Cubs & Sox Trades

There's been some speculation that the Cubs may be looking to the White Sox if the Sox continue their tear down.  Yesterday the Trib had an article that looked at all of the trades between the two team.  There have been just 14 cross town trades, which seem pretty low.  Something new that I learned was that the first trade was in 1949.  It took almost half a century before the two teams made a deal with one another.  I wonder if the same was true with the Yankees / Giants / Dodgers, the Red Sox / Braves, Cardinals / Browns, or Phillies / Athletics?

After looking over the 14 deals, I've come up with what I consider to be the best for the Cubs, the worst, and the splashiest.

The Splashiest 

 

 

Ron Santo for Steve Stone, Ken Frailing Jim Kremmel, and Steve Swisher.  This is the splashiest because of Ron Santo.  Sending one of your biggest names to the cross town rival is a big deal.

 What always struck me as odd about this trade is that the Cubs got four players for one.  Santo had earlier vetoed a trade to the Angels, saying he wanted to stay close to his Chicago home.  That didn't leave the Cubs too many trading partners.  I would have thought the White Sox could have gotten him for practically nothing, knowing the Cubs had few other options.  But the Cubs were able to wrangle four players from the Sox.

The Worst

The Cubs were in a pennant race in 1998 and looked to the White Sox to bolster their bullpen.  The got reliever Matt Karchner in exchange for prospect Jon Garland.  Karchner had an ERA over 5, not exactly bolstering the bullpen.  Garland helped the White Sox to the 2005 World Series title.

The Best

   

Sammy Sosa and Ken Patterson for George Bell.  The Cubs sold high on Bell and got Sammy at just the right time.  The Sox got 38 homers from Bell while Sammy smacked 545 for the Cubs.