It is easy to point to June 15th, 1977 as the day the Mets franchise was ruined forever. After speculation, the Mets traded the best player in their history, Tom Seaver, to the Cincinnati Reds for Dan Norman, Pat Zachary, Steve Henderson and Doug Flynn. Yes, the move was crazy and fans had the right to be upset over it. The Mets made a trade with the Reds after the 1982 season to get Seaver back, only to lose him on this date in 1984.
Some younger Mets fans do not know about what caused Seaver's second stay to be only one year. Some may think he simply left as a free agent after the Mets decided not to re-sign him. But at the center of the 1981 MLB player's strike was compensating the teams that lost star caliber players to free agency. The result was a system where teams that would lose a player like that would be able to select from a pool of players left unprotected by all other teams. While MLB players like Joel Skinner and Steve Mura were taken in the previous year's draft, but Seaver became the most significant player selected in the brief history of the draft. The White Sox signed LHP Floyd Bannister that off season, as the Mariners took Danny Tartabull as compensation. The sad part of the whole thing was the fact that Seaver was awarded as compensation for the Toronto Blue Jays signing of RHP Dennis Lamp. After Seaver was traded by the Mets for four players and re-acquired for three more, Seaver went to the White Sox straight up for Lamp. Lamp was a solid starting pitcher, but obviously not in the same league as Seaver. The Mets, wrongly, thought that leaving Seaver unprotected would not be an issue as no team would want to take on his contract after a 9-13 season. As in many other occasions, the Mets could not be any more wrong.
Some younger Mets fans do not know about what caused Seaver's second stay to be only one year. Some may think he simply left as a free agent after the Mets decided not to re-sign him. But at the center of the 1981 MLB player's strike was compensating the teams that lost star caliber players to free agency. The result was a system where teams that would lose a player like that would be able to select from a pool of players left unprotected by all other teams. While MLB players like Joel Skinner and Steve Mura were taken in the previous year's draft, but Seaver became the most significant player selected in the brief history of the draft. The White Sox signed LHP Floyd Bannister that off season, as the Mariners took Danny Tartabull as compensation. The sad part of the whole thing was the fact that Seaver was awarded as compensation for the Toronto Blue Jays signing of RHP Dennis Lamp. After Seaver was traded by the Mets for four players and re-acquired for three more, Seaver went to the White Sox straight up for Lamp. Lamp was a solid starting pitcher, but obviously not in the same league as Seaver. The Mets, wrongly, thought that leaving Seaver unprotected would not be an issue as no team would want to take on his contract after a 9-13 season. As in many other occasions, the Mets could not be any more wrong.
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