On This Day in Firesale History: David Justice Traded to the Yankees
While a lot of Indians fans are merely waiting to see who’s next on the Indians trading/chopping block, I thought it would be worth pointing out a trade that occurred exactly nine years ago today.
The Indians shipped outfielder David Justice to the New York Yankees for outfielder Ricky Ledee and two players who would be named later.
Ledee was hitting a monstrous .241 with seven home runs at the time of the deal. Justice, on the other hand, was hitting .265/.361/.582 with 21 home runs and 58 RBI. For comparison purposes, in 2009, Mark Teixeira has hit 20 home runs with 60 RBI with an OPS of .962. Imagine any team trading that – in any year – for Ricky Ledee, and then saying that they’re “still hoping to compete” for the year (though the team did finish in second place with 90 wins), as well as the future.
The move was entirely financial, as Justice was making $7 million per year. This move actually signaled what would wind up being the not so distant future as the days of heavy spending were nearing an end. At the time, John Hart called it “simple economics.” Coincidentally, Hart announced that 2001 would be his final year with the team.
If it is any consolation, one of the players that were later named was Jake Westbrook, who has been more than serviceable over the years. The other player? Zach Day, who never saw a single inning with the Tribe. Another consolation may be that the team did make the playoffs a year later, but this would be the final time until 2007.
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June 29th, 2009 at 11:47 am
Omar’s quote to the media that day was appropriate: I don’t know how it makes us better when we just traded our best player
June 29th, 2009 at 12:54 pm
“The Indians also are looking to add pitching, with starters Charles Nagy and Jaret Wright out with injuries. The deal also frees up money to re-sign Manny Ramirez, who is eligible for free agency after the season.”
Glad that worked out
June 29th, 2009 at 1:08 pm
Yeah, but we were able to sign Juan Gonzalez, who gave us one great (and probably steriod-fueled) year before his body fell apart.
June 29th, 2009 at 3:36 pm
I remember this. The Indians were the hottest team in the MLB at the end of the season and missed the wild card by a game. Think an extra bat could’ve gotten one more win?
June 30th, 2009 at 2:52 am
But the Tribe traded Ledee pretty quickly for David Segui, right? And Day didn’t pitch for them because they traded him for Milton Bradley, and they now have Valbuena to show for that. It seems to me this deal worked out pretty well.
June 30th, 2009 at 10:12 am
Nice job Greg – and frankly – an old Justice straight up for Westbrook was a steal for the Tribe. The writer just says Day never pitched for Cleveland without tracking down the actual story.
These blogs are the same clowns who post under PD articles except they bought a domain name. As far as news – zero content. Opinions? A few but mostly uninformed. Why? News content – zero.
June 30th, 2009 at 12:17 pm
LambBone: What Greg says is correct, so yes this particular article is a little poorly researched. But on the whole, this site has a solid reputation with Cleveland fans, and they almost always have breaking sports news before most other sources. Your criticism is a little unfounded.
June 30th, 2009 at 12:43 pm
Thanks for stopping by, Cleveland.com commenters.
The Zach Day ommission is my fault. If it was a trade analysis piece, that would have been included. However, the goal of the piece was not an attempt at showing a trade that worked out poorly. It was just a piece that turned back the clock nine years to the day. Never once did I state how I felt about the deal nine years later – just that Ledee, at the time, was the main piece. A main piece that wasn’t doing very well at the time.