Another Sad Day in Mets History: Club Trades Milledge for Spare Parts

A little while back, ESPN ran a commercial where the "star" was a blanket with a Cardinals logo on it. We got to see the blanket and its owner grow up through the years and the different ways it was used. It started off as the blanket of a youngster being pulled in a red wagon and the commercial ended with the boy as a grown man, pulling his son in a red wagon with the same blanket. I don't remember the exact tagline, but basically it said something along the lines of - without sports, what else do we have to hold on to?

I grew up in New York, although I haven't lived there in 25 years. However, I still live and die with the Mets and the Knicks. If nothing else, you can't accuse me of being a front-runner.

Management of both teams have made it really difficult to keep the faith. There's the whole Isiah Thomas running the Knicks into the ground and that's on top of the epic collapse by the Mets last September.

But it just got worse.

The Mets just traded one of their up-and-coming stars, Lastings Milledge, for a bag of broken bats and a pop-up toaster. Actually, it's not quite that bad. Ryan Church is a pretty decent player. But he is considerably older than Milledge and has none of the upside. And Brian Schneider is a top-notch defensive catcher who can no longer hit.

I don't think even the Bush White House could put a spin on this trade that would make it seem halfway reasonable. Let's look at the pros and cons of the deal from the Mets' point of view.

Pros
Schneider and Castro will make a good catching tandem
Church is a good defender and is very good against RHP

Cons
Mets gave up the best player in the deal
Mets took on more salary
Mets traded future star to division rival
We can now add Milledge's name to Otis, Singleton, Ryan, Seaver and Kazmir as players the Mets traded and got pennies on the dollar in exchange.

When the Mets traded Scott Kazmir, Associated Content did not exist and I could not use this forum to vent. I did send an email to my brother telling him it was a horrible trade. Now, through the magic of technology, I can tell everyone how bad this deal is and you can say you heard it from me first. Or remind me when Church hits the winning HR in the World Series. I won't mind, honestly.

I want to be a Mets fan, to have something to hold on to. But I just can't make sense of this.

Lastings Milledge is 22-years old. Most guys who are 22 haven't even sniffed the Majors yet. Milledge should have been the Mets' starter down the stretch in 2006, but they instead opted to trade for Shawn Green.

In 2007 the combination of injuries and Willie Randloph's refusal to properly utilize him left Milledge with 184 at-bats, but in that time he put up a .272/.341/.446 line, which is better than the National League average of .269/.338/.430 and an excellent line for a player so young.

Milledge has a reputation for having an attitude problem. I believe Scott Kazmir had the same bad rep. Milledge's problems date back to when he was an amateur player. Several teams bypassed him because he received oral sex from a girl two years younger and was brought up on charges of taking indecent liberties with a minor.

While with the Mets, Milledge has added to his reputation with the following crimes:

1. He wears his hair in corn rows
2. He spent the off-season making a rap record
3. He high-fived fans after hitting his first home run in the Majors
4. He rubbed some veterans (I think it was Billy Wagner, although I'm not 100% sure) with his choice of clubhouse music.

Milledge, a first-round draft pick, has all of the talent in the world. His biggest asset is bat speed, which is going to translate into 30 HR power. In basketball you can't teach height. In baseball, you can't teach bat speed. You either have it or you don't. You can try to compensate by starting your swing earlier, but then you're a sucker for any off-speed pitch and you become an easy out.

So, congratulations to fans of the Washington Nationals. You just traded two spare parts and got a future star. I think you will enjoy watching Milledge.

My only hope is that Milledge gives some young fan in DC something to hang on to.