This Date In Transactions History

On this date in 2011, the Cubs traded minor leaguer Hak-Ju Lee, Chris Archer, Robinson Chirinos, Sam Fuld ,and Brandon Guyer to the Rays for Matt Garza, Fernando Perez and Zac Rosscup.  Garza would go on to post a 3.45 ERA with 8.6 K/9 and 2.8 BB/9 across two years and change (60 starts) for the Cubs.  After finishing the 2013 season with the Rangers, Garza now finds himself as one of the top starting pitchers available on the open market.  Here's a look at other significant moves that have gone down on 1/8..

• In 2010, the Astros signed Brett Myers for one-year and $5.1MM guaranteed. He rewarded them with a 3.14 ERA in 223 2/3 innings, so they rewarded him with two-year, $21MM extension.
• That same day, the Royals inked Scott Podsednik to a one-year, $1.75MM contract. He hit .310/.353/.400 with 29 steals in Kansas City before being traded to the Dodgers for a pair of minor leaguers before the deadline.
• Long-time Padre Trevor Hoffman agreed to a one-year, $6MM contract with the Brewers in 2009. He was fantastic in 2009, pitching to a 1.83 ERA with 37 saves in 54 innings, though 2010 didn't go so well and wound up being his final season.
• The Angels finalized their one-year, $6MM contract with Shea Hillenbrand on this date back in 2007. Not only did he hit .254/.275/.325 in 204 plate appearances for the Halos, but he also made some disparaging remarks about the team. He was cut that June.
• In 2005, the Indians signed Kevin Millwood to a one-year, $7MM contract. He led the league with a 2.86 ERA in 192 innings, but only had nine wins to show for it. 
• The Tigers acquired Carlos Guillen from the Mariners on this day in 2004, sending Ramon Santiago and a minor leaguer to Seattle. Guillen has hit .299/.369/.480 in seven seasons with Detroit, while Santiago was released (only to re-sign with the Tigers) a year later.
• A three-team trade was completed back in 2001. The A's acquired Johnny Damon, Mark Ellis, and Cory Lidle, while the Royals acquired Angel Berroa, Roberto Hernandez, and A.J. Hinch. Tampa Bay walked away with former Rookie of the Year Ben Grieve. In hindsight, Oakland was the clear winner here.
• Some other players involved in transactions on this date: Rocco Baldelli, Mark Loretta, Doug Mientkiewicz, Braden Looper, Julio Franco, two different Juan Gonzalezes, Harold Baines, Darryl Strawberry, and Rich Aurilia twice.

Mike Axisa's post from 2011 was used in the creation of this post.

New Year's Day isn't typically a hotbed of activity in baseball, but we have seen a few significant moves go down on January 1st.  The biggest 1/1 transaction happened in 2012, when the Blue Jays acquired Jason Frasor from the White Sox in exchange for right-handed pitchers Myles Jaye and Daniel Webb. 

Beyond the fact that the White Sox and Blue Jays didn't take a holiday (much like MLBTR), it was an interesting deal for a number of reasons.  For starters, Frasor returned to Toronto just five months after he was shipped to Chicago in a July deal.  That trade saw him packaged with right-hander Zach Stewart in exchange for right-hander Edwin Jackson and utility man Mark Teahen.  Of course, Jackson's tenure with the Blue Jays was short-lived as he was flipped to the Cardinals for center fielder Colby Rasmus later that day.

The deal was also notable because Frasor just had his $3.75MM club option exercised on Halloween of 2011. The White Sox's return on this trade wasn't spectacular – neither Jaye nor Webb were considered to be strong prospects and had yet to advance to Double-A.  However, (then) General Manager Kenny Williams would have gotten absolutely nothing had he declined Frasor's 2012 option.  It would appear that Chicago exercised Frasor's option year for the express purpose of trading him.

Frasor had a decent year in his second act north of the border, turning in a 4.12 ERA with 10.9 K/9 and 4.5 BB/9 in 50 appearances.  After leaving Toronto for the Rangers last year, Frasor posted a stellar 2.57 ERA with 8.8 K/9 and 3.7 BB/9 in 61 games, and recently re-signed with Texas.

Meanwhile, the 6'3" pitchers sent to Chicago both spent 2012 in Single-A Kannapolis before moving up in level for 2013. Webb, 24, put up a 1.87 ERA last year, most of it spent at the Double-A and Triple-A level, and could soon be ready to contribute to a MLB pen. Jaye, 22, managed to crack Baseball Prospectus's organizational top ten list before the year, and threw well enough at High-A (4.11 ERA in 118 1/3 innings pitched) to earn a single Double-A start.

This post was adapted from a January 1, 2013 post written by MLBTR's Zach Links.

Expecting a quiet day on Thanksgiving?  it's true that things tend to slow down on the major holidays, but the business of baseball never stops.  Thanksgiving itself might not have a lengthy trade history, but we've had some notable transactions go down on November 28th..

• The Rays and Twins completed a six-player trade on this date in 2007.  The Rays received Matt Garza, Jason Bartlett, and Eddie Morlan while Minnesota received Delmon Young, Brendan Harris, and Jason Pridie. The Rays were the winners of the trade with Garza and Barlett helping their new team to its first World Series in 2008.  The Twins didn't come away totally empty-handed, however.  It's easy to forget now, but Young had a career season in 2010, hitting .298/.333/.493 with 21 homers.  Today, Garza finds himself as one of the most desirable starting pitchers on the free agent market.
• On the same day, the Reds signed Francisco Cordero to a four-year, $46MM deal.  Cordero pitched to a 2.96 ERA with 7.6 K/9 and 4.1 BB/9 in four seasons with Cincinnati, but he's had a rough time ever since.  Cordero has been derailed by injuries and at last check, the reliever is shooting for a return in 2014.
• On this date in 2003, the Red Sox acquired Curt Schilling from the Diamondbacks for Casey Fossum, Brandon Lyon, Jorge de la Rosa, and minor leaguer Michael Gross. Schilling helped Boston to World Championships in 2004 and 2007, and other than Lyon (4.03 ERA in 232 IP), Arizona didn't get much out of this trade.
• The Mariners signed David Ortiz, a young slugger out of the Dominican Republic, on this date in 1992, and eventually traded him to the Twins four years later.  Of course, Big Papi would go on to find his greatest success in Boston.

Mike Axisa's post from 2010 was used in the creation of this post.

New Year's Day isn't typically a hotbed of activity in baseball, but we have seen a few significant moves go down on January 1st.  The biggest 1/1 transaction happened just last year when the Blue Jays acquired Jason Frasor from the White Sox in exchange for right-handed pitchers Myles Jaye and Daniel Webb. 

Beyond the fact that the White Sox and Blue Jays didn't take a holiday (much like MLBTR), it was an interesting deal for a number of reasons.  For starters, Frasor returned to Toronto just five months after he was shipped to Chicago in a July deal.  That trade saw him packaged with right-hander Zach Stewart in exchange for right-hander Edwin Jackson and utility man Mark Teahen.  Of course, Jackson's tenure with the Blue Jays was short-lived as he was flipped to the Cardinals for center fielder Colby Rasmus later that day.

The deal was also notable because Frasor just had his $3.75MM club option exercised on Halloween of 2011. The White Sox's return on this trade wasn't spectacular – neither Jaye nor Webb were considered to be strong prospects and had yet to advance to Double-A.  However, (then) General Manager Kenny Williams would have gotten absolutely nothing had he declined Frasor's 2012 option.  It would appear that Chicago exercised Frasor's option year for the express purpose of trading him.

Frasor had a decent year in his second act north of the border, turning in a 4.12 ERA with 10.9 K/9 and 4.5 BB/9 in 50 appearances.  The right-hander is still on the open market and is said to be receiving interest from the Brewers.  Meanwhile, the 6'3" pitchers sent to Chicago both spent 2012 in Single-A Kannapolis.  Webb (23) and Jaye (21) didn't set the world on fire, but the youngsters still have plenty of baseball in front of them.

The game of baseball changed forever this week in 1975. No, not how the game was played on the field, but how the game was played off the field. Thirty seven years ago this week, arbitrator Peter Seitz issued his historic decision making pitchers Andy Messersmith and Dave McNally true free agents. Federal district and appeals courts both upheld Seitz's opinion, effectively voiding baseball's reserve clause.

The reserve clause allowed teams to renew a player's contract "for the period of one year on the same terms," except that the salary could be cut by as much as 20%. Players generally signed new contracts, so the process had the effect of holding the player to the team with which he first signed indefinitely. This eliminated competition and suppressed salaries to the benefit of the owners and to the dissatisfaction of the players.

In 1975, Messersmith and McNally were the only two players bound to their teams, the Dodgers and Expos respectively, on the basis of the reserve clause. Since neither signed a contract during that option year, both insisted that they were free to sign with other teams the following season. The owners disagreed.

The grievance was submitted to arbitration with MLBPA executive director Marvin Miller and players Joe Torre and Jim Bouton testifying for the players. Meanwhile, commissioner Bowie Kuhn, NL president Chub Feeney, and AL president Lee MacPhail testified for the owners. The hearing lasted three days and produced an 842-page transcript with 97 exhibits. Seitz sided with the players, ruling owners could not maintain a player's services indefinitely. Messersmith went on to sign a three-year deal with the Braves worth $1MM while McNally, who quit baseball in June 1975, remained retired. 

The decision created a true free agent market and salaries skyrocketed. According to Baseball Almanac, the average salary in 1975 was $44,676. Today, the Associated Press (via ESPN.com) reports the average salary is over $3.2MM, an increase of nearly 7,100%.

The free agency windfall has continued this offseason with the top five richest free agent contracts, based on MLBTR's Free Agent Tracker, totaling nearly $500MM. This includes the richest contract ever given to a right-handed pitcher (Zack Greinke's $147MM), a record average annual value (AAV) for any pitcher on a multiyear contract (also Greinke at $24.5MM), and the fifth player in MLB history to receive a contract with an AAV of at least $25MM (Josh Hamilton at $25MM). The Indians recently agreed to sign Nick Swisher to a four-year, $56MM contract, but Swisher's AAV of $14MM doesn't even crack the top 50 list of the highest-paid players in baseball history (based on AAV), as compiled by Cot's Baseball Contracts.

In his opinion, Seitz summarized the owners' argument that eliminating the reserve clause "would encourage many other players to elect to become free agents at the end of their renewal years, that this would encourage clubs with the largest monetary resources to engage free agents, thus unsettling the competitive balance between the clubs, so essential to the sport…that driven by the compulsion to win, owners of franchises would overextend themselves financially in improvident bidding for players."

It could be argued that the owners weren't far off the mark. The George Steinbrenner reign of the Yankees featured some lavish spending and the next few Dodgers teams are poised to set National League payroll records under the ownership of Guggenheim Baseball Management. 

What was Seitz's reward for changing the game of baseball? He was fired the same day he issued his opinion by the owner's representative in labor matters and asked to refrain from writing or discussing the historic decision. However, on the day of his ruling, Seitz put his decision in context saying, "I am not Abraham Lincoln signing the Emancipation Proclamation."  

Seitz may have downplayed the effect his ruling would have on baseball, but no decision in the last half century has had such a profound impact on the business side of the sport.

Thanks to Sports Illustrated for some historical information.

Things tend to be fairly quiet between Christmas and New Year's Eve, but we've seen some big free agent signings go down during that week.  Today marks the anniversary for two of them: Jason Bay signing with the Mets and Barry Zito to the Giants.

In the winter of 2009, the Mets agreed to a four-year, $66MM deal with former Red Sox slugger Jason Bay.  The deal was panned by many critics at the time as they felt that the Mets were mortgaging their future with a heavily backloaded deal.  The Mets agreed to give Bay $6.5MM in 2010 and $16MM in the following three seasons.  The deal also included a $17MM club option for 2014, which could be 86'd for another $3MM.  Of course, the two sides never got close to that point.  After playing just 288 games across three seasons in Queens with a batting line of .234/.318/.369, the Mets and Bay agreed to an early expiration of his contract in November 2012.  Bay will still earn the $21MM owed to him for the remainder of the deal, but the Mets will save a bit by being able to defer a portion of it.

Three years prior to that, the Giants made a statement when they signed Barry Zito to a seven-year, $126MM deal.  At the time, the deal made the left-hander the highest paid pitcher in major league history.  The deal was widely panned as an overpay and it's not clear how much the next-highest bidder was offering.  The Rangers put a six-year, $80MM offer on the table and those spend-happy Yankees never got around to making a formal offer. 

On the whole, Zito has struggled to pitch well consistently, but the left-hander found redemption last season.  After pitching to a 4.15 ERA with 5.6 K/9 and 3.4 BB/9 across 32 starts in the regular season, Zito shined in a pair of postseason starts for San Francisco, including a strong effort in Game 1 of the World Series to give the Giants a 1-0 advantage.

Can Bay re-write his story as well?  The Mariners took a low-risk flyer on the veteran this winter, signing him to a one-year, $1MM deal with $2MM in performance bonuses.  Bay now has a chance at a tabula rasa, away from the scrutiny of the New York press and a short drive from his home in Kirkland, Washington.

Major transactions can occur at any time in baseball's offseason, even during the lull between Christmas and New Year's Eve.  Let's look back at some of the major transactions that have taken place on past December 28ths over the years…

• It was one year ago today that the Red Sox acquired Andrew Bailey and Ryan Sweeney from the Athletics in exchange for Josh Reddick and prospects Miles Head and Raul Alcantara.  Boston had Bailey tapped as the team's replacement for Jonathan Papelbon at closer, but Bailey struggled with injuries and posted a 7.04 ERA in 19 games.  Reddick, meanwhile, had a breakout year, winning a Gold Glove and hitting .242/.305/.463 with 32 homers to help lead the A's to the AL West pennant.  Even if Bailey gets healthy and returns to form, a good closer doesn't have the value of a good (and controllable through 2016) everyday outfielder, so I'd say Oakland has won this trade already.
• Jon Garland signed a three-year, $29MM contract to remain with the White Sox on this day in 2005.  Garland never quite developed into anything more than a nice innings-eater, averaging 210 IP with a 4.37 ERA and 4.5 K/9 rate over the next two seasons.  Chicago dealt Garland to the Angels for Orlando Cabrera following the 2007 season.
• The Diamondbacks acquired their most beloved player in franchise history on this day in 1998, picking up Luis Gonzalez from the Tigers in exchange for Karim Garcia.  Gonzalez had been a solid player for his first nine years in the majors but he exploded in Arizona, posting a 1.001 OPS over the next three seasons including a 57-homer outburst in 2001.  Gonzalez is best remembered for his walkoff bloop single against Mariano Rivera in Game Seven of the legendary 2001 World Series.  Garcia, meanwhile, had a .708 OPS in 104 games with Detroit before being dealt during the 2000 season.
• Tim Raines is in the news due to his Hall of Fame candidacy, and it was on this day in 1995 that Raines was dealt from the White Sox to the Yankees for future considerations.  Raines was 36 years old at the time of the trade but he still had plenty of value as a platoon player, hitting .299/.395/.429 in 940 PAs over his three seasons in New York and winning two World Series rings.
• The Astros and Padres swung a whopper of a trade on this day in 1994, with 12 players eventually changing teams once all was settled.  Houston acquired Derek Bell, Ricky Gutierrez, Pedro Martinez (not that one), Phil Plantier and Craig Shipley while San Diego picked up Ken Caminiti, Andujar Cedeno, Sean Fesh (as a player to be named later), Steve Finley, Roberto Petagine and Brian Williams.
• Warren Cromartie surprised many by instead signing a three-year, $2.5MM deal with the Yomiuri Giants on this day in 1983, a rare case of a player going to Japan in his prime. (Baseball Reference believes collusion may have played a role in Cromartie not finding a good Major League offer.) Cromartie played in Japan for seven seasons and wrote a book about his experiences in the NPL following his retirement. 
• Danny O'Connell may not be well-remembered today, but the infielder was so highly-sought by the Braves that they sent six players and $100K to the Pirates in exchange for O'Connell on this day in 1953.  It remains the only six-for-one trade in Major League history, topped only by the A's dealing Vida Blue to the Giants for seven players in 1978.  O'Connell, by the way, didn't quite live up to the hype in Milwaukee.  He posted a .647 OPS in three-plus years with the Braves and was part of a trade package sent to the Giants partway through the 1957 season for Red Schoendienst, who ended up playing a key role in the Braves' 1957 World Series run.