Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
I looked at the details of this trade, and I have to say, the trade looks beyond terrible for the Angels.
The trade happened in the offseason between 2010 and 2011 seasons. Angels traded Mike Napoli and Juan Rivera to the Blue Jays for Vernon Wells.
Vernon Wells proceded to hit .226/.267/.387 for the rest of his career while being paid almost 60 million dollars! Mike Napoli hit a much much better .267/.371/.523 during the next three years, while being paid less than half the salary of Napoli. In 2011, the year after the trade, Mike Napoli hit a phenomenal .320/.414/.631 with 30 homeruns, with 6 of those 30 homeruns coming against the Angels. Ouch.
The trade made zero sense from the start. Mike Napoli had a career .847 OPS at the time of the trade, considerably higher than Wells' .804. Juan Rivera on the other hand had a .789 OPS, which really isn't that far from Wells. If the deal was simply between Wells and Rivera, that would've been completely reasonable. Instead, the Angels dealt away a player who was almost as good as Wells, and then packaged on a player who was significantly better and younger than Wells. It's kind of like trading away your Porsche and your 2012 Honda so that you could get a 2013 Honda.
Of course, you might say that "hindsight is everything man, if Vernon Wells was hitting like he did in 2010 for Toronto, that would've been a great deal for the Angels!" Actually, the lack of hindsight actually makes this trade seem worse. Vernon Wells was 31 at the point of the trade, and had to be paid a sh*tload of money, by sh*tload of course I mean "$26,000,000". Mike Napoli was to be paid $5,800,000, while Juan Rivera was to be paid $5,200,000. Combine their two salaries and it's still less than half of what Vernon Wells was to be paid in 2011. Financially the trade was an absolute disaster.
Worst of all, Vernon Wells' 2010 was an extreme outliar, it was easily his best season since 2006, and it came after three years of mediocrity. Why the f*ck did the Angels think that the rest of the contract would resemble his 2010 season? And assuming that Vernon Wells did repeat his 2010 performance (which he absolutely failed to do); is a slashline of .273/.331/.515 really worth $26 million? He didn't even receive a single MVP vote that year. The Angels expected to dole out $26 million for a guy who hasn't had a single MVP vote in five years. Did the Angels assume that Vernon Wells would magically pull out a .300/.400/.600 season out of his *****? Because if you're the second highest paid player in MLB (as Vernon was in 2011), then you better hit like the second best player in MLB. The Angels also cannot use the "we needed to fulfill a position" excuse, as Vernon Wells was an outfielder; by far the easiest position to fill.
What an awful trade, what were the Angels smoking at the time they made the trade?
The Angels tend to draft well, but their big-money acquisitions over the past few years have been a joke. Everyone knew at the time the Wells trade was stupid, just like giving Josh Hamilton a humongous contract coming off a season where he completely choked for the Rangers down the stretch.
As for worst trades of all-time, this one doesn't even crack the top-ten, but it was pretty bad.
In 2001 Armando Rios had played 219 games as an outfielder for the Giants and posted an 860 OPS for his career. In mid season he was traded to the Pirates for pitcher Jason Schmidt.
The Giants happened to be playing the Pirates at this time and in his first game for Pittsburgh, Rios made a key error which allowed the Giants to win. In the next game, Schmidt went eight innings giving up one run for the SF win, and it was partially made possible by Rios fanning on an attempted sliding catch where he also injured himself and was out for the remainder of the season.
The next year Rios posted a .650 OPS in 226 plate appearances for the Pirates and they shipped him to the White Sox who released him after 49 games with them. Rios never played ML ball again. As a Pirate he produced -0.06 WAR.
Schmidt on the other hand wound up going 78-37, 3.36 ERA, ERA+ 126 over the next six seasons. Of the 31.7 WAR Schmidt produced in his career, 22.6 of it was as a Giant.
I know some Mets fans who still whine about the results of the George Foster trade, but they didn't give up much to get him. They really should have been complaining about trading Jeff Reardon to the Expos for Ellis Valentine.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
