2 recent NY Mets trade deadline strategies to repeat, 2 to avoid at all costs

Avoid this: Sell a high-ranking prospect for a rental

It was that ill-fated 2021 trade for Williams that also brought us Javier Baez for two months. Baez played excellently even if the bigger story was his involvement alongside Francisco Lindor at giving the fans a thumbs down. It’s amazing how winning and putting up MVP numbers made us easily forget what year one of Lindor was like.

Pete Crow-Armstrong was the cost for Baez and Williams. One prospect for two major league players was a bit unique than most trades. The Chicago Cubs must have really liked what they were getting. Today, they’re loving it.

One could argue trading two prospects for one player comes with the greater mathematical probability of one of those players turning into an All-Star. Two is better than one. It’s not a matter of quantity. The quality of player dealt is what can cost an executive their reputation. If a team steals someone from you that no one saw coming, so be it. It’s when someone drafted in the first-round the year prior gets traded only a few years after the same organization traded another first-round outfielder in a controversial trade when you start to see a pattern of pain develop.

The Mets have been very careful in recent years about dealing away any of their greatest prospects. Good. It’s stacking their farm system up with more options. Save them for your own big league roster or an offseason move when you can acquire a player who isn’t going to bail for free agency in a few months.