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The 3 worst Mets trade deadline fire sales and why each was so horrible

By Tim Boyle |
Wild Card Game - San Francisco Giants v New York Mets
Wild Card Game - San Francisco Giants v New York Mets / Elsa/GettyImages
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The MLB trade deadline has become a much more significant summer event than it used to be. The New York Mets have had seasons on both sides of buying and selling. It’s those heartbreaking selling seasons when Mets fans were tortured the worst.

Among all of the trade deadline fire sales, three stand out as the most significantly awful. What made them so dreadful?

1977 NY Mets trade deadline fire sale

The infamous Midnight Massacre took place at the 1977 MLB trade deadline. The fact that it has a nickname tells anyone who wasn’t around to live through it how infamous it must’ve been.

Contractual disputes with Tom Seaver led to the MLB legend getting traded to the Cincinnati Reds for four players. The Mets also unloaded power hitter Dave Kingman in a separate deal to the San Diego Padres. A third trade, one where the Mets actually won, acquired Joel Youngblood from the St. Louis Cardinals.

This day and trade deadline fire sale is best-remembered as the day Mets management officially turned heel against the fans because of the Seaver deal. Tom Terrific. The Franchise. He was now a member of the Reds, a rival of the Mets in the earlier part of the decade. New York had faded in the standings and with zero playoff appearances since the 1973 season when they took down the Reds in the NLCS, the 1977 ball club was working toward the invention of sports tanking.

It’s not unusual at all these days for teams to trade away players they don’t have an intention of signing. In 1977, it was unusual to see a player like Seaver who was still one of the best in the league get traded away. 

The simplest way to describe why this fire sale was so bad was due to the heartbreak. Seaver defined Mets baseball.

While some front office apologists might suggest this was best for the team, the playoff drought until 1986 begs to differ. Too much time passed between the Seaver trade and winning Mets baseball to justify a rebuild.

2003 NY Mets trade deadline fire sale

The Mets traded away some pieces in the 1990s during the lean years but it’s the 2003 trade deadline where they gutted the team. The team finished last in the National League East during Tom Glavine’s first year on the roster. He was clearly not the answer, at least not this season.

The fire sale began early with a July 1 trade of Roberto Alomar to the Chicago White Sox. The Mets picked up Royce Ring, Edwin Almonte, and Andrew Salvo in the deal. It was more of a trade to rid themselves of Alomar who never came close to meeting expectations.

About two weeks later, Jeromy Burnitz was traded to the Los Angeles Dodgers. The Mets picked up three more players for him. Does anyone remember Victor Diaz, Kole Strayhorn, or Joselo Diaz? Only Victor Diaz would ring a bell as he did manage to appear in 89 games for the 2005 team. He’d get traded in August 2006 to the Texas Rangers for Mike Nickeas. For the most part, Victor Diaz is a forgotten Mets player.

The busy July continued with the Mets sending Armando Benitez to the New York Yankees for Jason Anderson, Anderson Garcia, and Ryan Biconda. The month finished with Graeme Lloyd going to the Kansas City Royals for Jeremy Hill and Rey Sanchez getting traded to the Seattle Mariners for Kenny Kelly.

That’s a lot of names to digest and a lot of Baseball-Reference pages to research to see if they ever even made an appearance with the Mets. Whether they did or not, the fact that we don’t have significant memories of any shows how meaningless many of these trades tend to turn out.

Even more recent than 2003 was another fire sale where the Mets made a whole bunch of trades to acquire even more players we don’t remember.

2017 NY Mets trade deadline fire sale

The 2017 Mets were supposed to be much better than they were. Where have we heard this before? Some horrible and injured starting pitching (again, sound familiar?) helped eat them alive. They were clearly not going to make a third consecutive playoff appearance. With several veterans on expiring contracts, it was time to unload.

There was a whole lot of moving and shaking at this trade deadline. Rather than rehash all of the names, let’s recap this a little more simply.

The Mets traded away Curtis Granderson, Lucas Duda, Addison Reed, Neil Walker, and Jay Bruce. Four everyday players and the closer were all on the move. The Mets must’ve gotten something good in return, right?

Even all of these years later, the most significant piece they acquired was Drew Smith in the Duda deal with the Tampa Bay Rays. Each deal was essentially a veteran for a young relief pitcher or bundle of them. It was essentially a repeat of the 2003 trade deadline where the Mets failed to acquire anything of significance.

What made this even more frustrating was how locked in the Mets were to keep competing. The 2003 trade deadline fire sale was bad but it was mostly dead weight they cut off. In 2017, the Mets traded away a couple of much better players and came away with very little in return. It seems like they just chose all of the wrong players. Jacob Rhame and all the rest.

Most puzzling of all, the Mets added AJ Ramos to the bullpen in a trade with the Miami Marlins. It wasn’t a bad idea but a 5.59 ERA in 49 games between 2017 and 2018 confirms it actually was.

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