I've written often of my admiration for Joe Posnanski, and this blog post about his favorite bad trades of all time is a great example of why I love the guy.
Lots of Reds talk, as you'd expect since they're the team that managed to swipe Tom Seaver for nothing, while trading away Frank Robinson and Christy Mathewson for peanuts.
My favorite part of the post is this though, absolutely hysterical:
This isn't the worst deal ever. It's just my favorite bad deal. I remember when the Royals made this trade, I called up general manager Allard Baird and said, "It appears you just traded Jermaine Dye for Neifi Perez. Why would you do that?" He explained to me the Royals really couldn't afford Dye and that they desperately needed a shortstop - talks with Rey Sanchez had broken down - and Perez was a good defensive shortstop who would hit a little bit.And I said: "It appears you just traded Jermaine Dye for Neifi Perez. Why would you do that?"
I've never seen an everyday player as bad as Neifi Perez in 2002.
I do more than my fair share of bitching about the Kearns/Felipe deal, but it really could be a lot worse. I'd be pissed if the Reds acquired Neifi Perez for free, let alone if they gave up a pretty solid player like Jermaine Dye for him.