Remember 1969: Who Won? Player swap in Mets history: 1992

 

Mets Trades through the years:  Who won?

November 1991 through October 1992

We're back to a point where it looks like the sole intent of whoever was running the Mets was to completely run them into the ground. 

Notes:  (mixing it up a bit for this year and putting my notes on top!)  Wow, 1992 may have been the worst trade year in Mets history.    The two worst ones were the first and the last ones.   While Bret Saberhagen won 29 games for the Mets in his 3.5 years in New York (half of them in one very good year), Gregg Jeffries had 1100 hits after leaving the Amazin's.   

Jeffries had a pretty decent career for himself with over 100 hits 10 years in a row, including 172 and 186 in the first two years after the trade. 

Keith Miller was a very good utility man and had his best major league season in 1992 with the Royals.

And not everybody gets an established player ranking system named after them.  At least Bill Pecota had something come out of his career.  And he did play every position on the diamond at least once in the majors.  

As for the last trade of the year, Jeff Kent and Ryan Thompson both had a lot of hype, but David Cone went on to win 113 games over the next 10 years.   He was a guy they should have kept.   We have already reviewed Kent and Thompson had a few years as a fourth-outfielder type with the Mets.

The list: 

(1)  New York Mets traded Gregg Jefferies, Kevin McReynolds and Keith Miller to the Kansas City Royals for Bret Saberhagen and Bill Pecota  (Dec 06, 1991)

(2)  New York Mets traded Blaine Beatty to the Montreal Expos for Jeff Barry  (Dec 09, 1991)

(3)  New York Mets traded Hubie Brooks to the California Angels for Dave Gallagher  (Dec 10, 1991)

(4)  New York Mets traded Jeff Gardner to the San Diego Padres for Steve Rosenberg  (Dec 11, 1991)

(5)  New York Mets traded Chuck Carr to the St. Louis Cardinals for Clyde Keller  (Dec 13, 1991)

(6)  New York Mets traded Mark Carreon and Tony Castillo to the Detroit Tigers for Paul Gibson and Randy Marshall  (Jan 22, 1992)

(7)  New York Mets traded Terry Bross to the San Diego Padres for Craig Bullock  (Mar 30, 1992)

(8)  New York Mets traded Doug Simons to the Montreal Expos for Rob Katzaroff (Apr 02, 1992)

(9)  New York Mets traded Julio Valera and Julian Vasquez to the California Angels for Dick Schofield  (Apr 12, 1992)

(10)  New York Mets traded Tim Burke to the New York Yankees for Lee Guetterman  (Jun 09, 1992)

(11)  New York Mets traded Rob Katzaroff to the San Francisco Giants for Kevin Bass (Aug 08, 1992)

(12)  New York Mets traded David Cone to the Toronto Blue Jays for Jeff Kent and Ryan Thompson  (Aug 27, 1992)

Notes, part 2:  Julio Valera had a 3.1 WAR with California in 1992, while Dick Schofield became one of Tom's guys:  a career .232 hitter that came to New York and just couldn't cut it, hitting .202 while getting almost 500 at bats while trying.   

Trivia Time:  Hubie Brooks was drafted 6 times in amateur drafts before he signed in June 1978 with the Mets a full four years after he was first drafted by the Expos in 1974.

Tuesday's Who Won? will feature what could be regarded as the final clean-out of the 1986 World Championship team.   One of my favorite players and current announcer/analyst Ron Darling was traded in 1991.   I had completely forgotten that and would not have remembered which team he was traded to and for whom if you had given me 29 chances.    True Mets fans most certainly would remember .. anybody???