Sunday: Ugly Trade #1

Oh Montreal...

This sums up Colon pretty well

The pinnacle of Ugly Trade week is here. I present to you one of the most ridiculous trades of all time. If this trade had never happened perhaps the Expos wouldn't have had to move to Washington; maybe the Cleveland Indians would have been forced to move instead. The results of this trade not going through may never be known, but we do know it is one of the ugliest trades of the last 10 years.

The Cleveland Indians send: Bartolo Colon and Tim Drew
The Montreal Expos send: Lee Stevens, Brandon Philips, Grady Sizemore, and Cliff Lee

I know what you're thinking, what a frightening trade, and I agree. Colon was a workhorse in Cleveland, but never an outstanding pitcher. He ended up with a 75-45 record and a career ERA in Cleveland of 3.92, which is good, but not worth the haul the Expos gave up. Montreal would only hold on to Colon until the end of the season before flipping him to Chicago for players that netted them nothing.

It all seems so unfair

Cleveland got the bigger end of the stick in this one, by about a mile. Brandon Philips was underrated by the Indians and eventually traded to the Reds were his stats took off. However, the player they got in return (Jeff Stevens) was influential in the Indians getting their current closer Chris Perez.

Another piece was a young pitcher named Cliff Lee. Lee would struggle from injuries, but he had massive upside and eventually hit it in 2008. The south paw went 22-3 that season with a 2.54 ERA and 4 complete games, netting him a Cy Young Award. Lee would dominate in 2009 before being flipped to the Phillies for another great haul. Today he's known for his ridiculously dominate control and efficiency.

Despite both those great players we all know the true diamond in the rough was Grady Sizemore. Sizemore was a young athletic fielder who would begin his stellar career two years after the trade, at the young age of 21. At 28 Sizemore has become the marquee player in Cleveland, posting a career slash line of .272/.363/.477 with 129 home runs and 134 stolen bases. Sizemore led the Tribe to a playoff berth in 2007 and his defense has netted him two gold gloves. His best season came in 2008 where he had 33 home runs and 38 swipes. The big lefty suffered from some injuries in '09 and '10, but he's finally returned (after a long battle back from microfracture knee surgery) and he hit a home run today in his first game in the 2011 season.

One can only imagine where these two teams would be without these deals. I'm not sure about Cleveland, but Montreal might still be in Montreal, and a dominate team. They would have Cliff Lee as an ace and an offense built around Ryan Zimmerman and Grady Sizemore. It was a strange deal at the time, and one that seemed to have a huge disparity in the amount of talent being traded. It was a deal that I think changed the landscape of the league forcing Montreal out of Canada and into Washington as the Nationals.