There's an old saying that some of the best trades are those that a team doesn't make.
There were both brilliant and bonehead changes made in Major League Baseball this season.
The San Francisco Giants made some of the best moves in baseball. The best by far was to acquire Andres Galarraga from the Texas Rangers. He is a slugging first baseman who is a perfect fit to bat behind Barry Bonds.
The Giants are trying to catch the Arizona Diamondbacks in the National League West Division. They are currently in the lead for the Wild Card spot.
Despite the career years of Bonds and Rich Aurilia, the Giants had never fully recovered from the loss of Ellis Burks in the off season till Galarraga walked into the clubhouse.
Bedsides being a super bat, Galarraga is also a vocal leader in the clubhouse. Burks was a major factor both on and off the field as well.
The Giants have surged to the wild card spot and far ahead of where they were at the time of the Galarraga pickup.
There were several other good deals which brought big bats in the middle of the lineups. Fred McGriff of the Cubs and Jermaine Dye of the Athletics come to mind.
The A's are now several games ahead in the wild card race and the Cubs are still in the Wild Card hunt.
On the other hand, there were some teams in contention that made some bonehead changes and have totally bombed since the deals.
The Minnesota Twins surprised the nation by holding on to first place for many months of the season.
The management wanted to strengthen the young pitching staff by adding a veteran starter. They went ahead to get Rick Reed of the New York Mets.
Sounds good except for the fact that Matt Lawton was the player traded to the Mets.
He was the heart and soul of the Twins. He had been there the longest and, in my opinion, was the most valuable. The Twins had dropped out of the race since the deal.
Would the Twins have traded Kirby Puckett a few years ago? Of course not.
Teams shouldn’t trade the key members that got them into contention in the first place.
The Boston Red Sox General Manager Dan Duquette made a bonehead mistake as well. He fired the manager, Jimy Williams. Was he doing poorly?
Williams was 12 games over .500 without the fire power of Pedro Martinez and Nomar Garciaparra for the majority of the year. Take away Sammy Sosa and Kerry Wood away from the Cubs. Would they be 12 games over?
Jimy Williams is one of the best managers in baseball and was fired because he didn’t get along with a couple of the players or Duquette himself.
Talk about your all-time backfires. The Red Sox lost 10 of 11 and are virtually out of the race as well.
This was one of the stupidest things in baseball history. The Red Sox have to beat the curse of stupidity before they beat the curse of Babe Ruth.
Copyright Central Michigan Life
