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February 22, 2007
Five Years Later: The Roberto Alomar Trade
Perhaps it’s appropriate that I sit down to write this at 2 A.M., because the only person I can think of who looks more tired than I do right now was Roberto Alomar as a Met. The Alomar trade is one of very few blockbuster trades I can remember. I remember hearing the official rumors on the way to school, tracking it through the day, and then officially hearing that it was a done deal and being very pessimistic about it from day one. Part of this can be traced to the fact that Roberto Alomar was 33, another part to the cult brainwashing that all Mets fans underwent at this time that involved Alex Escobar being a future Hall of Famer, and most of it can be traced to an undeniable love for Edgardo Alfonzo. In 2002, the Mets were coming off a season defined by injuries and the inability of anyone not named Mike Piazza to hit the ball over the fence. They finished dead last in the National League in runs scored. The lineup, which GM Steve Phillips had neglected following their 2000 World Series appearance, was a mess. Alfonzo was slumping and injured, Todd Zeile only managed a .373 slugging percentage, and the “younger” players like Jay Payton and Benny Agbayani regressed as scouts discovered their weaknesses. In truth, the youngest players to get more than 300 at-bats were veterans Desi Relaford and Alfonzo, who were both 27. Phillips, faced with fixing the lineup, made wholesale changes. He carted in Mo Vaughn from Anaheim, despite the fact that doctors really had no clue whether Mo would be able to play well again. He dealt several players for Jeromy Burnitz, who practically paid for himself by providing free air conditioning to all of Queens during the summer of 2002. And most importantly, he gambled on an aging Roberto Alomar to be the sparkplug that would turn the Mets’ offense around. December 11, 2001: Mets receive Roberto Alomar, Danny Peoples, and Mike Bacsik. Indians receive Matt Lawton, Billy Traber, Earl Snyder, Alex Escobar, and Jerrod Riggan. Roberto Alomar Not many people disagreed with the Mets’ acquisition of Alomar. The Mo Vaughn trade drew criticism almost from its conception, and the Jeromy Burnitz trade attracted plenty of attention from the pack of strikeout-hating gypsies who now spend most of their time writing columns about how bad Adam Dunn is. But Alomar was largely hailed as the acquisition of the offseason. However, Alomar himself was not very pleased with the deal. Almost immediately following the deal, he was quoted as saying “I was kind of disappointed…I was real happy in Cleveland and thought I did a great job.” Eventually he gave out the same quotes you’d expect any good teammate to say: he’d give his best effort for the team, dive into first base headfirst on every groundball, yada-yada. But when the Mets and Indians battled in a spring training game, he took over the stage and called out Indians GM Mark Shapiro, saying that he had guaranteed he wouldn’t be traded. I was against this trade from the beginning, thinking that Alomar would probably hit closer to his 2000 version than his near-MVP 2001 version, but not even in my 70-win nightmare scenarios did I imagine the gruesome .266/.331/.376 line he eventually put up. The media, for their part, did a great job of stoking him. His sensitivity was a well-documented issue throughout the 2002 season, touched on by Buster Olney, Bob Klapisch, and even then-Mariners GM Pat Gillick. Eventually, Alomar ended up getting in an incredibly funny (in retrospect) fight with Roger Cedeno involving the question of who looked better on their rookie card. Not only was this exactly the kind of sensitivity that people like Olney were touching on, but it really showed a lack of awareness on Alomar’s part. After all, would you take a barb about looks from the major leaguer who most resembled Mr. Hankey seriously? After one-and-a-half agonizing seasons, Jim Duquette ended our crisis by dealing Alomar for Royce Ring, Edwin Almonte, and Andrew Salvo at the midway point of the 2003 season. Ring would later go on to be included in the Jon Adkins/Ben Johnson trade this offseason, which was depressing, because Ring is the only player who always has a lifetime pass from me no matter what he does. Danny Peoples Mike Bacsik Matt Lawton Much like Alomar, Lawton, traded for the second time in six months after originally being acquired for Rick Reed at the 2001 trading deadline, was supposed to bring a good batting eye and a veteran bat to a rebuilding team. Unlike Alomar, Matt Lawton wasn’t dealt away, and stayed on to give the Indians three mostly mediocre seasons, even being named an All-Star in 2004. After he departed Cleveland at age 33, it was apparent he was washed up; his last two seasons included playing in four different uniforms and a steroid suspension. Essentially blackballed from the game, he was released by Seattle in May of last year. Alex Escobar Considered the Mets best prospect for several years—which at this point in time was a big sign to Steve Phillips that said “Trade me!”—Escobar promptly tore his ACL in spring training. He bounced back in 2003 with a pretty solid year for Buffalo and had some good at-bats with the Indians in the latter part of the year. Following a slow start with the Indians in 2004, he fractured his right foot in Buffalo and again found himself out for the year. After being waived, Jim Bowden recognized his name from his five-hundred item “outfielders who will one day play on my bench” list, and he played pretty well for the Nationals in 2006 before—you guessed it—he separated his shoulder. Escobar may not be the leading candidate, but I feel he’s at least a strong contender for the Bill James Historical Abstract’s “Can I try this career over?” 2000’s award. Billy Traber At the time considered the Mets’ top pitching prospect, Traber immediately started dominating hitters from the second he joined the Indians organization. Starting off in Double-A Akron, he tore up the Midwest league, going 13-2 with 82 strikeouts and only 20 walks in 107 innings. Moving up to Buffalo, he went 4-3 with a 3.29 ERA, with 33 strikeouts to 12 walks in 54 innings. After being used mainly as a reliever over his first few months with the Indians in 2003, he became a starter and threw a couple phenomenal games (including a complete game shutout over the Yankees that gave some Mets fans a primitive form of Kazmir-itis), and was generally doing pretty well until August, when Dr. James Andrews activated his magic Battle Royale-esque chip that blows up a pitcher’s shoulder and forces him to pay a lot of money. Traber is also now a National, providing additional dividends should the Mets face him this season. Jerrod Riggan Following up on his fine 2001 season, Riggan took his league-average stuff to Cleveland, where he put up an ugly 7.64 ERA in 32 innings for the Indians. After washing out the next year as well, Riggan signed on with the Hanshin Tigers, posting a 1.51 ERA in 2003 and a 2.84 ERA in 2004. Afterwards, he reappeared in the Mets minor leagues in 2005, putting forth a yeoman’s effort throughout Florida before being sent to Binghamton, where his career has seemingly ended. On the plus side though, his cousin is a really good agent. Earl Snyder The Mets’ organizational player of the year in 2001, Snyder has since played the role that Danny Peoples was supposed to fill for us: Quadruple-A slugger and all-around good guy. Snyder has some added utility since he can play third base and was mentioned as a candidate for the Devil Rays 3B job back during their bleakest hours. Snyder also has a ring from his one game stint with Boston in 2004, which I’m sure will become a big story once it’s sold on E-Bay when his career ends in 2014. After seeing his slugging average dip to .430 for the Louisville Bats last year, Snyder is probably either working on his Japanese or looking for a new line of work. While many trades end up being a clear win for one side and a few end up being good for both sides, the Alomar trade was one of the few trades involving a star player in his prime that ended up not going right for either side. Indians fans are understandably grumpy about getting so little in return for a probable Hall-of-Famer in his prime, and Mets fans are equally grumpy after watching Roberto Alomar play for one-and-a-half years. The Indians probably won the trade due to Lawton’s additional service time, but it was a bleak trade for both sides, neither helping the Indians rebuild nor the Mets compete. Like Alomar’s trademark headfirst slide into first base, the trade was a flashy yet worthless exercise for all parties involved. 31 Responses to “Five Years Later: The Roberto Alomar Trade”Leave a ReplyYou must be logged in to post a comment. |
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great article!
the only guy that still matters is Escobar. He’ll probably hit one out and wink at the other Alomars as he rounds the bases.
Alomar was an all-star for 12 years in a row and a gold glover for 10 in 11 before we got him! Then we gave him his biggest two checks and he did neither again.
I always hated Chris Berman when he said Roberto remember the Alomar. Argh!
Anyways, great article Chris.
The Battle Royale reference was a stroke of genius.
Wow. All those names, all the supposed value at the time of the trade, and the second-best performance of the bunch was a throw-in lefty. (Yes, I’d take Bacsik’s 9 starts of mediocrity over Alomar’s 250 games of poisonous indifference.)
I’m trying to come up with a modern equivalent, of what this would be like…
Milledge, Mulvey, Carp, Alou and Feliciano for Jeter, Andy Phillips and Colter Bean?
I still need to see Battle Royale…
Really fun article to read. Cedeno probably did have a better looking baseball card; he’s got a better smile than Isiah Thomas and he is not even a snake.
Roberto Alomar going so quickly from super star to mediocre at the very best has remained a mystery to me. Chris has pointed to the Mets acquiring an “old” player in 33. That ain’t young, but most Mets have been happy with the geriatric players and those applying for their cards - like Delgado, like Wagner, like LoDuca, like you name it. Alomar should have maintained superstar status for another year or two before to someone a bit less consistent. I didn’t know that most considered Vaughn a medical risk. I mean his biceps was healed. Was it known that he had a problematic arthritic knee before signing him? I doubt it. He never missed a lot of time for knee problems previously (well I don’t think so; I am not checking my facts here). To me, they both seemed like reasonable acquisitions.
Will Chris be writing a similar story about some of our other acquired ancients? LoDuca gave us a good year but I guess the only catcher who does not decline quickly at 35 is Carlton Fisk.
maybe he just wasn’t as good without a stronger cast. He was on two great Blue jay teams, two great Oriole teams, and three great indian teams during his run….
Eli, I’m more than happy to take requests, but it would be really difficult to fully evaluate the Lo Duca trade at this point in time. At the time it seemed like we were choosing between Ramon Hernandez for 3 or 4 years and losing our 2nd round pick (Mulvey) or Paul Lo Duca for Gaby Hernandez (and Dante Brinkley).
At the time, I was a fan of Hernandez camp, and after this year, I can’t say that my opinion has changed, .300 average by Lo Duca or not. However, we’ve got a ways to go before the Mulvey-Hernandez derby is decided (i’d say Mulvey is losing), and we’ve also got to see what the Mets end up having to do with the position after this season. If we got Michael Barrett, it’d be nice, but in retrospect, with the Free Agent market exploding, wouldn’t Hernandez for 3 or 4 years look nice right about now?
Very interesting piece. I had forgotten who we traded for Alomar, only that he was obviously a bust for us. Fascinating that the trade didn’t really turn out to be that terrible, because none of the pieces we traded for him really turned out to be that valuable anyway. Turned out to be almost our sh*t for your sh*t.
Benito Santiago is the Julio Franco of catchers
This is also true of the mo vaughn deal, but we still had to watch that combo “man” the right side of our infield. It was a far “cry” from the infield of 2000.
Please dont’ get me started on Mo Vaughn. I was against that trade from the moment I saw film of what he looked like at that point in time.
And then he lived down to my worst nightmares.
The only good thing about the Vaughn trade is that it relieved us of another onerous contract, and then Vaughn couldn’t play any more so the Wilpons got a lot of it back from insurance. On that basis, you could argue that that trade worked out a heck of a lot better than that Alomar one did.
It’s true, the Mo Vaughn-Kevin Appier trade was essentially a wash as well. We all remember the Mo Vaughn era and its obvious shortcomings, but he did provide a thrill here and there with some titanic home runs. I remember the one against the Yankees at Shea in particular, when the ball hit the middle of the Budweiser sign in right center.
Appier had a decent 2003 with the Angels, posting a 3.92 ERA and 1.35 WHIP in 188 innings, and then over the next two years he threw 115.6 innings with a 5.68 ERA for Anaheim and Kansas City. Oh, and he made $21.3 million for those 2+ seasons.
ha, a battle royale reference. awesome. anyone that hasnt seen that film…should.
We should’ve put one of those chips in kazmir’s arm just to be safe. if we cant have him, no one can! ;)
I still hold onto the memory of Mo Vaughn hitting the hardest ball I have ever seen in my life at Yankee Stadium. It was a line drive that the second baseman jumped for (very late) that ended up hitting the right center field wall. When Mo got one, he really got one. In one of the greatest days of my life, the Mets smoked the Yankees like 14-2 or something ridiculous. Cedeno also stole home that game. Yeah, it was worth the trip from VA.
This was an awesome article. It rivals the Diaz-Nickeas trade for poop-for-poop value. Who woulda thunk it at the time? If Escobar can’t beat out Pookie Logan for the Nationals starting CF job this spring, he probably should call it a career.
On Vaughn, at least it taught whatever moron trainers the mets were paying at that time, that a guy coming off knee problems shouldnt be put thru massive weight training on a power sled. dumb is dumb
FYI - The links under Not and many are to the same place eventhough they appear as to separate links (the line breaks with the space instead being under both words)..ie
How did he earn that?
Big Mo hit the long HR I have seen in person. Against Kevin Grabowski then of the Braves. Hit Bud ad on top of the Right Center scoreboard.
Great article. I always like reading about trades and how everyone faired afterwards. Everytime I hear someone talking about a great prospect in our farm system I always remember Escobar and how he was the “can’t miss guy”. Seems a lot of these can’t miss guys seem to miss for one reason or another. Another one that always pops into my mind was Brian Taylor - pitcher from the Yankees - Just goes to show you that baseball is a crap shoot on who will do great and who won’t.
Not being Roberto Alomar.
HA! that’s funny.
I remember seeing that one on TV. Like Danny said, when he got one he got one.
anyone remember that play where alomar extended fully to his left, laid out on the ground, rolled over to throw a no-look strike to vaughn, the highlight to his time with the mets.
Awesome article Chris. Brings back many memories.
I feel soo bad for Escobar because when he does play, he actually produces and plays good. Unfortunately he’s always injured never on the field. Whomp whomp.
He should do something else, not because he’s not talented, I still think he is, but because he’s going to kill himself eventually.
And that Roberto Alomar trade… it sounded like such a good trade at the time. Not only did he fall but he fall hard and fast. They even installed special cameras at Shea for the Rey Ordonez and Roberto Alomar gold glove defense up the middle.
The hardest ball I’ve ever seen hit in person was indeed by Mo, but when he was a Red Sock, in the first ever interleague game played at Shea. He hit the ball halfway up the scoreboard. An odd fact of that day was that every hoem run hit that day accross baseball would lead to some organization donating $50,000 to prostate cancer research (a fact they announced after every home run). Seven home runs were hit in that game, including Vaughn’s monster shot. As my father said, “I’ve never heard prostates being mentioned so frequently in public.”
I like the reference to the Historical Baseball Abstract. Other possible candidates: Rick Ankiel, Drew Henson, Ryan Anderson (though both of the last two might be disqualified for never even reaching the bigs)…but my winner, unless he finally turns it around, has to be Mark Prior.
As an Indians fan, I remember the rage at Shapiro for making the deal. Click my name to read an interesting perspective from our side of the fence.
I wish to thank you Chris. Insomnia has overtaken me this very night only to be thwarted by your article that has bored me to sleep. It saddens me to think of the time you have wasted in researching and writing this article. You have expended time that is forever lost.
I remember jumping for joy when this trade was announced. Alomar was, at the time, one of my favorite non-Mets — A smart player, great fielder, with speed, some power, hit HRs and doubles, just a complete player. From the second he put on the Mets uniform, he was nothing but a giant turd. He couldn’t hit, didn’t hussle, and wasn’t even good in the field. It was like he aged 10 years over that offseason. The sad part was, I always suspected that he would pull a Tony Fernandez, and that once traded, he would regain some of his form and admit that he dogged it during his days in Queens. Rather, he just was the same old turd in a different uniform.