Doper Baseball Fans, Is Bagwell-for-Andersen the Worst Trade Ever?

In My Humble Opinion
1

After musing in this thread on how Roger Clemens was unconscionably ripped off in the voting for the 1990 Cy Young award in the American League, I got to thinking a bit more about that edition of the Red Sox, which won three divisional titles and a league pennant in five seasons. At the end of August 1990 the club made a trade which, I’d argue, at this point has to rank among the worst of all time, and the question I put before the house today is whether this particular transaction is in fact the biggest stinkeroo in major league history.

I refer, of course, to the trade of Jeff Bagwell, then a 22-year-old minor leaguer, to the Houston Astros for 37-year-old relief pitcher Larry Andersen. The numbers, unfortunately, don’t lie, so let’s go straight there, painful as it is.

What Boston got from Andersen: Appearances in 15 games with no decisions, an ERA of 1.23 and one save, plus three more appearances in the playoffs with an ERA of 6.00 and a loss.

What Bagwell has done with Houston: hit 446 home runs, drive in 1,510 runs and score 1,506 runs himself in 2,111 games over 14 seasons. Oh, and win the Rookie of the Year award in 1991 and both Most Valuable Player and a Gold Glove in 1994, and play in four All-Star games.

Well, I just don’t think it’s possible to get much more lopsided than that, but what about the rest of you? Is this the worst deal any team ever made, or am I missing something obvious? Let’s have 'em, which trades do you think have turned out worse? Trades only, please - players who leave teams as free agents and go on to great success elsewhere don’t count.

Oddly enough, less than six months after the Bagwell trade the Astros made another deal with an American League East team on which they made out like bandits. This was the trade of first baseman Glenn Davis, who at the time had hit 166 home runs in seven seasons, to Baltimore in January 1991 for pitchers Pete Harnisch and Curt Schilling and outfielder Steve Finley.

What Baltimore got from Davis: 24 home runs, 85 RBIs and 83 runs scored in 185 games spread over three seasons.

What Harnisch, Schilling and Finley did in Houston: Harnisch started 117 games in four seasons, going 45-33 with a 3.41 ERA, and Schilling had eight saves in 56 appearances in 1991 with a 3-5 record and an ERA of 3.81 before he was traded away. Finley appeared in 557 games over four seasons, scoring 301 runs and driving in 186 more and stealing 110 bases with a 73% success rate.

Hmmm … not good from the Orioles’ point of view, although nowhere near as bad as the Bagwell trade, I’d say. Anyway, this post is long enough already, so I’d better cut it off here and not start going into Cater-for-Lyle or Broglio-for-Brock … and I guess Houston could be faulted for dealing Schilling away for Jason Grimsley … and there was that minor-leaguer who Detroit traded to Atlanta to get Doyle Alexander for the stretch drive in 1987, name of Smoltz … but enough from me, your turn.

2

That was a bad trade. But they still had Mo Vaughn during the hey-day of Jeff Bagwell.

I’ll offer up the 1987 trade of David Cone (Kan - P) for Ed Hearn (NYM - C). Horrendous trade. Hearn went on to play in 13 games over the next two years, Cone went on to be a dominant pitcher for the Mets. Granted, he was later picked up as a free agent, and later went on the Yankees where he pitched a perfect game.

3

Not even close.

Ruth for a $350K loan.
Brock for Broglio
Sandberg for DeJesus
Carlton for Wise
Rusie for Mathewson

All far worse.

Zev Steinhardt

4

Hey! Remember that it was Larry Bowa for DeJesus with Sandberg included as a throw in!

Concerning the Bagwell trade Bill James wrote that offseason something like “If there’s any justice in the world the Bagwell for Anderson trade will haunt the GM of the Sox until the day he dies.”

Oofah. That was painful.

Is there, in baseball, anything stupider for a GM to do than trade anything at all for a middle relief pitcher? Anything? RP are essentially fungible assets…turn over a rock and you’ll find one that’s servicable.

5

But if Jeff Bagwell hadn’t panned out, nobody would care- many similar trades have been made. When a team is trying to win now, it’s not really so bad to trade prospects for parts they need immediately. (I have a friend who is a Tigers fan, and I like to needle him by thanking him for trading John Smoltz to the Braves for Doyle Alexander. But the reality is that that trade worked just fine. Alexander helped the Tigers, I think they won the Series that year.) Bagwell wasn’t going to help that team, and those look like solid relief-pitcher numbers.

6

Just to reinforce what I said, I’ll illustrate what (IMHO) was the stupidest trade of all time – Rusie for Mathewson.

Amos Rusie was a star with the Giants during the 1890s, winning 245 games from 1889 to 1899. He won those 245 games despite sitting two seasons due to salary disputes.

On Dec 15, 1900, the Giants traded Rusie to Cincinnati for a young right-hander named Christy Mathewson who 0-3 with a ERA over 5 for the Cincinatti in 1900. The Reds were estatic that they were getting Rusie. They need’nt have been. Rusie only pitched three games for the Reds, going 0-1 with an ERA over 8.50. I’ve heard rumors (but I haven’t been able to confirm them) that Rusie ended the year as the Reds’ groundskeeper.

As for Mathewson, the Giants eventually gave him back to the Reds – 16 years and 372 wins later. Mathewson, of course, went on to become the greatest pitcher the Giants ever had (including New York and San Fransisco). Rusie’s last win came two years before the trade even happened!

I think this trade is far more lopsided than Andersen for Bagwell.

Zev Steinhardt

7

Alexander pitched very well for Detroit in 1987, going 9-0 down the stretch with an ERA of 1.53, but the Tigers lost in the ALCS to the Twins, who went on to defeat St. Louis in the World Series. Anyone else remember Darrell Evans getting picked off at third in Game Four of the ALCS?

8

I kinda feel for Larry Andersen. I mean, at least Bill Buckner was directly responsible for the reputation that has dogged him since his gaffe. But Andersen, whose name is never mentioned anymore except in reference to the Bagwell trade, did nothing wrong and STILL gets an albatross around his neck. Heck, he got his reputation for his accomplishments – i.e., being valuable enough that another team wanted to trade for him.

Now that I think about it, I feel for the albatross as well. It did nothing wrong except get mentioned in a poem, and nobody ever talks about it anymore except as a symbol for something bad that never goes away.

9

Ah, right you are. Anyway that’s an excellent second half.

10

Ruth was oh, so much worse. But Lou Brock wasn’t as good a player as Jeff Bagwell, I don’t think.

There are actually more than a few stinkers like this. Ferguson Jenkins was given away for peanuts. Nolan Ryan was given away. Plus you have Doyle Alexander trades where a team at least gets a decent stretch drive but gives up a whole career to do it, like John Smoltz, or the Blue Jays trading away Jeff Kent to get David Cone, who of course was the man in the Ed Hearn trade. Is Kent for Cone a bad trade, though? Cone only started 14 games with Toronto while Kent has hit like 300 home runs - but without Cone, maybe the Blue Jays don’t win the 1992 World Series. As a Blue Jay fan, I would rather have one World Series win than a whole career of Jeff Kent.

11

Amos Otis (Mets) to KC for Joe Foy. Remember, less than a year before the Mets refused to include Otis in a trade for Joe Torre, calling him one of their six “untouchables” (The Braves commented in spring training of 1969 that if the Mets had so many untouchables, why weren’t they winning? :wink: ). So they gave him away for a so-so third baseman while Otis had a great career in KC.

There’s also the Nolan Ryan (and three others) to the Angels for Jim Fregosi. The deal made sense at the time – Ryan was an erratic pitcher and uncomfortable playing in NYC, while Fregosi was an All-Star going into what should have been the prime of his career – but in the long run, it was terrible.

Going back, there’s Joe Cronin for Lyn Lary. Prior to the trade, Washington had been one of the powers in the AL for about ten years, winning over 90 games for four years in a row. After it, they never really challenged for anything (though the decline had already begun). Cronin also did a lot to improve Boston’s fortunes, as both player and manager.

12

Actually, it was just Ruth for $100,000. The $350,000 loan didn’t come until later.

13

No, I’m not speaking of a specific trade. I’m speaking of trading ANYTHING for middle relievers. The simple fact is that relief pitchers are A) extremely erratic and B) almost completely replaceable.

Does anyone seriously think that the Red Sox couldn’t have picked up a relief pitcher off the scrap heap in 1990 who could do just as well as Anderson did in those few innings?

And then Boston would have gone through the mid-90s with Mo Vaughn at 1B and Bagwell at 3B (where he initially played in the minors, as I recall). Instead we see the most common blunder GMs make…overpaying for little gain other than some feeling of ‘proven veteran’ security.

14

I’ll say it. No, I don’t think they could have. In just 22 IP, Andersen put up a 9.5 VORP. That’s basically worth a win over any reliever they could have picked up off the scrap heap.

I’ll even say it right now, Andersen became their most valuable reliever for that last stretch of the season. In fact, if you take Andersen’s year long totals, Andersen was worth more than most of the Boston staff that season, aside from Clemens and Boddicker.

To take this even further, Andersen’s 22 innings contributed more to Boston’s record than every pitcher on that staff contributed all year, aside from 6 - Clemens, Boddicker, Harris, Kiecker, Bolton and Reardon. And, in his 51 IP, Reardon only contributed less than run more than Bolton did in his 22.

Basically, Andersen’s worth was about as much as Dibble’s or Eckersley’s in 1990. It’s true that most relievers are fungible, the best ones aren’t. And Andersen was one of the best that year.

What were Bags’s minor league stats? Any indication of the power to come?

15

Boy, was this a bitch to find.

1989 R .316/.409/.368
1989 A .310/.384/.419
1990 AA .333/.422/.457

Oh yeah. The potential was there and seeable for those who would see.

16

Took almost 20 years but the Cubs finally evened out that Brock/Spring/Toth fiasco.

17

[Totally Irrelevant Nitpick]
It’s C-i-n-c-i-n-n-a-t-i

Just didn’t understand how you could spell it two different ways in the same sentence.
[/Nitpick]

I do enjoy reading your takes on baseball. Sorry about the nit.

18

As a Dodger fan I have to add Delino Deshieds for Pedro Martinez.

Haj

19

Heh. Then a few years later they gave away Dennis Eckersley for exactly nothing (three minor leagues that never played a game in the bigs) to the A’s. Had they kept him, he might never had become a closer. The A’s got him to be a end of the rotation starter (even Eck thought he was washed up), but they had some bullpen injuries in spring training. The rest is history…

20

Heck, my beloved Indians gave away the Eck first. Actually it was Eckersley and Fred Kendall for Rick Wise, Cox, Diaz and Mike Paxton.

I’d put the Giants trade of Gaylord Perry and Frank Duffy for Sam McDowell pretty high on the list of bad trades too.