Jackson was sold to Chicago by the Cleveland Indians for $30,000 and three
bodies in late 1915.
     Mack invested some of the nearly $200,000 his sales accumulated to
purchase minor leaguers and by the late 1920s the A's were competitive again.
The lineup boasted future Hall of Famers Jimmie Foxx, Lefty Grove, Al Simmons
and Mickey Cochrane and made three straight trips to the Series starting in
1929. But after losing the 1931 Series and falling behind the revitalized
Yankees in 1932, Mack began stripping his team. Despite the championships,
Mack was losing money in a depression that showed no signs of letting up.
Outfielders Al Simmons and Mule Haas were sold to the White Sox with second
baseman Jimmy Dykes for $150,000. Before the 1934 season got underway, sale
items included pitchers Lefty Grove, Hank McDonald, Rube Walberg, and George
Earnshaw, and Hall of Fame catcher Mickey Cochrane.
     The start of the Federal League may have cost Philadelphia its top stars,
but it was the end of the rival league that drove the Red Sox star center
fielder Tris Speaker out of Boston. When the rival circuit disbanded before
the 1916 season, Red Sox owner Joseph Lannin wanted to cut Speaker's salary
back to its pre-Federal League level, from $18,000 to $9,000. Speaker said
he'd rather sit than accept that 50 percent cut. Loath to see one of his
league's prime gate attractions on the sidelines, President Johnson arranged
to deal Speaker to the Cleveland Indians for pitcher Sad Sam Jones, third
baseman Fred Thomas and $55,000. Speaker threatened not to report, but
Johnson persuaded Lannin to share $10,000 of the purchase price with Speaker.
Jones posted 16 of his 229 major league victories for the pennant winning 1918
Sox, but Cleveland got the better of the deal. The Gray Eagle was their
signature player for the next decade, leading the AL in batting in 1916,
taking over as the Tribe's manager in 1919 and leading them to their first
world championship in 1920.
     If Bostonians were furious over the Speaker trade and glad to see Lannin
sell the team after a World Series victory in 1916, the joy was short-lived.
New owner Harry Frazee, a theatrical producer specializing in flops, joined
Mack as a prolific vendor of talent to the rest of the league. After
purchasing several of Mack's A's, the Sox were short of funds even though they
won the 1918 World Series, so Frazee sold pitchers Ernie Shore, Dutch Leonard
and Carl Mays, plus outfielder Duffy Lewis to the Yankees, netting over
$50,000.
     After the 1919 season, Frazee needed additional cash, so he dispatched
Babe Ruth to the Yankees for $125,000 plus a $300,000 loan secured by Fenway
Park. Although Frazee brazenly declared that the Sox would be better off
without Ruth, the deal stands unchallenged as the most lopsided transaction in
baseball history. For good measure, and more Yankee dollars, over the next
two years Frazee sent to New York pitchers Waite Hoyt, Joe Bush, Sad Sam
Jones, catcher Wally Schang, shortstop Everett Scott, and third baseman Joe
Dugan. By the time the Yanks acquired pitcher Red Ruffing from Boston for
outfielder Cederic Durst and $50,000 in May 1930, Frazee had established
himself as chief architect of the Yankee dynasty.
     The Yankees weren't alone in wooing Frazee to acquire Ruth. John McGraw
put in a bid on the Sox slugger but was rebuffed. So McGraw turned his
attention to the best righthanded hitter around, St. Louis Cardinal second
baseman Rogers Hornsby. Reportedly, during the winter of 1919-1920 McGraw
offered Branch Rickey $250,000 for his star (another report pegged the offer
at five players and a more reasonable $70,000). Hornsby's six straight
batting titles from 1920-1925, with triple crowns in 1922 and 1925, may have
inspired Rickey's maxim, "Some of the best deals are the ones you don't make."
But back in 1919, the stumbling block was a replacement second baseman.
Rickey wanted Frankie Frisch, the Fordham Flash, who had batted .226 and
stolen 15 bases in a 54-game rookie campaign. McGraw refused to part with his
future captain and debating partner.
     When the Giants faltered, the Cardinals took the world championship in
1926 with Hornsby serving as manager. The Rajah's production dropped, and his
dictatorial manner had players near rebellion. But Hornsby's biggest problem
was with owner Harry Breadon, whom Hornsby had cursed in full view of the
Cardinal players when Breadon refused to cancel an exhibition game during the
1926 pennant race. Breadon ordered Rickey to trade the manager. So Rickey,
whose gospel included "better to trade a player a year too early than a year
too late," offered the 30-year old second sacker to McGraw for Frisch, who had
averaged 28 steals per year but had gotten on the wrong side of his manager.
The Giants sweetened the deal with pitcher Jimmy Ring and the two second
basemen were swapped. Hornsby batted .361 while leading the NL in runs scored
for the Giants, and Cardinal Frisch took the stolen-base crown, but neither
club won the flag in 1927.
     Predictably, the strong wills of McGraw and Hornsby clashed, resulting in
the Rajah's exit to the Boston Braves for catcher Shanty Hogan and outfielder
Jimmy Welsh following the 1927 season. After a seventh batting crown with the
Braves in 1928, Boston sent him to the Cubs for five players and an
irresistible $200,000. Hornsby took over for Joe McCarthy as manager of the
Cubs at the end of 1930 and continued through nearly two-thirds of the 1932
campaign before angering another owner. Charlie Grimm took the reins from
Hornsby and led the club to the pennant. Hornsby began the 1933 season with
the Cardinals but moved across town to the Browns as player-manager with 54
games to go and remained there through the 1937 season, never finishing in the
first division. Frisch was a key member of the Cardinals' Gas House Gang,
going to the World Series in 1928, 1930 and 1931. The Fordham Flash became
their manager in the middle of 1933, led them to a World Series victory over
the Tigers in 1934, and stayed at the helm until the tail end of the 1938
season.
     The Red Sox passed into the capable hands and deep pockets of Tom Yawkey
in 1933, just in time to participate in Connie Mack's final Philadelphia fire
sale. That December, marginal pitcher Bob Kline, shortstop Rabbit Warstler
plus $125,000 brought the Red Sox Hall of Famer Grove, plus pitcher Walberg
and second baseman Max Bishop. Two Decembers later, $150,000 of Yawkey's
cash, minor league catcher George Savino, and 2-10 righthander Gordon Rhodes
pried Hall of Fame slugger Jimmie Foxx from Mack.
     Throughout the Depression, Yawkey's cash made him a popular man with
Boston fans and AL owners alike. The Red Sox bought a number of quality
players, including outfielders Bing Miller and Henie Manush, and the brothers
Ferrell, catcher Rick and pitcher Wes, in separate deals. (Subsequently, in
the only transaction of its kind, the batterymate brothers were traded
together to the Senators in 1937 for outfielder Ben Chapman and pitcher Bobo
Newsom.)  In another family affair, Washington owner Clark Griffith
reluctantly sold his Hall of Fame shortstop and son-in-law Joe Cronin to the
Sox after the 1934 season for $225,000 and shortstop Lyn Lary. Legend has it
that Yawkey swayed The Old Fox by saying, "I can do more for your son-in-law
than you can," and then signed Cronin to a $30,000 contract. (Lest anyone
suspect the Sox have gone soft on family ties, Boston managing partner Haywood
Sullivan sold his son, catcher Marc, to the Houston Astros prior to the 1988
season.)  Yawkey's acquisitions improved the Red Sox--not surprisingly since
they were 43-111 in 1932--but they failed to capture the AL flag until 1946.
     The Cubs rivaled the Cards as the NL's best team during the Depression on
the strength of the Wrigley family bank account and trades for Hornsby, Kiki
Cuyler, and Chuck Klein. In 1938, they picked up Dizzy Dean, thought to be
finished after breaking a toe in the 1937 All-Star Game, then hurting his arm.
Dean dipsy-doodled his way to a 7-1, 1.81 season for the eventual World Series
sweep victims. The Reds unseated the Cubs in 1939 on the strength of trades
throughout the decade including those for pitchers Paul Derringer and Bucky
Walters, outfielder Ival Goodman and second baseman Lonnie Frey. But the
Reds' best deal of the 1930s was undone. They purchased Johnny Mize from the
Cards in December 1934, but returned the Big Cat when he showed up with a bad
knee. Mize averaged 26 homers in six seasons for the Cards, notching a pair
of home run titles before going to the Giants after the 1941 season for three
no-names and 50 grand. Two homer crowns later, Mize moved to the Yankees in
August 1949 for $40,000, helping New York win its first of 10 pennants under
skipper Casey Stengel. Mize led the AL in pinch hits three times as the
Yankees made five straight trips to the World Series during his tenure in the
Bronx.
     Upon purchasing the Indians in June 1946, Bill Veeck hoped to stick it to
the Yankees, symbols of the baseball establishment he detested. After the 1946
season, Veeck stole lefty knuckleballer Gene Bearden, 20-7 with a league-best
2.43 ERA for the Tribe's 1948 world champions, along with pitcher Al Gettel
and three-toed outfielder Hal Peck, both helpful in restoring the Tribe to
respectability in 1947, for catcher Sherm Lollar and second baseman Ray Mack,
neither much good as Yankees. Veeck selected Bearden from a list of prospects
on the advice of Casey Stengel, who had managed for Veeck's Milwaukee Brewers
in the American Association. Before 1948, Veeck got outfielder Allie Clark, a
.310 hitter with 38 RBI as a part-timer, for pitcher Red Embree, who had eight
wins left in his major league career.
     The usual show-biz flair characterized Veeck's stewardship. St. Louis
Browns utility infielder Johnny Berardino refused a trade to the Senators over
the winter of 1947 and announced his retirement to pursue a promising career
in the movies. Veeck quickly acquired Berardino for outfielder Catfish
Metkovich and $50,000 (a broken finger caused the Brownies to return Metkovich
and settle for an additional $15,000), then wooed the 30-year-old actor back
into baseball by offering a higher salary plus an attendance clause, a movie
contract (Veeck's Cleveland investors included Bob Hope), and insuring
Berardino's face for $1 million, the same amount riding on Betty Grable's
legs. Berardino, who went on to stardom in the General Hospital soap opera,
generated loads of publicity, but Veeck's pursuit had a solid baseball
foundation. Detroit, second-place finishers in 1947, desperately needed a
second baseman, and Veeck wanted to keep Berardino out of the Tigers'
clutches.
     Amid the sideshows and promotions, Veeck's key deal to make the Tribe
world champions in 1948 was that most rare type, one that benefited both
teams. The Indians had a magnificent shortstop in Lou Boudreau, who also
served as their manager, but they needed a quality second baseman to pair with
him. At the 1946 World Series, Veeck met his Yankee counterpart Lee MacPhail,
an angry spectator on the prowl for pitching. He offered MacPhail 31-year-old
righthander Allie Reynolds, four games over .500 after four years in the
Indians' rotation. Veeck decoyed, suggesting that MacPhail trade him George
"Snuffy" Stirnweiss, an infielder with two stolen base crowns and a batting
title to his credit during the war years. MacPhail balked, counteroffering
31-year-old second baseman Joe Gordon with whom he'd been feuding. That was
the man Veeck wanted.
     With Boudreau and Gordon in the middle of the infield, the 1947 Indians
turned 31 more double plays and led the league in fielding, tacking on a
second fielding crown in 1948. Gordon piled up 29 homers and 93 RBIs in his
first season in Cleveland and followed up with a 32-homer, 124-RBI, .280
campaign for the 1948 world champs. Reynolds went 19-8, leading the AL in
winning percentage for the pennant winning 1947 Yankees, then topped the
league in ERA, shutouts and strikeouts while winning 20 in 1952. A stalwart
in the Yankee rotation through 1954, Reynolds finished his career at 182-107,
75 games over .500. The Indians got their world championship with Gordon, and
the Yankees got six, the way things went back then. The Indians' World Series
triumph over the Boston Braves in 1948 would be the last for an AL squad other
than the Yankees until the Orioles swept the Dodgers in 1966.
     When the Yankees didn't reach the World Series in 1954 after five
straight visits, general manager George Weiss took dramatic action,
engineering a record 18-player deal with the Orioles, commencing November 18,
1954 and winding up the next May when pitcher Art Schallock went to Baltimore
via the waiver wire. The Yankees got the better of the mess, largely composed
of marginal players, most notably hurlers Don Larsen and Bob Turley. Larsen,
3-21 for the 1954 Birds, went 45-24 in five seasons wearing the pinstripes,
adding three World Series victories including his perfect game in 1956.
Turley went 17-13 for the resurgent 1955 Yankees, and took the Cy Young Award
in 1958, leading the AL with 21 wins and 19 complete games. Turley also
contributed from the bench as an expert pitch stealer, tipping off Mickey
Mantle and others about the upcoming delivery with a whistle or clap.
     The New York-Kansas City pipeline during the 1950s prompted one of
baseball's best nicknames:  Harry "Suitcase" Simpson. The outfielder-first
baseman spent three uneventful seasons in Cleveland, batting .266 once, under
.230 twice, then found himself back in the minors in 1954 at age 28. Simpson
climbed back onto the Indians' roster in 1955 but after three appearances was
sold to the A's on May 11 and thus his saga began. Simpson batted .300 for
the A's and thought he had found a home. In 1956 he led the AL in triples
with 11, hit 21 homers, drove in 105 runs, and batted .293, exploits that
earned the attention of the Yankees. On June 15, 1957, Simpson and his .296
batting average went to New York with pitcher Ryne Duren and outfielder Jim
Pisoni in exchange for Ralph Terry, Woodie Held, and brawling Billy Martin.
Simpson finished 1957 with a .270 average and again led the league with nine
triples. Exactly one year later, June 15, 1958, the Yankees sent Simpson back
to Kansas City with pitcher Bob Grim for pitchers Duke Maas and Virgil Trucks.
He ended the 1958 season with a .255 mark and opened the 1959 season in Kansas
City, but a month into the campaign he was traded to the White Sox for third
baseman Ray Boone. Fifteen weeks later, Simpson was traded to Pittsburgh with
a minor league infielder for Ted Kluszewski. Pittsburgh sold Simpson back to
the White Sox at the end of the season. With no frequent flyer programs to
motivate him, Simpson never returned to the majors. In all, he logged six
trades, five of them in 26 months, all but the finale in mid-season.
     During this same era, Frank Lane served as general manager for the White
Sox, Cardinals, Indians and A's. He helped construct the White Sox squad that
interrupted the Yankee's stranglehold on the AL pennant, then earned the wrath
of Cleveland fans by trading 1959 AL homer leader (tied at 42 with Harmon
Killebrew) and local hero Rocky Colavito for Detroit's 1959 batting titlist
Harvey Kuenn. The move was splashy and daring, but helped neither team unseat
the Yankees. Lane may be best remembered for his mid-1960 swap of managers,
acquiring Jimmy Dykes to lead his Indians and sending Joe Gordon to pilot the
Tigers.
     Stan Musial, the St. Louis Cardinals' finest player of the post-war era,
retired after the 1963 season, having last visited a World Series in 1946. In
1964, the Cards won their first of three pennants and two world titles during
the 1960s. After selling future Hall of Fame reliever Hoyt Wilhelm to
Cleveland in September 1957, the Cards ran off a string of trading successes
nearly unbroken for a dozen years that would have made Branch Rickey proud.
     The construction of the Cardinals' championship teams of the 1960s dates
from the December 5, 1957 acquisition of center fielder Curt Flood, along with
outfielder Joe Taylor, from the Reds for pitchers Marty Kutyna and Ted Wieand.
Before a later deal made him famous, Flood won six Gold Gloves and batted over
.300 six times (under .296 once) between 1961 and 1969. At the end of spring
training in 1959, fine-fielding first baseman Bill White was acquired from the
Giants, who had plenty of other lefthanded first basemen, with third baseman
Ray Jablonski for another pair of pitchers, Don Choate, who never had a major
league victory, and Sam Jones. At 33, this second Sad Sam topped the NL with
22 wins and a 2.83 ERA in 1959 and won 18 more games in 1960, then dropped off
severely. White batted at least .283, topping .300 four times, in seven
seasons with the Cards, knocked in 100 runs three times and averaged 20
homers, while collecting a Gold Glove annually. With Ken Boyer anchoring
third base, St. Louis secured the remainder of the infield for their 1964
championship squad with help from Pittsburgh. Second baseman Julian Javier
escaped the shadow of perennial all-star Bill Mazeroski in May 1960, and
shortstop Dick Groat, NL batting champion in 1960 for the world champion Bucs,
arrived in '63.
     These moves made the Cardinals contenders, six games behind the Dodgers
in 1963, but the Redbirds needed more help to get over the top. They got it
from their long-standing rivals, the Chicago Cubs. The Cards sent pitchers
Ernie Broglio and Bobby Shantz plus part-time outfielder Doug Clemens to
Chicago for a couple of marginal hurlers and an outfielder three days short of
his 25th birthday named Lou Brock. Broglio hurt his arm and went 7-19 in
three seasons with Chicago before dropping from sight. Shantz recorded a loss
during his two months in Chicago before moving to Philadelphia, his eighth and
final major league team.
     In his 16 years with the Cardinals, Brock picked up where Maury Wills
left off in re-establishing the stolen base as an integral part of major
league offenses. All but 50 of Brock's career-record 938 steals were made in
a St. Louis uniform, including a then-season record 118 in 1974. Brock ranks
second to Stan Musial in hits, runs, total bases, and doubles for the Cards,
finishing with 3,023 hits and a ticket to Cooperstown. With Brock igniting
the offense from the leadoff spot, the 1964 Cardinals squeaked past the
Philadelphia Phillies in a wild pennant race and defeated the New York
Yankees. The Cards won again in 1967 and lost a seventh game to Mickey Lolich
and the Detroit Tigers in 1968. Brock's seven steals in both the 1967 and
1968 remain single-Series standards. In 21 October classic games, Brock
batted .391, tops among participants in 20 or more Series games, and is tied
with Eddie Collins for the Series career lead with 14 steals.
     The Dodgers matched the Cards with three pennants in the 1960s, with
trips to the Series in 1963, 1965 and 1966, aided by deals providing bullpen
support for the homegrown hurlers. They shipped third baseman Don Zimmer to
the Cubs for reliever Ron Perranoski, as well as third baseman John Goryl, a
minor league outfielder and $25,000, just before opening day in 1960. After a
year of seasoning in the minors, Perranoski became a dominant reliever, going
16-3 with a 1.67 ERA and saving 23 games for the 1963 champs. He saved the
Dodgers' only 1963 World Series triumph that wasn't a complete game in their
stunning sweep of the Yankees. Before the 1966 season, the Dodgers got
reliever Phil "The Vulture" Regan from the Tigers for utility infielder Dick
Tracewski. Regan imitated Perranoski's previous heroics, with a 14-1, 1.62
mark and league leading 21 saves for 1966 pennant winners.
     The Cards kept dealing. In May 1966, they got another first baseman from
the Giants, Orlando Cepeda, for lefthander Ray Sadecki, a 20-game winner in
1964 who never again broke a dozen wins. Cepeda dubbed his new club "El
Birdos," then batted .325 in 1967 with 25 homers and an NL best 111 RBIs to
receive National League MVP honors. Traded to the Braves for Joe Torre during
spring training in 1969, Cepeda helped Atlanta win the first NL West crown,
but there's no word as to whether he called his new club "El Bravos."  Roger
Maris, acquired from the Yankees at the winter meetings before the 1967 season
for third baseman Charley Smith, allowed the Cards to move Mike Shannon from
right-field to third.
     The Cincinnati Reds followed Rickey's adage about trading a player a year
too soon when they sent Frank Robinson, an "old 30," according to the Reds'
brain trust, to the Baltimore Orioles for pitchers Milt Pappas, Jack
Baldschun, and Dick Simpson. But what a year too soon it turned out to be.
Robinson won the triple crown and MVP as the Orioles collected their
first-ever world championship. The O's bagged another three American League
pennants and a second world title during Robinson's six seasons in Baltimore.
The trio of pitchers Cincinnati received recorded a total of 31 victories for
the Reds, and none of them was still in the majors when Robby hung up his
spikes in 1976.
     Trades helped rebuild the Reds after the Robinson disaster, adding key
components to a farm system harvest that included Pete Rose, Tony Perez,
Johnny Bench, and Dave Concepcion. The team was perennially short of starting
pitching but picked up relievers to back Sparky Anderson's Captain Hook act
and had phenomenal success trading for position players.
     After the 1968 season, the Reds traded aging center-fielder Vada Pinson
to the Cardinals for center-fielder Bobby Tolan, who led the NL in steals with
57 in 1970, batted .316 with 16 homers and 80 RBIs and seemed ready for
greater things before a torn Achilles' tendon kept him out for the entire 1971
campaign. As if that wasn't enough, the deal also brought the Reds' reliever
Wayne Granger, who paced the NL with 35 saves in 1970. In May 1971, sending
pitcher Vern Geishert and shortstop Frank Duffy to San Francisco secured
George Foster, winner of three consecutive RBI titles starting in 1976.
     After a fourth place finish in 1971, their last sub-.500 season until
1982, the Reds sent the right side of their infield (first baseman Lee May and
second baseman Tommy Helms) to the Astros with outfielder Jimmy Stewart for
super center-fielder Cesar Geronimo, third baseman Dennis Menke (moving Tony
Perez to a more comfortable existence at first base), pitcher Jack Billingham,
who became the workhorse of the Cincinnati starting staff, reserve outfielder
Ed Armbrister, and second baseman Joe Morgan, who notched MVP honors in 1975
and 1976. The trade gave the Reds classic strength up the middle, with
Geronimo, Morgan, Concepcion, and Bench receiving Gold Gloves annually from
1974 to 1977.
     Trades boosted other 1970s winners. Early in the decade, the Yankees
acquired Graig Nettles and Chris Chambliss to anchor the corners, Lou Piniella
and Oscar Gamble as platooning doctors of hitology, and stole reliever Sparky
Lyle from the Red Sox for first baseman Danny Cater, who murdered Boston
hurlers but few others. Center-fielder and offensive catalyst Mickey Rivers
and stalwart starter Ed Figueroa were acquired for Bobby Bonds at the winter
meetings of 1975, as was second baseman Willie Randolph with pitchers Ken
Brett and Dock Ellis from the Pirates for Doc Medich. The Yankees also
bolstered the rival Orioles by sending key lefthanders Scott McGregor and
Tippy Martinez, righties Rudy May and Dave Pagan, plus catcher Rick Dempsey to
Baltimore for pitchers Ken Holtzman, Grant Jackson and Doyle Alexander, all of
whom would do their best work elsewhere, and washed-up catcher Elrod Hendricks
on June 15, 1976. The three-time world champion A's supplemented their fine
nucleus with Holtzman, acquired before the 1972 campaign for center-fielder
Rick Monday, first baseman Mike Epstein, and reliever Darold Knowles in 1971,
center-fielder Billy North before the 1973 campaign, and a succession of DHs
such as Orlando Cepeda, Deron Johnson, Rico Carty, and Billy Williams from NL
clubs, at bargain prices since the senior circuit had less use for their
single skill. The Dodgers, who provided the Reds with their most serious
competition in the NL West, annually shored up their offense with used power
hitters:  Richie Allen for 1971; Frank Robinson and Larry Hisle for 1972;
Jimmy Wynn for 1974, and Reggie Smith in 1976, along with Dusty Baker, both of
whom lasted into the 1980s. They won the 1974 West title as reliever Mike
Marshall, acquired from Montreal the previous winter for aged speedster Willie
Davis, appeared in a record 106 games, ringing up a 15-12, 21 save log.
     Three of the game's all-time great hurlers were involved in trades during
the 1970s. The Mets, following their post-1969 season trade of Amos Otis to
Kansas City for third base flop Joe Foy, acquired Jim Fregosi from the
California Angels for a scatter-armed fireballer named Nolan Ryan and three
prospects. The Phils heisted Steve Carlton from the Cards in February 1972
for Rick Wise. In June 1977, the Mets sent Tom Seaver to the Reds for
outfielders Steve Henderson and Dan Norman, second baseman Doug Flynn, and
pitcher Pat Zachry, a deal brought on by a contract dispute and sealed by a
vendetta conducted against Seaver by columnist Dick Young on behalf of the
Mets' chairman M. Donald Grant. In the aftermath of the trade, Shea Stadium
became known as Grant's Tomb.
     The deal with the greatest impact on the 1970s was made in October 1969,
when the Cardinals tried to send Curt Flood to the Phillies in a seven-player
swap. Although Flood lost his suit against the reserve clause, the challenge
alerted owners to the need for concessions and brought arbitrators into the
game. The arbitrator's ruling that ended the reserve system in 1975 came
about in part because of lefthander Dave McNally's refusal to sign a contract
for 1975 following his trade from the Orioles to Montreal. An arbitrator
declared Oakland A's star pitcher Catfish Hunter a free agent following the
1974 season, because owner Charles O. Finley had reneged on paying for an
annuity. Baseball owners got a taste of what was to come. After leading the
AL with 25 wins, his fourth consecutive 20-plus win season, and a 2.49 ERA,
Hunter was the object of lively bidding before agreeing to a five-year, $3.75
million contract with the Yankees on New Year's Eve. At the time, the average
major league salary was under $45,000. Before the 1981 season, an arbitrator
declared Boston catcher Carlton Fisk a free agent because the Red Sox had
failed to mail him a contract on time, allowing Fisk to change to the White
Sox. Arbitrators found major league owners guilty of collusion to restrain
free agent movement after the 1985 and 1986 seasons, and seven Class of '85
members were granted a second chance at free agency prior to the '88 campaign.
Only outfielder Kirk Gibson signed with a new club, leaving Detroit for LA and
leading the Dodgers to postseason play.
     The run-up to the new free agent system in 1976 featured frantic dealing
by clubs unsure of where the chips would fall. Knowing that he couldn't
afford to keep all of his stars, Oakland A's owner Charles O. Finley traded
Reggie Jackson, Ken Holtzman, and a minor leaguer to Baltimore (which couldn't
afford them either) for Don Baylor and pitchers Mike Torrez and Paul Mitchell.
Thus began the era of rent-a-player, as teams tried to get something for
potential free agents they expected to lose, and receiving clubs hoped for
good salary-drive seasons. Bill Veeck used this approach with some success,
not to mention increased program sales, during his second stint with the White
Sox from 1976 to 1980, with one-year wonders like Richie Zisk and Oscar
Gamble.
     Realizing he couldn't outbid rich clubs for the best players, Finley
hoped to sell the remaining stars from the three-time world champion teams,
just as Connie Mack did with the franchise six decades earlier. Finley sold
pitcher Vida Blue to the Yankees, reportedly for $1.5 million, and outfielder
Joe Rudi and reliever Rollie Fingers to the Red Sox at $1 million each. Blue
never reached New York, but Fingers and Rudi reported to Boston on June 15 and
donned Red Sox uniforms, but didn't play in that evening's contest.
     The next day, Commissioner Bowie Kuhn barred the three players from
further competition pending his review, then undid the deals. Kuhn ruled that
Finley's sales would cheat the people of Oakland out of a competitive team.
(Commissioner Kuhn saw things differently than attorney Kuhn, who argued in
court for the Braves' right to abandon Milwaukee for Atlanta in 1965.)
Finley argued that the cash would allow him to rebuild a depleted farm system,
the best method for a low-income club like Oakland to compete in the age of
escalating salaries. Kuhn's edict also ignored the reality that the A's and
their fans would lose those free agents with no return at the end of the
season, as happened with Rudi, Fingers and host of others after 1976 (Blue had
been signed to a contract in anticipation of his sale). In December 1977,
Finley tried to sell Blue, this time to the Reds for $1.75 million, plus minor
league slugger Dave Revering. Kuhn again foiled Finley, establishing a
$400,000 per transaction cash limit still in effect. Later that winter,
Finley finally disposed of his prize lefty, shipping him across the bay to San
Francisco for seven players and $390,000.
     Traditionalist doomsayers predicted that free agency would ruin the fine
art of baseball trading, not to mention the game itself, just as divisional
play and the League Championship Series were supposed to kill the World
Series.
     Owners and fans had no reason to fear change. The post-Seitz free agent
system has added new dimensions to baseball's trading game, as well as
enhancing the game's competitive balance on the field and redistributing
income. With players free to change teams after six years in the big leagues,
teams had a new option for improving their rosters. The system also presented
front offices with whole new reasons to trade players.
     Dire predictions of how the richest teams would get the best players and
destroy the game's competitive balance under free agency conveniently ignored
nearly a century of baseball history. Modern free agency didn't alter the flow
of talent from the financially strapped teams to the better-off ones; it just
altered the direction of the cash. The money went to the player in the form of
salary instead of to his former team as the purchase price. From the dawn of
the professional game, talent has moved from the strapped teams to the
affluent ones. It was no coincidence that dynasties of the era before the
amateur draft were built by the wealthy teams. The dirty little secret of the
John J. McGraw New York Giants wasn't their connection to corrupt Tammany Hall
politicians, but their wealth, which enabled them to search deeper for talent,
sign more prospects, buy more talent from independent minor league operators,
and pay the players they needed. Winning meant more revenue, which helped
successful teams remain successful.
     The next dynasty, the New York Yankees, shared that same big market--and
for a time their home field--with the Giants. The Bronx dynasty began when
Boston Red Sox owner Harry Frazee sold his stars, most notably Babe Ruth, to
the Yanks to finance his theatrical ventures. Frazee's follies merely
continued a Red Sox tradition; his predecessor, Joseph Lannin, sold Tris
Speaker to Cleveland. Then, as now, salaries also mattered. Connie Mack twice
broke up multiple-World Champion Philadelphia Athletics teams because they
grew too costly. After all, the 1914 A's featured the $100,000 infield.
     The St. Louis Cardinals under Branch Rickey developed the farm system as
an antidote to wealthy teams' player purchases. His Cardinals joined the ranks
of the rich by selling farm system excesses to other teams and became the
dominant National League team between the wars.
     Even though talent flowed to the richest teams in the past and today,
teams have never been able to buy championships outright. After Tom Yawkey
purchased the Red Sox in 1933, the team became renowned for its generosity to
players and actively participated in the second breakup of the Athletics,
acquiring stars such as Lefty Grove and Jimmy Foxx. Still, during six decades
of Yawkey ownership, the Red Sox failed to duplicate their 1918 world
championship. Similarly the Yankees of the 1980s had the best overall won-lost
record of that decade, thanks in part to profligate free agent spending under
owner George Steinbrenner, but failed to win a title except for the truncated
1981 season. The Mets and Dodgers, the teams with the National League's
highest payrolls in 1992, inflated by free agent spending, were awful, while
the spendthrift Toronto Blue Jays won back-to-back world titles in 1992 and
1993. Successful franchises have, almost to a rule, blended home-grown talent
with players acquired from other teams, either through trades or free agent
signings. Wise spending beats free spending every time.
     The free agent rule change having the greatest impact on competition was
the institution of the amateur draft in 1965. Prior to the draft, teams
competed for prospects according to the golden rule--whoever has the gold
rules. The pool of amateur players was baseball's first free market, with all
teams competing equally to sign players and bind them to organizations for
life through the reserve clause. Richer teams could outbid rivals for top
prospects, even after bonus baby restrictions forced teams to keep high priced
signees on the major league roster. Just as important as contract money,
richer teams could outscout others, digging deeper to find talent and
bird-dogging harder to build relationships with teenaged prospects and their
families that were often as crucial to signings as money. The amateur draft,
with the worst teams picking first, eliminated a prospect's right to choose
his team, but it helped dismantle the dynasties by equalizing opportunities to
acquire the best young talent. That foundation gave teams better players to
keep and to trade.
     The other boost to competitiveness came with major league free agency.
The team with the best players could no longer hold on to them forever. After
six full years of major league service, a player not under contract could
offer his services in a free market, causing salaries to soar. Even collusion
among owners following the 1985, 1986, and 1987 seasons failed to destroy the
system and caused only a temporary pause in the dizzying pace of salary
escalation. A record number of free agents after the 1992 season may have
given owners a more useful lesson in controlling salaries. Scarcity has made
multimillionaires out of marginal players such as Danny Darwin, Matt Young,
and Franklin Stubbs because they were the best available at their positions in
that season's particular free agent class. When it became apparent that the
reserve clause would fall, Finley, in another show of his near-infallible
baseball business instincts, proposed letting every player become a free agent
every year. According to Finley, and most economists, in a free market,
increased supply would lower prices.
     Whether by design or happy accident, the system gave players their first
taste of freedom at or near the peaks of their careers. Age, not sloth,
suggests they'll likely earn more money for less output after signing
lucrative free agent contracts. Even with salary arbitration pushing up their
salaries after three years of major league service, young players generally
deliver better value for salary dollars than veterans past their sixth big
league season.
     That fact of life may have contributed to team success cycles replacing
the dynasties of old. As in the past, a team near the top will be most
inclined to acquire current stars for a piece of their future, either by
signing free agents or trading prospects. In most cases, their flow of minor
league talent eventually dries up, their star players age, and their payroll
is higher than their winning percentage, as happened to the Pittsburgh Pirates
of the mid-1980s. Under General Manager Syd Thrift, after letting free agent
Dave Parker walk, they traded away their aging stars and their salaries for
unproven talent: John Candelaria, Al Holland, and George Hendrick for Pat
Clements, Bob Kipper, and Mike Brown; Rick Rhoden, plus Clements and Cecilio
Guante, for future Cy Young-winner Doug Drabek, Brian Fisher, and Logan
Easley; Tony Pena for Andy Van Slyke, Mike LaValliere, and Mike Dunne. With
smart drafts, including Barry Bonds (but Jeff King instead of Greg Swindell),
and a terrific manager in Jim Leyland, they went--in the space of four
seasons--from three straight last place finishes to the first of three
straight division championships. Hit by free agency losses and economically
inspired trades, the cycle appears to be spinning downward again for the
Pirates as the mid-nineties approach. The Houston Astros, winner of the NL
West in 1986, began their rebuilding process in earnest after the 1990 season,
and after a last place finish in 1991, rebounded to .500 in 1992.
     Even though major league free agency offers a method to acquire players
without giving up one in return (under the current rules, signing a quality
free agent costs a draft choice, so the bill comes due years later), trades
remain the lifeblood of winning--and losing--teams, just as they have for over
a century.
     The signings of Reggie Jackson and relief ace Rich Gossage were driving
forces in the Yankees' four AL East titles and a pair of world championships
in the first five years of free agency. Equally important were trades for
defensive specialist Paul Blair, shortstop Bucky Dent, pitcher Mike Torrez,
and reliever Ron Davis. The "We Are Family" Pirates of 1979 were abetted by
trades for outfielder Mike Easler, second baseman Phil Garner, pitchers Bert
Blyleven and Rick Rhoden, shortstop Tim Foli, and, finally, on June 28, Bill
Madlock to fill the troublesome third base slot. The deal was notable in
addition to its pennant implications for including infielder Lenny Randle, who
had slugged manager Frank Lucchesi while a member of the Texas Rangers in the
spring of 1977, and pitcher Ed Whitson, who would slug manager Billy Martin
while a member of the Yankees in 1985. Madlock never got beyond shoving his
glove into umpire Jerry Crawford's face in 1980.
     The Phillies, who divided NL East honors with the Pirates between 1975
and 1980, combined a potent farm system that produced Mike Schmidt, Greg
Luzinski, Larry Bowa, Bob Boone, and others, the continuing dominance of Steve
Carlton, and sharp trades for pitchers Jim Lonborg and Jim Kaat, second
baseman Dave Cash, center fielder and secretary of defense Garry Maddox, and
Rollie Fingers from San Diego (with pitcher Bob Shirley and catchers Gene
Tenace and Bob Geren for catchers Terry Kennedy and Steve Swisher, utility
infielder Mike Phillips and four pitchers of little note), and, one day later
at the winter meetings, Bruce Sutter from the Cubs (for first baseman Leon
Durham, third baseman Ken Reitz, and utility man Ty Waller). The Cards then
shipped Fingers to Milwaukee with pitcher Pete Vuckovich and catcher Ted
Simmons for outfielders Sixto Lezcano and David Green, plus pitchers Lary
Sorensen and Dave LaPoint. The deal helped bring the Cards and Brewers
together for the 1982 World Series, as Fingers (1981) and Vuckovich (1982) won
back-to-back Cy Young Awards, the only pitchers in the same trade to pull off
that feat.
     The Cards reloaded for three trips to the World Series during the 1980s
with smart deals for: Ozzie Smith (with two pitchers from the Padres for Garry
Templeton, Sixto Lezcano, and Luis DeLeon); Lonnie Smith (in a three-team
trade also involving the Indians and Phillies that cost St. Louis pitchers
Silvio Martinez and Lary Sorensen); and Willie McGee (from the Yankees for
pitcher Bob Sykes), all before the 1982 world championship. Coming later were
John Tudor (with Brian Harper, who would have had the game winning RBI in the
sixth game of the 1985 World Series but for Don Denkinger's infamous call at
first base, for George Hendrick and a minor league catcher), and Jack Clark
(from the Giants for David Green, Dave LaPoint, Gary Rajsich, and that
ultimate player to be named later, Jose Gonzalez, who became Jose Uribe).
     Free agency has actually lubricated the trade market. Impending free
agency has created a new reason to trade a player. The David Cone trade--in
which the Toronto Blue Jays leased the pitcher from the Mets for forty days
plus the postseason--illustrates the evolution of the art, and how much
potential free agency devalues the player. For a twenty-nine-year-old pitcher
en route to a third straight National League strikeout title with the best
stuff in the game this side of Roger Clemens, the Mets received only unproven
infielder Jeff Kent and marginal prospect Ryan Thompson. Unable to land a
pitcher for the 1993 stretch run due to expansion depleting the arms supply,
the Jays traded farm system jewel Steve Karsay for free agent-to-be Rickey
Henderson, a stiffer price, and some suggested the Jays would have been better
off simply promoting Karsay from Double A. He joined the Oakland rotation
after the trade, and could well prove the cynics right.
     The biggest blockbuster of 1992, in which the Oakland A's traded Jose
Canseco for Ruben Sierra, plus pitchers Jeff Russell and Bobby Witt, was also
inspired by free agency and its side effect, big salaries. The A's were
obligated to pay Canseco nearly $15 million through the 1995 season. So, in
addition to adding a couple of pitchers for the stretch drive, the A's lopped
off a long term commitment, giving them time to assess whether salaries were
indeed heading downward.
     Some observers might cite these deals as proof of how the game has
changed. Yet salaries inflated by the Federal League led to the breakup of the
A's champions of the 1910s and the sale of Tris Speaker. Trades have always
been a factor in the useful life of a player, which in the past meant solely
age, rather than including today's contract considerations. The rules have
changed and the possibilities have grown, but the sizzle of players changing
teams--by their choice or that of their bosses--remains a baseball staple.
     The baseball strike of 1981 resulted in a new way to acquire players, a
compensation pool from which teams losing a top-ranked free agent (as
determined by a complex statistical system) could choose an unprotected player
from any team. The most important picks from the short-lived pool, which
ended with the Basic Agreement signed in 1985, were fireballing Toronto closer
Tom Henke; reliever Donnie Moore, instrumental in the Angels' 1986 AL West
title; righthander Tim Belcher, a key to the Dodgers' 1988 success, who had
previously been plucked by the Oakland A's days after signing out of college
with the Yankees; and the Chicago White Sox's selection of Tom Seaver in 1984
after the Mets had brought their all-time leading pitcher back with great
fanfare in 1983 to restore faith in the franchise. Perhaps there was some
justice in the Mets' random loss of Seaver since they acquired him through a
similar stroke.
     William Eckert's most meaningful act in his tenure as Commissioner
involved picking a slip out of a hat, awarding Seaver to the Mets. Seaver had
been drafted off the Southern Cal campus in January of that year and signed by
the Atlanta Braves, but his contract was invalidated on a technicality, while
the NCAA ruled him ineligible for further college competition. Threatened
with a lawsuit unless the righthander was allowed to sign another pro contract
immediately, Eckert offered Seaver to any club that would match the Braves
$40,000 bonus. Three teams expressed interest, the Indians, Phillies, and
Mets, and on April 3, Eckert pulled New York's slip out of a hat and a
franchise out of the wilderness.
     Today's serious consideration of salary, contract term and major league
tenure that go into making deals shouldn't obscure how zany trades can be.
Perhaps today's game is too sophisticated to again see a club pay its rent for
spring training facilities in Little Rock with Tris Speaker, as the Red Sox
did in 1908. At least the Sox were farsighted enough to retain the option to
repurchase Speaker from Little Rock in the Southern Association for the $500
they owed in rent. Perhaps several decades' perspective will uncover a deal
as amusing as that 1939 trade sending outfielder Gee Walker to the Senators
from the White Sox for outfielder Taffy Wright and pitcher Pete Appleton.
Someday we may see a repeat of the Cardinals and Cubs exchange of outfielders
Max Flack and Cliff Heathcoate between games of a May 30, 1922 doubleheader,
although the modern version will likely require a preceding rain out.
     Rest assured, trade history can repeat itself. The Mets obtained Harry
Chiti from Cleveland on April 26, 1962, for a player to be named later. After
watching Chiti hit .195 in 15 games, the Mets named Chiti as the player to be
sent to the Indians. In September 1987, the Cubs sent reliever Dickie Noles
to assist the Tigers' bare bullpen in their pennant drive for that PTBNL. It
was rumored that Noles was the forward scout for a larger deal between the
clubs, involving the Cubs' hard-hitting, harder-gloved third baseman Keith
Moreland. However, in November, Chicago GM Dallas Green resigned and any
contemplated deal fell apart. The clubs haggled unsuccessfully on a fair
price for Noles, eventually agreeing to make him the Cubs' player to be named.
     A recent trend in the market seems to be many players for one star, such
as the Phillies' acquisition of Von Hayes from the Indians at the 1982 winter
meetings for outfielder George Vukovich, catcher Jerry Willard, pitcher Jay
Baller, and infielders Manny Trillo and Julio Franco. The Yankees got Rickey
Henderson (and pitcher Bert Bradley) from the A's after the 1983 season for
outfielder Stan Javier and pitchers Eric Plunk, Jose Rijo, Jay Howell, and Tim
Birtsas. The Mets snatched catcher Gary Carter from the Expos after the 1984
season for infielder Hubie Brooks, outfielder Herm Winningham, pitcher Floyd
Youmans, and catcher Mike Fitzgerald. In each case, the stars have
outperformed the numbers. But for sheer bulk, there's still no challenger to
the biggest one-for-one ever, the December 12, 1975, deal that sent Detroit
pitcher Mickey Lolich to the Mets for outfielder Rusty Staub, close to 500
pounds of beef changing sides.
     Even the old Yankee-Kansas City pipeline may be in the midst of a
revival, rerouted through Chicago. The Yankees and White Sox made seven deals
between December 1984 and November 1987, even though the Yankees' principal
owner had once called White Sox partners Jerry Reinsdorf and Eddie Einhorn
"Abbott and Costello."  Those seven deals saw minor leaguers Mike Soper, Glen
Braxton, and Scott Nielsen ping-pong between the organizations, and four of
the deals included big league catcher Ron "Hand Luggage" Hassey.
     If you're looking for the oddest trade ever, refer to the June 1973 deal
that sent Yankee lefthander Mike Kekich to Cleveland for a pitcher named
Lowell Powell. The trade came about because an earlier swap had soured, one
between Kekich and fellow Yankee southpaw Fritz Peterson. They exchanged
their families, wives, houses, and dogs, a scene the Yankees broke up when
Kekich's relationship with the previous Mrs. Peterson deteriorated and
resentment affected his pitching. (Kekich was out of the majors in 1974 and,
naturally, Peterson was traded to Cleveland that year. After their major
league careers, Peterson became a honcho in Baseball Chapel and Kekich, who
studied medicine and pitched in Mexico, became a doctor.)

Baseball's Most One-Sided Trades

     1) Babe Ruth from Boston Red Sox to New York Yankees for $125,000 and a
$300,000 loan, January 3, 1920:  If you're looking at the bottom line, gate
receipts from a couple of World Series would have brought in more cash than
the Sox got from the Yankees. If you're looking at baseball history, no one
made more than George Herman Ruth.
     2) Christy Mathewson to New York Giants from Cincinnati Reds for Amos
Rusie, December 15, 1900:  After throwing 3,748 innings in nine seasons, Rusie
had 22 innings left in his arm. Mathewson had 373 victories to go. A deal
this bad had to be crooked. And it was.
     3) Lou Brock with pitchers Jack Spring and Paul Toth from Chicago Cubs to
St. Louis Cardinals for pitchers Ernie Broglio and Bobby Shantz and outfielder
Doug Clemens, June 15, 1964:  Broglio went 7-19 in three season with the Cubs,
Clemens batted .500 for the Cubs (.279 in 1964 and .221 in 1965), and
39-year-old Shantz lasted 20 games before finishing his career with
Philadelphia later that season. With St. Louis, Hall of Famer Brock batted
.297, scored 1,427 runs, stole 888 bases, and sparked the Cards to three
pennants.
     4) Frank Robinson to Baltimore Orioles from Cincinnati Reds for pitchers
Milt Pappas and Jack Baldschun and outfielder Dick Simpson, December 9, 1965:
Robinson won the triple crown, MVP, and a World Series ring in his first
season with the Orioles, powering the team to four World Series in six years.
Pappas and Baldschun combined for a 31-34 record with the Reds, Simpson had 34
hits for Cincinnati and none were still in the majors when Robinson, "an old
30" according to Reds at the time of the trade, retired 10 years later.
     5) Mordecai "Three Finger" Brown with catcher Jack O'Neill to Chicago
Cubs from St. Louis Cardinals for pitcher Jack Taylor and catcher Larry
McLean, December 12, 1903:  Traded after a 9-13, 2.60 rookie season, Brown
went on to win 239 games, reaching 20 victories in six straight seasons,
1906-1911. He ranks among the all-time leaders with a 2.06 ERA, a .649
winning percentage and 57 shutouts, plus three more whitewashings and five
complete games in nine World Series starts for the fearsome Cubs of the
century's first decade. Taylor went 44-49 with St. Louis before returning to
the Cubs for a 12-3 record in the 1906 pennant drive. O'Neill batted .206 in
two seasons with the Cubs, 39 points better than McLean managed for the Cards
before being peddled to Cincinnati.
     6) Roger Maris with shortstop Joe DeMaestri and first baseman Kent Hadley
to New York Yankees from Kansas City Athletics for outfielders Hank Bauer and
Norm Siebern and pitcher Don Larsen, December 11, 1959:  Siebern hit at least
.272 in each of his four seasons at KC with a top of .308, and Bauer became
the A's manager in 1961. DeMaestri went 14 for 76 with four RBIs in two
seasons and Hadley hit .203 in 64 at-bats with the Yankees. So far, so good,
even if Larsen was 2-10 for the A's. But Maris won back-to-back MVP awards
for the Yankees and hit 203 homers in seven seasons while playing marvelously
in right field.
     7) Ferguson Jenkins with outfielders Adolfo Phillips and John Herrnstein
to Chicago Cubs from Philadelphia Phillies for pitchers Larry Jackson and Bob
Buhl, April 21, 1966:  It looked like a steal for the Phils in 1966 as Jackson
won 15 and Buhl added six while Jenkins struggled to a 6-8 mark. But the
Phillies' pair of pitchers were long retired when Jenkins rolled up the last
of six straight 20-win seasons for Chicago. In nine-plus Cub campaigns,
Jenkins tallied 167 wins, on his way to a career total of 284.
     8) Grover Cleveland Alexander and catcher Bill Killefer to Chicago Cubs
from Philadelphia Phillies for pitcher Iron Mike Prendergast and catcher
Pickles Dillhoefer, December 11, 1917:  The Phillies got the better nicknames
but the Cubs got the better deal. Uncertainty over the draft status of
ballplayers during World War One precipitated the trade, and Alexander was
lost for most of the 1918 season. He returned to log 128 wins in just over
seven seasons in Chicago before moving to St. Louis. Prendergast was 13-15 in
two seasons with the Phils and Dillhoefer hit .223 in five years of part-time
duty.
     9) Nolan Ryan with pitcher Don Rose, outfielder Leroy Stanton and catcher
Francisco Estrada to California Angels from New York Mets for shortstop Jim
Fregosi, December 10, 1971:  The Mets acquired Fregosi to answer their
perpetual problem at third base, a position Fregosi had never played in the
majors:  strike one. Fregosi batted .233 in 146 games for the Mets:  strike
two. The Mets gave up Nolan Ryan . . .
     10) Ron Perranoski with third baseman John Goryl, minor league outfielder
Lee Handley and $25,000 to Los Angeles Dodgers from Chicago Cubs for third
baseman Don Zimmer, April 8, 1960:  The Dodgers got a dominant reliever for
the better part of a decade, a useful Triple A player, and mad money for
Walter O'Malley. The Cubs got a third baseman who would one day manage them.
     Dishonorable Mention:  P Steve Carlton to Phillies from Cardinals for P
Rick Wise, '72; 1B Orlando Cepeda to Cards from Giants for P Ray Sadecki, '66;
CF Curt Flood with OF Joe Taylor to Cardinals from Reds for P Marty Kutyna and
P Ted Wieand, '57; 2B Nellie Fox to White Sox from A's for C Joe Tipton, '49;
1B Jimmie Foxx with P Johnny Marcum to Red Sox from A's for P Gordon Rhodes, C
George Salvino, and $150,000, '35; OF-INF Pedro Guerrero to Dodgers from
Indians for P Bruce Ellingsen, '74; 1B Keith Hernandez to Mets from Cardinals
for P Neil Allen and P Rick Ownbey, '83; C Ernie Lombardi with OF Babe Herman
and 3B Wally Gilbert to Reds from Dodgers for 2B Tony Cuccinello, 3B Joe
Stripp, and C Clyde Sukeforth, '32; P Sparky Lyle to Yankees from Red Sox for
1B-OF Danny Cater, '72; CF Willie McGee to Cardinals from Yankees for P Bob
Sykes, '81; P Mike Marshall to Dodgers from Expos for OF Willie Davis, '73; OF
George Foster to Reds from Giants for SS Frank Duffy and P Vern Geishert, '71;
P Gaylord Perry with SS Frank Duffy (what's with this guy?) to Indians from
Giants for P Sam McDowell, '71; P Jeff Reardon with OF Dan Norman to Expos
from Mets for OF Ellis Valentine, '81; 2B Ryne Sandberg with SS Larry Bowa to
Cubs from Phillies for SS Ivan DeJesus, '82; P Tom Seaver to Reds from Mets
for P Pat Zachry, 2B Doug Flynn, OF Steve Henderson and OF Dan Norman, '77;
1B Glenn Davis to Orioles from Astros for P Pete Harnisch, P
Curt Schilling, and OF Steve Finley, '91.

Brains for Brawn

     In addition to trading for help on the field, teams sometimes seek aid in
the dugout. Although the trade of Detroit's Jimmy Dykes for Cleveland's Joe
Gordon in the middle of the 1960 season remains the only manager-for-manager
swap, teams have gone to the trade-mart for leadership 13 times.

     - Second baseman Buck Herzog traded by Giants to Reds as player-manager
with catcher Grover Hartley for outfielder Bob Bescher, December 12, 1913.

     - Christy Mathewson traded by Giants to Reds as manager with outfielder
Edd Roush and infielder Bill McKechnie for outfielder Red Killefer and
ex-manager Buck Herzog, July 20, 1916--Mathewson activated himself for a final
start against old rival Three-Finger Brown.

     - Shortstop Dave Bancroft traded by Giants to Boston Braves as
player-manager with outfielders Casey Stengel and Bill Cunningham for pitcher
Joe Oeschger and outfielder Billy Southworth, November 12, 1923.

     - Player-manager Bucky Harris traded by Senators to Tigers for infielder
Jack Warner to succeed George Moriarty at Detroit, December 19, 1928.

     - Catcher Jimmie "Ace" Wilson traded by Cardinals to Phillies as
player-manager for catcher Spud Davis and second baseman Eddie Delker,
November 15, 1933.

     - Catcher Mickey Cochrane traded by Athletics to Tigers as player-manager
for catcher Johnny Pasek and $100,000, December 12, 1933. Black Mike led the
Tigers to a pennant by seven games over the Yankees and took the Cardinals to
seven games in the World Series in 1934. In 1935, he became the first traded
manager to garner a world championship as the Tigers downed the Cubs in six.

     - Catcher Bob O'Farrell traded by Cardinals to Reds as player-manager
with pitcher Syl Johnson for pitcher Glenn Spencer, January 11, 1934.

     - Second baseman Eddie Stanky by Giants to Cards as player-manager for
pitcher Max Lanier (Hal's dad) and outfielder Chuck Diering, December 11,
1951.

     - Second baseman Solly Hemus traded by Phillies to Cardinals as
player-manager for third baseman Gene Freese, September 29, 1958.

     - First baseman Gil Hodges traded by Mets to Senators as manager for
outfielder Jimmy Piersall, May 23, 1963.

     - Manager Gil Hodges traded by Senators to Mets for pitcher Bill Denehy
and $100,000, November 27, 1968. Hodges became the first non-playing manager
acquired in a trade to win a world championship with the 1969 Amazin's.

     - Manager Chuck Tanner traded by A's to Pirates for catcher Manny
Sanguillen and $100,000, November 5, 1976. Tanner also won a world
championship for his new team. The Pirates actually kept some of the cash in
the Tanner deal as the A's purchased Buc infielder Tommy Helms on the same
date. Helms was returned to Pittsburgh that spring with infielder Phil Garner
and pitcher Chris Batton in one of Finley's finest heists, the A's acquiring
pitchers Rick Langford, Doc Medich, Doug Bair, and Dave Guisti plus
outfielders Mitchell Page and Tony Armas.

     - First baseman Pete Rose traded by Expos to Reds as player-manager for
infielder Tom Lawless, August 16, 1984.