Remember 1969: Who Won? Mets trades in History - 1996

 

Mets Trades through the years:  Who won?

1996 - a terrible year in the standings where the best trade might have been in the manager's seat, replacing Dallas Green with Bobby Valentine.

November 1995 – October 1996

(1)  New York Mets traded Jeff Barry to the San Diego Padres for Pedro Martinez  (Dec 15, 1995)

(2)  New York Mets traded Al Shirley to the Kansas City Royals for Brent Mayne  (Dec 19, 1995)

(3)  New York Mets traded Kelly Stinnett to the Milwaukee Brewers for Corey Lidle  (Jan 17, 1996)

(4)  New York Mets traded Aaron Ledesma to the California Angels for Kevin Flora  (Jan 18, 1996)

(5)  New York Mets traded Yudith Ozorio, Erik Hiljus and Eric Ludwick to the St. Louis Cardinals for Bernard Gilkey (Jan 22, 1996)

(6)  New York Mets traded Damon Buford to the Texas Rangers for Terrell Lowery  (Jan 25, 1996)

(7)  New York Mets traded Pete Walker and Luis Arroyo to the San Diego Padres for Roberto Petagine and Scott Adair (Mar 17, 1996)

(8) New York Mets traded Ryan Thompson and Reid Cornelius to the Cleveland Indians for Mark Clark  (Mar 31, 1996)

(9)  New York Mets traded Chris DeWitt to the Chicago Cubs for Matt Franco  (Apr 08, 1996)

(10)  New York Mets traded Blas Minor to the Seattle Mariners for Randy Vickers  (Jun 09, 1996)

(11)  New York Mets traded Jeff Kent and Jose Vizcaino to the Cleveland Indians for Carlos Baerga and Alvaro Espinoza  (Jul 29, 1996)

Notes:    Not THAT Pedro Martinez.  I either forgot about or never heard of Pedro (1) until now.   He was part of the trade with Derek Bell from San Diego to Houston the year prior, then traded back to the Padres a couple months before the Mets acquired him.   

As a lefty reliever, he actually pitched in 122 games, the first 80 of which were pretty darned good – sub 3.00 ERA over two years.   Unfortunately he could not duplicate that after he got to New York and only pitched 5 games with the Mets. 

The Bernard Gilkey trade was probably the best trade of the year, but Matt Franco also had his moments with the Mets.

Trading Jeff Kent for Carlos Baerga  ..  hmm.   It obviously didn’t work out in the long run, but at the time it wasn’t really a bad idea.  Baerga was actually on the better Hall of Fame track of the two at the time.  Unfortunately, he had just a couple decent years with the Mets, but Kent went on to have a potentially Hall of Fame career.  

And a last comment - this one about time.   It was a little slap to the side of the head when I looked at Damon Buford's baseball reference page and it showed him being almost 52 years old now.    Geez, he is the son of Don Buford who was the one I remember.   Ouch.