Terry was hit by a Randy Johnson fastball for uttering:
TM> And "Traded By." You can make the argument that several teams wanted to
TM> get rid of him.
You could if it wasn't for the fact that Harold was never causing anyone any
trouble and he was traded for quality players (The only trade so far that
hasn't been that way would be this current Baltimore trade but for a 38-year
hitter, it should be better than average). Reinsdorf probably wanted to trade
AWAY Baines because of money (Hell, it was rumored that Albert Belle was on
the trading block because Reinsdorf was slashing salary), however, Baltimore
had him at the top of their list.
TM> Whether they were the primary focus or not, they were both traded FOR
TM> and BY; you can turn it into a positive or a negative, depending on how
TM> you want to phrase it.
It's pretty easy to see who is what, Terry. Baltimore traded FOR Berrora
earlier this season, St. Louis traded FOR Mark McGwire, Seattle traded FOR
Slocumb....
TM> As I said previously, every trade is both FOR and BY the same player,
Sorry, Terry but that's not true. Do you think that Oakland wanted to trade
away McGwire? Unlike the time they got rid of Canseco, which took them all of
.0000000000000000000000000000000000000000001 seconds to say "YES!", this
trade was agonized over. McGwire will NEVER be thought of as traded BY, only
as traded FOR (Do you think that Babe Ruth's trade meets for your FOR/BY
criteria? Certainly the fans of the Red Sox won't feel that way).
TM> So trades are a wash, in terms of positive or negative reflection on
TM> a player, though players that are traded a lot tend to raise a bit of
TM> suspicion that maybe there is something wrong with them.
No, it doesn't. Harold Baines has always been seen as the last piece of the
puzzle for the pennant drive and several others that have been traded
multiple times have been seen that way. You can't say that being traded
multiple times means that you're unwanted or unloved but you can sure as hell
see when a player was traded BY and traded FOR (Minnesota had a player
without any legs playing with them last year, Darryl Strawberry started his
comeback to the majors there. Seeing another gimmick to attract fans, they
went after the woman -- TRADED FOR).
--- TrekEd 1.00
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* Origin: Bill James, James Dunlop. Coincidence? (1:170/1701)
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