Tom Brennan - The Nolan Ryan Mets Trade Revisited

Nolan Ryan Wikipedia

As any Mets fan worth his or her salt knows, the Mets traded a wild young flame thrower named Nolan Ryan, later of the Hall of Fame, for a late 20s six time All Star named Jim Fregosi.

The same Nolan Ryan who I absolutely fell in love with when, as a raw 19 year old in 1966, he faced a lethal Braves line up with Hank Aaron, Eddie Matthews, Joe Torre, Rico Carty, and Denis Mende and throwing bullets like nothing any other Mets pitcher before him could even dream of, fanned 5 in 3 innings.  WOW!  A KEEPER!

OK, back to Fregosi.  While Fregosi also won a Gold Glove, let me note that he got his All Star selections in a 10 team league, not the 15 teams of today’s baseball.  His years, to me looking back, were decent but not that impressive.

He had slipped from a very solid age 28 season in 1970 in which he played 158 games, knocked out a career high 22 HRs and 82 RBIs, with a .278/.353/.459 split, to a 1971 season with just 107 games where he hit a Ruben Tejada-like .233/.317/.326. 

I guess hopes were high that as a 30 year old Met in 1972, he would bounce back to something more akin to his 1970.

But nope, he again was Ruben Tejada in 1972 as a Met, at .232/.311/.344, and had 45 equally weak games, if not worse, before being traded to Texas. 

Of course, he hit better with them, closer to his Angels days, but on a part time basis for a few years. 

In 18 seasons, he hit just 151 homers and knocked in just 706 runs in 6,523 at bats.  By comparison, a Met fan’s non-favorite, Todd Frazier, has hit  214 HRs, with 624 RBIs in his career in just 4,200 at bats.  Much better than Fregosi.

To let a fan ask himself today, would the (apparently superior to Fregosi) Todd Frazier the Mets acquired in 2018 have been worth trading a young wunderkind named Nolan Ryan?  HECK, NO.

Ryan, on the other hand, immediately exploded with the Angels, going 19-16, 2.28, with 329 Ks and 20 complete games...for starters.  WHOOPS.

Why would they trade the young Mets flamethrower for Fregosi?  As an 18 year old, I was appalled. But what did others say?

In a long-ago Times article, these points were key:

"[Ryan] could put things together overnight, but he hasn't done it for us and the Angels wanted him. I would not hesitate making a trade for somebody who might help us right now, and Fregosi is such a guy," Mets manager Gil Hodges told the Times after the trade.

The Angels were equally optimistic: "We picked up one of baseball's best arms in Ryan. We know of his control problems, but he had the best arm in the National League and, at 24, he is just coming into his own," said Angels GM Harry Dalton. 

Mets GM Bob Scheffing said: "But we've had him three full years and, although he's a hell of a prospect, he hasn't done it for us. How long can you wait?"

(Scheffing, in one of the greatest misjudgments of all time, added) "I can't rate him in the same category with Tom Seaver, Jerry Koosman or Gary Gentry."

Shame on the great Gil Hodges, and triple shame on GM Bob Scheffing. They trade pure fan gold for an aging vet.

One reason the Mets had to have traded Nolan Ryan, I would surmise, was fear that his arm would fall off due to his incredible velocity and high pitch counts. A mere mortal like his teammate Gary Gentry, after all, had his arm blow up in 1973, affectively ending his career.

Young Nolan Ryan started 74 games as a Met, finishing “just” 13 of them, and relieved in some others.  With Seaver around, Ryan was apparently viewed by the hierarchy as Cinderella, the 2nd class family member who would never measure up, and who was then given up on.

The Angels welcomed Cinderella and found out that the glass slipper fit perfectly.

In the first 3 seasons after the trade to the Angels, Ryan’s arm not only didn’t fall off, he completed a staggering 72 games.  SEVENTY TWO.  He did this despite what had to be enormously high season pitch counts.

For example, in 1977, he started 37 games, went 299 innings and fanned 341 while walking 204. He also hit 9 batters, gave up 199 hits, and recorded 556 outs by other than strikeout. If his walks and Ks averaged 6 pitches each, that is 3,270 pitches, or 88 pitches per start.  

If the hits, other outs, and HBPs each averaged 3 pitches, that is another 2,300 pitches, or 62 pitches per start.  88 + 62 = 150 pitches per start, probably a reasonable (perhaps low) estimate.  

By comparison, Jake deGrom averaged 103 pitches in 2019.

Ryan literally had NO pitch limits.  MLB in 2014 had an article stating the following:

”Taking the mound for the Angels on June 14, 1974, (Nolan Ryan)  the future Hall of Famer struck out 19 Red Sox hitters over 13 innings in the California Angels' 4-3, 15-inning victory at the Big A. But the most eye-popping stat from Ryan’s outing might be his pitch count: 235, according to accounts from the game.”

My observation?  235 pitches...MAN!  Nowadays, if both starting pitchers TOTALED 235 pitches, that would be considered newsworthy.He was even a high pitch count freak at an age where the vast majority of other pitchers have long since retired.  

An article some time ago noted that, “In 1989, at age 42, Nolan Ryan averaged 127 pitches a game with a high of 164, which came five days after he threw 150. He's now the CEO of a team that has a pitcher who threw 130 pitches, creating a huge uproar.”

Keeping official pitch counts apparently began in 1988. So no one really knows how many pitches Ryan threw.

And this laser-armed hombre had more strikeouts in the rest of his career than any major leaguer has ever had in their entire career!

No matter how you re-evaluate this trade, it not only makes no sense in hindsight...it made no sense at the time either.

We Wuz Robbed!