Hot Stove History

Hot Stove History: How The Yankees Almost Acquired Zack Wheeler From The Mets

By Mark Polishuk | January 7, 2022 at 4:25pm CDT

The Mets and Yankees haven’t agreed to a player-for-player trade since the Mike Stanton-for-Felix Heredia swap in December 2004, but that streak was almost broken in blockbuster fashion during Brodie Van Wagenen’s two-year stint as the Mets’ general manager. The two New York teams came very close to a July 2019 swap that would have sent Zack Wheeler to the Bronx, according to SNY’s Andy Martino, except an unknown player also involved in the trade failed a medical exam.

The Yankees were known to be one of the teams interested in Wheeler heading into the deadline, though the Bronx Bombers reportedly had even more interest in another Mets hurler in Noah Syndergaard. Beyond those two members of the Mets rotation, the Yankees cast a wide net looking for rotation help at the deadline but didn’t come away with any significant trades whatsoever, whether it be for pitchers or hitters.

The Mets also held off on dealing Wheeler to anyone, as the right-hander finished off a strong season and then left Queens that winter for a five-year, $118MM free agent contract with the Phillies. Interestingly, the Yankees were also linked to Wheeler’s free agent market, but instead pivoted to make an even bigger splash by signing Gerrit Cole to a nine-year, $324MM pact — still the largest contract ever given to a pitcher in total dollars.

Beyond the sheer rarity of the two Big Apple rivals swinging such a notable trade, the Wheeler deal would have created a big ripple effect across recent baseball history. For starters, adding Wheeler might have been the final piece the Yankees needed for a championship, as the club overcame a ton of injuries to win 103 games before eventually falling to the Astros in the ALCS.

If Wheeler had been a key cog in a 28th Yankees World Series title, perhaps the Bombers would’ve been more inclined to retain their new hero in free agency, rather than sign Cole. Even if keeping Wheeler might’ve cost more than $118MM in this scenario, his deal would’ve been worth much less than Cole’s contract, thus giving the Yankees extra money to spend on other needs that offseason.

It isn’t known what the Yankees would’ve had to have given up to land Wheeler from the Mets, though since he was a free agent that winter, it wouldn’t have been an overwhelming trade package for just two-plus months of the righty’s services. However, it was clearly enticing enough for Van Wagenen to pull the trigger had everything worked out on the medical front, and it was enough to outbid the many other teams known to be circling Wheeler in the lead-up to July 31, 2019. The Mets could have kept those Yankees trade pieces as a way of restocking the farm system after the Marcus Stroman deal with the Blue Jays that same deadline, or perhaps looked to flip the prospects in a future trade for more immediate help.

A Wheeler trade would have impacted his free agency in another fashion, as he would’ve been been ineligible to receive a qualifying offer due to the midseason deal. While it didn’t seem like the QO draft compensation had much impact on Wheeler’s market, the lack of a qualifying offer might have resulted in one or two extra teams getting involved, which could have resulted in a few extra millions in Wheeler’s bank account.

The qualifying offer also must have factored into the Mets’ decision-making about the proposed Wheeler deal. The Yankees must have offered something Van Wagenen judged as being more valuable than the compensatory pick the Mets were set to receive for Wheeler. This ended up being the 69th overall pick in the 2020 draft, which the Mets used on high school outfield prospect Isaiah Greene. With his first pro season now in the books, the 20-year-old Greene hit a very solid .289/.421/.368 over 191 plate appearances…

…for the Guardians’ rookie ball affiliate. This is another interesting branch in the Zack Wheeler/Yankees multiverse, as Greene was part of the four-player package (along with Amed Rosario, Andres Gimenez, and prospect Josh Wolf) sent to the Guardians in exchange for Francisco Lindor and Carlos Carrasco — a blockbuster trade completed exactly one year ago today. While Greene wasn’t the centerpiece of that deal from Cleveland’s perspective, it could be that the two sides might have agreed on another prospect as the fourth player. Or, maybe that one little change makes the whole trade fall apart, and Cleveland could have opted for another team’s offer for Lindor and/or Carrasco.

The Astros/Nationals Blockbuster Trade That Was Almost A Reality

By Mark Polishuk | October 21, 2019 at 7:15am CDT

The Astros and Nationals share a Spring Training site, but there isn’t exactly a lot of shared history between the two franchises as they prepare to meet in the World Series. The Astros hold a 244-207 all-time record over the Nationals/Expos, and the no-hitter that Larry Dierker threw against the Expos back on July 9, 1976 is probably the most historically significant game to ever take place between the two clubs….until Tuesday’s Game 1, that is.

There isn’t even a lengthy or significant trade history to work with in finding links between the two clubs, as the last deal between Washington and Houston took place back in 2007. However, the reigning pennant winners came close to a much more significant trade in July 2018, when Bryce Harper almost became an Astro. As detailed by The Athletic’s Ken Rosenthal (subscription required) last November, the two teams had worked out the framework of a trade that would have sent Harper to Houston for a three-prospect package headlined by right-hander J.B. Bukauskas. The other two prospects were a pitcher in the lower minors and catcher Garrett Stubbs “was in play” to be the third piece, Rosenthal noted.

The swap was ready to go by July 30, the day before the trade deadline, though Nationals ownership stepped in to veto the proposal. The Lerner family was still hopeful of re-signing Harper to a new contract either in free agency or even before he hit the open market, and didn’t yet want to part ways with the star outfielder. For similar reasons, a potential August trade between the Dodgers and Nationals that would have seen Yasiel Puig head to D.C. and Harper go to L.A. was also a no-go.

The idea Harper going to the Astros is such an eye-opening concept that the entire baseball world would have been shaken up had the trade been completed. Here are four of the larger ripple effects that could have emerged if Harper had indeed donned Houston orange in July 2018…

Do The Astros Win The 2018 World Series?
Maybe the most obvious question of the bunch, as the Astros had a surprisingly middle-of-the-pack offense in the second half of the 2018 season. With Harper’s bat in the lineup, perhaps Houston (who won 103 games in real life) could have scored enough extra victories to overtake the 108-win Red Sox for home-field advantage throughout the postseason. If not, perhaps at least Harper helps the Astros generate enough offense to overcome the Red Sox in the ALCS. Astros hitters combined for a mediocre .219/.337/.385 slash line in Houston’s five-game loss, and while pitching (a combined 5.52 ERA) was the Astros’ larger problem against Boston, it’s worth noting that Sox hitters had only a .710 collective OPS.

In a short series, even a few hits could have swung the entire thing Houston’s way, and perhaps Harper could have also been a difference-maker in helping the Astros top the Dodgers in the 2018 Series. Stretching the butterfly effect out a bit further, maybe the Harper-led Astros only make it a round further, and it’s the Dodgers who wind up as the 2018 champions. Or, if the Red Sox fell short, perhaps president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski is fired after the season (ownership was already considering a change late in the 2018 season), Boston has a new front office boss installed last winter, and the entire scope of the Red Sox 2018-19 offseason and 2019 season are also changed.

No QO, No Status Quo For Harper’s Free Agency
One can definitely fall down lots of different wormholes when exploring an alternate reality scenario, but one thing seems pretty uniformly certain — Harper would still have become a free agent after the 2018 season, and he wouldn’t have been an Astro in 2019. The Astros didn’t show interest in signing Harper to a mega-deal last winter, and even in a world where Harper magically carries Houston to a championship, it’s very likely that the two sides thank each other for the ring and part ways. As such, the Astros’ offseason decisions aren’t greatly impacted, so the team’s real-world moves (i.e. signing Michael Brantley and Wade Miley) probably still happen.

One wrinkle to Harper’s free agency is that, since he was dealt at midseason, he was ineligible to have a qualifying offer placed on his services. So the Nationals would’ve gotten the Bukauskas package but not the compensatory pick they received for Harper once he signed with Philadelphia. This comp pick ended up falling after the fourth round (since the Nats exceeded the luxury tax threshold in 2018) though Washington actually forfeited this pick regardless — the Nationals had to give up their second- and fifth-highest picks in the draft as compensation for signing Patrick Corbin, another QO free agent. So without the Harper pick to work with, the Nationals wouldn’t have had a fifth-round draft pick, and thus wouldn’t have been able to select hard-throwing Florida right-hander Tyler Dyson. Washington went well above slot ($346.8K) in signing Dyson to a $500K bonus, and MLB Pipeline ranks Dyson as the 20th-best prospect in the Nationals’ system.

So with Dyson still on the board, that single inclusion quite possibly shakes up a lot of movement in the draft. But, if Harper doesn’t have a rejected qualifying offer hanging over him, the Phillies wouldn’t have had to give up their second round pick in order to sign him. So this gives the Phils another high draft pick to add to their farm system — or maybe the Phillies end up using that pick anyway on another QO free agent. Harper was known to be on the Phillies’ offseason radar from day one, so it’s safe to assume they’d already earmarked losing that pick to ink him.

But if that wasn’t a consideration, perhaps Philadelphia looks at the other five QO free agents who hit the market (Hyun-Jin Ryu accepted his offer and remained with the Dodgers) and pursues one of them during its aggressive offseason. How does the 2019 Phillies season play out look if Corbin or Dallas Keuchel had been in the rotation, if Craig Kimbrel was closing games, if A.J. Pollock was in the outfield, or if Yasmani Grandal had been behind the plate? The latter three are particularly intriguing, since signing any of those players would’ve meant the Phils would’ve had to forego some of their other acquisitions (such as David Robertson, Andrew McCutchen, or J.T. Realmuto) at those same positions.

Tax Relief In Washington
It isn’t known whether the Astros would’ve absorbed all of the approximately $7.21MM still owed to Harper over the last months of the season had the Nationals trade gone through. But even if only a portion came off the books, trading Harper would’ve jump-started the Nats’ efforts to reload for 2019, and they might’ve dealt veterans like Gio Gonzalez, Daniel Murphy, Matt Adams, and Ryan Madson on July 31 or earlier in the old August trade waivers period rather than wait until late August to unload the quartet.

The bottom line is that either by moving Gonzalez and company earlier, or in dealing Harper’s salary in its entirety, the Nationals would’ve been able to duck under the $197MM Competitive Balance Tax threshold and reset their penalty clock. In real life, D.C. had a $205MM luxury tax number, which resulted in a tax bill of $2,386,097 (which included a repeater penalty for exceeding the threshold in consecutive years).

The Nationals again slightly exceeded the $206MM threshold this season, as per both Roster Resource (just under $207.94MM) and Cot’s Baseball Contracts (less than $76K). These figures are estimations, of course, and given the small amounts involved, it’s possible the Nats managed to slightly sneak under the $206MM mark after all. Even with the 50% tax rate for three-time CBT payors, this small step over the threshold still means the Nationals won’t be facing a big tax bill. At Roster Resource’s number, the Nats will owe $969,309.50 in luxury tax payments, which is pocket change to a high-spending team.

Much more importantly than saving under $3.36MM in tax money, escaping the “CBT payor” designation would’ve impacted the Nationals in the 2018-19 free agent market. As per the qualifying offer rules, Washington’s compensatory pick for losing Harper would’ve come after Competitive Balance Round B rather than after the fourth round — a jump of roughly 60 slots. Also, signing Corbin cost the Nationals $1MM in international bonus money as well as their second- and fifth-highest draft picks, whereas if they hadn’t exceeded the luxury tax threshold, the Corbin signing would’ve cost only the second-highest pick and $500K in international pool funds.

Do The Astros Still Get Greinke?
This is the ripple effect that perhaps has the most clear and direct impact on the 2019 Series. If Houston trades Bukauskas in July 2018, it doesn’t have him in the organization in July 2019 to be dealt to the Diamondbacks as part of the four-player return for Zack Greinke.

It’s possible the Astros and D’Backs could’ve settled on another name rather than Bukauskas, though given how the Greinke talks were finalized just minutes away from the trade deadline, who knows how things play out with Bukauskas’ involvement. Bukauskas was the top healthy prospect in the deal, after all, given that Corbin Martin is sidelined due to Tommy John surgery.

Or potentially, in a reality where the Astros swing the Harper trade but it doesn’t work out, perhaps GM Jeff Luhnow thinks twice the next year about another splashy trade for a big name and foregoes a Greinke trade entirely, perhaps focusing on a lower-tier player or players instead.

It’s safe to assume that the Astros would have still acquired some kind of starting pitching help, and still go on to win the AL West even without an ace like Greinke in the mix. And while Greinke hasn’t been great in the postseason, does Houston still win Game Four of the ALCS without his 4 1/3 innings of one-run ball? Or, maybe without Greinke down the stretch, the Astros win fewer than 107 games and lose home-field advantage to the Yankees, which swings the ALCS in New York’s direction. Or, if the Yankees are the top seed, the American League bracket is flipped entirely and, who knows, we could’ve ended up with a Twins/Rays ALCS.

Report: Tigers Were Offered Baez, Bregman In 2017 Offers For Michael Fulmer

By Mark Polishuk | August 4, 2019 at 10:46pm CDT

Between a down year in 2018 and then Tommy John surgery in March 2019, Michael Fulmer has fallen off the radar for many fans outside of the Motor City. Yet it wasn’t long ago that Fulmer was one the most sought-after trade chips in baseball, hotly pursued by multiple teams in the aftermath of a Rookie Of The Year season in 2016, and a strong sophomore year that saw him post a 3.83 ERA, 2.85 K/BB rate, and 6.2 K/9 over 164 2/3 innings in 2017, though Fulmer’s year was cut short by elbow surgery.

It was during that 2017 season that the Tigers finally went into full rebuild mode, trading Justin Verlander, Justin Upton, J.D. Martinez, and others before the trading period finally halted at the end of August. Fulmer received plenty of attention from trade suitors, though he wasn’t as obvious of a moveable asset given that he still had so many years of team control remaining.

Nonetheless, the Tigers received some sizeable offers for his services, and according to Anthony Fenech of the Detroit Free Press, these offers included two blockbusters for future All-Stars. The Tigers reportedly declined a three-player package from the Cubs that would have seen Javier Baez head to Detroit in exchange for Fulmer, while the Astros were willing to give up Alex Bregman for both Fulmer and left-hander Justin Wilson.

It makes for an eye-popping case of hindsight for the Tigers and their fans, considering how the three principal figures of those offers have since performed. Baez and Bregman are simply two of the game’s best players, each collecting All-Star appearances in both 2018 and 2019, while Baez finished second in NL MVP voting last season while Bregman racked up a fifth-place finish in the 2018 AL MVP race and also played a big role in the Astros’ 2017 World Series title.

Fulmer, by contrast, hasn’t matched his early potential due to injuries and perhaps simply some statistical regression. Whether he can regain his former front-of-the-rotation status is a question that can’t be answered until at least a few months into the 2020 season (or perhaps until 2021, if Fulmer is one of many pitchers who under-performs in their first several starts back from TJ surgery).

There were some rumors about a Cubs/Tigers trade involving Fulmer back in 2017, prior to Chicago’s acquisition of Jose Quintana from the White Sox, though Detroit reportedly wanted both Baez and Ian Happ as part of a Fulmer trade package. Bregman and Fulmer were never linked in any trade talks, and one wonders if the Astros only floated the idea fairly early in the year, since Bregman was installed as the team’s everyday third baseman from Opening Day onward. Needless to say, Bregman was no longer on the table by the time Houston and Detroit collaborated on their actual 2017 blockbuster, the championship-deciding deal that sent Verlander to the Astros on August 31.

In fairness to the Tigers, every front office has countless examples of instances where they missed out on a trade or a signing that would have been a steal. Likewise, from the Cubs’ and Astros’ perspective, every team can cite numerous cases where they lucked out in not making a transaction. But the Fulmer situation looms large, Fenech notes, given how Detroit has been unable to maximize the return on several of their top trade assets during their rebuild.

Several scouts from around the league weren’t very impressed by the four total prospects Detroit received from the Cubs and Braves in trade deadline swaps of Nicolas Castellanos and Shane Greene. The Tigers also weren’t able to trade Matt Boyd, perhaps their most valuable trade chip, at all. While “multiple executives indicated Boyd’s trade value will never be as high as it was at 3:59 p.m. on Wednesday” prior to the trade deadline, it seems that Detroit’s asking price on Boyd was simply too exorbitant. One National League exec told Fenech that the Tigers’ demands were “borderline comical,” and an AL executive describing Detroit’s front office as “impossible to deal with.”

The Tigers also asked for a lot in their attempts to trade Greene. For instance, Detroit asked the Nationals for top infield prospect Carter Kieboom, and Fenech also reports that the Nationals turned down an offer for Luis Garcia, another prized young infielder.

Quick Hits: Pujols, Dodgers, Haniger, Dipoto, Bichette

By Mark Polishuk | June 24, 2019 at 12:36am CDT

On July 31, 2000, the Padres and Cardinals swung a trade deadline deal that sent Heathcliff Slocumb and prospect Ben Johnson to San Diego in exchange for catcher Carlos Hernandez and minor league utilityman Nate Tebbs. The swap is little more than a footnote in team history, though it could’ve been a far more legendary trade had Johnson been replaced with another prospect who was on the Padres’ radar — Albert Pujols. Derrick Goold of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch details the intriguing history of that would-be deal, and how the Cardinals front office had to make a decision between including Pujols (a famously unheralded 13th-round pick in the 1999 draft) or Johnson, a much more highly-touted fourth-rounder from that same draft. Pujols showed so much promise in his early pro career, however, that the team ultimately decided to move Johnson and spend more time evaluating a potential hidden gem. “I really didn’t want to give up Ben, either, but that’s why you always have your top guys scout your own system,” said Walt Jocketty, then the Cardinals’ general manager. “You have to know your own, like Pujols. There was no way we could trade him. No way, just based on what our guys had seen in a short period of time. They said, ‘I think he’s going to be something special – or has a chance to be.’ When I saw it myself, it was obvious.”

Here’s more from around the baseball world…

Even with Rich Hill on the IL for an undetermined period of time, Dodgers president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman isn’t planning to make starting pitching a particular focus at the trade deadline. “I don’t see it being an area where we spend a lot of energy,” Friedman told reporters, including Bill Plunkett of the Orange County Register. “Could that change? Of course. But I don’t expect it right now. We don’t expect it to be an area of need.” In fact, Friedman didn’t think his team had any obvious weak spots, which perhaps isn’t a surprise given the Dodgers’ league-best 54-25 record. Instead, the front office will look out for “impact players,” since such additions are “what moves the needle in October.”
In an interview on “The Front Office” on MLB Network Radio on SiriusXM (audio link), Mariners GM Jerry Dipoto reiterated that his trade deadline efforts will be directed towards moving veteran players. Younger and more controllable members of the Seattle roster are less likely to be moved, since they are part of what Dipoto hopes “is a very quick turnaround” within 12-18 months. “Some of the guys that we do have here that attract the most trade attention, particularly guys like Mitch Haniger, they’re critical to our growth. So at some point, you do have to build around something,” Dipoto said.
With Vladimir Guerrero Jr. and Cavan Biggio now in the majors, speculation is swirling in Toronto about when Bo Bichette could make his Blue Jays debut. A consensus top-12 prospect in the sport prior to the season, Bichette has a .256/.316/.453 slash line and three homers over 96 Triple-A plate appearances in 2019, while missing over six weeks due to a fractured hand. As a result, Jays GM Ross Atkins told Sportsnet.ca’s Ben Nicholson-Smith that Bichette still needs a bit more seasoning in his first stint at the Triple-A level. “We’d really like to see some time in triple-A and have him get his legs under him and have a good strong foundation before we have that discussion [about a promotion],” Atkins said. For comparison’s sake, Nicholson-Smith notes that Biggio had 174 PA and Guerrero 162 PA for Triple-A Buffalo before getting the call to the Show.

Reds Were Runners-Up For Albert Pujols In 2011-12 Offseason

By Mark Polishuk | June 20, 2019 at 10:42pm CDT

The Angels are making a rare interleague visit to St. Louis this weekend, marking Albert Pujols’ first on-field visit back to his former city since he left the Cardinals following the 2011 season. He could have been a much more frequent visitor to Busch Stadium, however, if he had remained within the NL Central, as USA Today’s Bob Nightengale writes that the Reds were the proverbial mystery team that came closest to keeping Pujols away from the Angels in free agency.

Cincinnati offered Pujols a ten-year, $225MM offer, which fell just short of the ten-year, $240MM contract Pujols ultimately accepted from the Angels. The Marlins actually offered more money than either the Angels or Reds, though Pujols turned down Miami’s ten-year, $275MM offer out of concerns that the contract didn’t contain a no-trade clause, and as Nightengale puts it, “Pujols [was] fearful of the Marlins being the Marlins.”

Walt Jocketty was the Reds’ general manager at the time, and had a long relationship with Pujols due to Jocketty’s time as the Cardinals’ GM from 1994 to 2007. “We thought we were going to get him,” Jockey told Nightengale. “We thought he would certainly give our organization a lift with his presence, on and off the field.”

After suffering through nine consecutive losing seasons from 2001-2009, the Reds won the NL Central in 2010 but were then unceremoniously swept out of the NLDS by the Phillies (a series that saw the Reds become just the second team to be no-hit in a postseason game, after Roy Halladay shut them down in Game One). That taste of the postseason gave way to a disappointing 79-83 record in 2011, which led to an aggressive offseason for Jocketty’s front office. Cincinnati added Mat Latos and Sean Marshall that winter, and indeed went on to regain the NL Central crown in 2012 and then reached the playoffs again as a wild card team in 2013.

Needless to say, adding Pujols would have been by far the biggest possible transaction for the Reds, and the signing would’ve had an incredible ripple effect on recent baseball history. The player who would’ve been most notably impacted, of course, is Joey Votto. Aside from six games as a left fielder in his rookie year, Votto has never played anywhere besides first base and (in interleague games) DH in the majors, and a position change would’ve seemingly been unlikely. While Pujols had played a handful of games at third base for St. Louis in 2011, that marked his first action at the hot corner since 2002, so he wasn’t going to be moved away from first base.

The most plausible scenario of a Pujols signing is simply that Votto would have become an enormous trade chip for the Reds. Votto had already established himself as a star, and since he wouldn’t have become a free agent until after the 2013 season, the Reds could have netted a hefty return for his services.

As things turned out, the Reds ended up spending their exact planned investment on Pujols into a new extension for Votto, inking him to a ten-year, $225MM deal covering the 2014-2023 seasons (after Votto’s original three-year deal with Cincinnati was up). This wasn’t the only money the Reds splashed around that spring, as they also extended Brandon Phillips on a six-year, $72.5MM contract.

It’s hard to argue that keeping Votto over Pujols was a bad move for Cincinnati, as Votto has decidedly outhit Pujols over the last nine seasons. There’s even some question as to whether Pujols could have even remained on the field if he had stayed in the National League, as the slugger said his decision to join the Angels “worked out perfect for me….With all of the injuries and everything that happened to me, it was the best-case scenario for me playing in the American League with a DH. It hasn’t been the best years of my career, but I’m still producing.”

Still, it’s worth at least guessing at how a Pujols-in-Cincinnati scenario could have developed. For one, the Reds would’ve had Pujols off their books following the 2021 season, whereas they’re still committed to Votto through 2023 (and Votto’s power numbers have dropped precipitously over the last two seasons). In terms of shorter-term results, who knows if the combination of Pujols and whatever pieces the Reds could have obtained in a hypothetical Votto trade could have put the Reds over the top in 2012 or 2013, though Pujols missed a big chunk of the 2013 season once his foot problems began to worsen.

Of course, who knows — maybe the Pujols-led Reds would’ve lost the 2012 or 2013 World Series to whichever team Votto ended up joining. His availability that winter creates a whole new set of alternate realities, as one can not only look back at the 2011-12 free agent market for teams in need of first basemen, but it’s quite possible that teams without a defined need at first might have changed their plans if Votto was on the table (in the same way that the Reds weren’t seen a suitor at all for Pujols).

Pujols signed with the Angels in early December, so if he signs with the Reds in this fantasy scenario, that gives Cincinnati much of the offseason to market their younger first baseman. Maybe it’s Votto who ends up in an Angels uniform after the Halos missed out on their top free agent choice. The 2011-12 offseason saw the Marlins splurge on Jose Reyes, Mark Buehrle and Heath Bell in free agency, so maybe they could’ve decided to augment those free agents with a first baseman in a Votto trade? If Votto is still a Red in late January 2012 when Victor Martinez tears his ACL, would the Tigers have spoken to the Reds about Votto rather than sign Prince Fielder? The possibilities are endless.

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