Worst baseball trades thread, or, why did the Cubs trade Lou Brock?

The trades I think of when I think of worst trades are:

Cincinnati trades an outfielder they dismiss as "an old 30" to the Baltimore Orioles for their all-time leader in victories. One year later, that "old 30" guy wins a Triple Crown and the Orioles shock the defending World Series champion Los Angeles Dodgers with a four-game sweep. Baltimore gladly took Frank Robinson, thankyouverymuch.

Baltimore decides it desperately needs a big bat to contend in the weak American League East and parts with budding pitching prospects Pete Harnish and Curt Schilling and promising outfielder Steve Finley for Glenn Davis. Finley and Schilling go on to long, productive careers. Harnish has a couple of good to decent seasons, while Davis is injury riddled. Gee, thanks Roland Hemond.

And before anyone waxes poetic about how great the Davis trade seemed at the time, I hated it then as a high school student.

 

Nolan Ryan and three other guys to the Angels for Jim Fregosi didn't work out so well for the Mets ...

And with all the Cubs fans on here, surprised this one hasn't come up ...

Winter of 1981-82, the Phillies want to trade shortstops with the Cubs, so they swap Ivan DeJesus for Larry Bowa ... and to make the deal even, the Phils throw in Ryne Sandberg.

 

Hey, if Postseason Legend Jack Morris hadn't spit the bit in the ALCS that year, they might have won another World Series. (Hi, Simon! )

That was the generation that missed a classic Cards-Tigers World Series -- '34, '68 and '06. 1987 would have fit right in.

 

It was actually Darrell Evans, who in fact had played very well that year, who made a couple of disastrous misplays that tanked the first game at Tiger Stadium, IIRC. And yeah, Morris stumbled too. It sucks, but they picked the wrong three games for the wheels to come off.

Of course, they had just come off one of the most incredible rocket runs of all time just to win the division, I guess they just didn't have anything left.

 

The Brewers don't have any real clunkers, they've made some steals over the years, though almost none were pitchers.

If Matt LaPorta works out in Cleveland, people will make the Alexander-Smoltz-like comparisons to Sabathia-LaPorta, but I'm with Starman, the trade was worth it for where the Brewers franchise was.

 

One of the most interesting stories about Lou Brock is he was a special guest at an LSU game a few years ago, and I think the Tigers were playing Southern, where he played college ball. There was some discussion in the press box about what kinds of honors Southern had bestowed upon Brock, and someone mentioned that apparently nobody could figure out what jersey number Brock wore when he played at Southern. There was no record of it, no photo ... nothing.

I wonder if anyone thought to just ask him. I've never met a ballplayer who forgot a jersey number he wore.

 

Royals swindled the Braves in getting Jermaine Dye for Michael Tucker. Then they made a historically bad (three-team) deal that resulted in them giving up Dye for Neifi Perez. Fucking awful.

Trading Damon for Angel Berroa is much more forgivable cause there was no way in hell Damon was sticking around. Plus Berroa had a great rookie year before falling to pieces.

 

That's not even in the same category as something like Brock-Broglio. It wasn't a baseball trade. They needed to get salary off their books in a hurry and made the first stupid deal that came along. They were getting warm bodies, and they knew it.

Brock-Broglio was made for baseball reasons. Cubs thought they were getting a 20-game winner for a disappointing OF.

 

I believe Carlton had been a holdout, Gussie Busch got pissed and told the GM to trade him.

 

In another Pirates deal, Cam Bonifay had his every-squirrel-finds-a-nut moment when he acquired Brian Giles for Ricardo Rincon.

Also, and I'm not sure how to categorize it given Montreal's uncertain future at the time, but what about Bartolo Colon's short Canadian stay?

Colon, if you don't remember, was traded (along with Tim Drew) for Lee Stevens, Brandon Phillips, Cliff Lee AND Grady Sizemore.

He did his job -- 10-4, 3.31 ERA in 17 starts -- but the Expos finished 19 games out of first.

(On a side note, Colon and another player went to the Fightin' Pallisters that winter. Montreal received Rocky Biddle, Orlando Hernandez, Jeff Liefer and cash .... yikes!)

 

Pennywise, poundfoolish Gussie.

For childish thinking like the above, and for essentially converting the old Busch Stadium into an inescapable open-air Budpisswater commercial -- bite me.

God, the Bud jingle, at earsplitting volume . . . not much more obnoxious than that.

 

This was at the time that MLB was openly talking about contracting the Expos. Omar Minaya, who was the appointed GM at the time, figured that if the team wasn't going to exist anymore, then he might as well mortgage the future for that one crack at the playoffs.

I remember a bunch of owners got mad that Minaya was able to make the trade, because they didn't want to subsidize a winning Expos team. Selig, in one of his smarter moments, didn't get in the way.