For current MLB players, it’s tough to beat the Cardinals. They’ve traded away Adolis Garcia, Randy Arozarena, Zac Gallen, Sandy Alcantara, Lane Thomas, Harrison Bader and Like Voit (among others).
Eh. I think Scholes was underrated in his time and overrated now. At the time he was probably considered the weakest of the Keane/Giggs/Beckham/Scholes midfield, but in hindsight is the best of those, albeit not head and shoulders above.
“Greats of the game” is a pretty squishy concept, but I don’t think I’d have him in my first tier.
I was going to say Kante, but 24 isn’t that old. For some reason I thought he was ~4 years older than he is and that he broke into Leicester at 27-28.
The Cardinals bigger mistake might have been trading Steve Carlton for Rick Wise. Carlton had gone 20-9 in 1971 and wanted a $100,000 contract, so the Cardinals dumped him for Wise, a serviceable pitcher from the Phillies - but no Steve Carlton.
Kurt Warner was an undrafted nobody who had failed in a tryout with the Packers and was playing in the Arena League and NFL Europe when he caught on with the Rams as a third-stringer who got into one game. The next season starting QB Trent Green went down in pre-season and Warner stepped in to lead the team to a Super Bowl victory, a second Super bowl, and later won another Super Bowl with Arizona.
Well, maybe. After 1986 Carter was indeed pretty washed up, as was Hernandez after 1987. But flags fly forever.
Actually, Bags was famously predicted to win the batting title, according to some statistical projections. He didn’t, but won the Rookie of the Year anyway, and was already developing his power.
Bart Starr was drafted as a quarterback by the Packers in the seventeenth round of the 1956 NFL Draft. Of course, it was a smaller league back then, with only 12 teams, but he was still only the 200th selection of that draft, roughly equivalent to being drafted late in the 6th round of the modern NFL draft.
He spent his first three years in the NFL as a backup and sometime-starter, until Vince Lombardi became the Packers’ coach in 1959; Lombardi installed Starr as his starter partway through that first season. In the next eight seasons (1960-67), Starr led his team to the NFL Championship Game six times (winning five), won the first two Super Bowls, and was a first-ballot Hall of Famer.
This is so common in baseball, though. Baseball’s draft isn’t random, but it’s close.
My favorite draft fact is that maybe the two best third basemen of all time, George Brett and Mike Schmidt, were drafted right one after the other… in the second round.
Jokic’s draft selection literally first appeared onscreen during a Taco Bell commercial for their new Quesaritos.
The Cardinals lost to the Steelers. Oddly, you are the second person in the last few months I’ve heard say that Warner won that Superbowl with the Cards. Both times I’ve heard that I found it very discordant because the Cardinals are one of the teams that have never won a Superbowl.
Steve Largent is a good candidate. He was drafted in the 4th round by the Houston Oilers. After the pre-season, he was going to be cut but was traded to Seattle (an expansion team in their first year) for an 8th-round pick. He played 14 years for Seattle and held several career receiving records at the time of his retirement.
Let’s end that myth. Ruth was traded in 1920; the musical opened in 1926.
Someone pointed out that the play the musical was based on opened in 1920. True, but it opened three weeks before the trade, and was a hit.
Frazer didn’t need the money; he traded Ruth because Ruth threatened to sit out the season. He was traded to the Yankees because rumors made them wary of the White Sox’s offer of Joe Jackson. No other team would trade with them. (Look up the insurrectos).
How about Jamie Vardy, someone who not only was undervalued at an age when teams would look for potential but well into the age he would be expcted to be in his prime.
The way soccer players are developed (at least in Europe) is professional clubs will have a youth system of kids that might have potential, the vast majority of these are released at the age of 16 and only those that have a decent chance of making the team remain. Some of these are loaned to lower tier teams until they are good enough to play for the team that owns them.
Jamie Vardy was released from (second tier at the time) Sheffield Wednesday at the age of 16. He played as an amature and at the age of 20 he got into the first team of Stockbridge Park Steels in the 8th tier of English football which earned him £30 ($40) a week. (At this age future stars are nomally playing in a top tier league such as the Premier league or at least in tier 2 or 3 either owned by that team or on loan from a top club).
At the age of 23 Halifax in the 7th tier signed him and a year later his skills attracted 5th tier Fleetwood Town. Single A Baseball could be considered 5th tier.
Now his skills were starting to be valued and a year later at the age of 25 he moved to Leicester City in the 2nd tier (The Championship), the details of the trade are not public but it is rumoured he was the first “non-league” (outside top 4 tiers) player to attact a transfer fee of £1m.
2 Years later Leicester won promotion to the premier league where he excelled. In Leicester’s unlikely title winning Season he won both the Player of the season and footballer of the year awards (essentially voted MVP by both players and football writers) and in 2019/20 won the golden boot for most goals scored. In 2015 he also became a member of the England squad.
Johnny Unitas was a late draft pick in the NFL and didn’t make the team. He spent a year working construction and playing semi-pro games on the weekends. The next year, he did make it back into the NFL as a backup. Eventually got into the starting lineup, and eventually turned into one of the best in the game.
Which story is more impressive, Starr, Unitas, or Brady?
So you’re saying Ruth was not undervalued by the Red Sox? Ruth is 90% myth, which is quite amazing considering the accomplishments of the real 10% playing the game. Ruth was undervalued by the Red Sox as demonstrated by his performance on the Yankees. The details are just adornment.
“Frazee.”
Frazee DID have financial difficulties at the time, just not specifically because of “No No Nanette.” He had paid a lot of money to buy the Red Sox and had gone into debt to complete the purchase, and the war and pandemic had really hit his businesses hard.
I decided to look it up a bit, and here’s what I found:
I think it’s fair to say that the Sox definitely highly valued Ruth, and demanded a great deal for him, but it’s also fair to say that even that wasn’t enough.
Fair enough.
Sure, but they traded him when he was just an AA player before he started putting up the big numbers. I mean, they all knew he was good, but the Red Sox apparently didn’t think he was that good.
Either way, they seriously undervalued him, or they’d never have traded him for Larry Andersen.
I think the list could be endless. It’s like what Billy Bean says in Moneyball talking to a scout, “You don’t know shit”, or words to that effect. I’m sure some times a team lets go of a player knowing full well the player may be good but they may not have room for him on the roster. Or it’s a cost-saving measure. Teams also treat players like commodities.
David Ortiz for example, I don’t know why the Twins let him go. He did well for them, I guess they just didn’t see the future potential.
Pedro Martinez was let go by the Dodgers because they saw him as short and would not have much stamina as a starter. Don’t know why they thought that, he did well out of bullpen for LA in his one full season, could have been another Mariano if stayed a reliever. The Dodgers also needed a second baseman. DeShields looked like he had value. Turns out, not as much as Pedro so poor evaluation there whereas Montreal made him a starter right away.
The Expos owner did not believe as I recall to pay athletes millions. They also were not winning with Carter and thought a trade could get them some good players. They did get 4 players for him.