PORT ST. LUCIE – Late last July, the trade collapsed, and Roy Oswalt didn’t land with the Mets.
Before last season’s trade deadline a little more than seven months ago, the Mets were trying to procure Oswalt, the Houston ace. They were talking with the Orioles about a follow-up trade to what would have been Baltimore’s acquisition of Oswalt from the Astros. Neither swap ever occurred.
It was a memorable sequence, though, that’s still worth considering now, especially with the Mets facing the Astros today and with starting pitching still their most significant issue. Through conversations with six different MLB team executives with knowledge of the multiple-team trade discussions, here’s a detailed look back at the days and hours leading up to the Oswalt trade disintegration.
Oswalt, one of the finest pitchers in the sport, was set to be a free agent after 2007, and when Houston began to be unsure about whether he would re-sign, the club became willing to hear proposals. To move Oswalt, however, the Astros wanted an established elite hitter.
From a prior inquiry, Omar Minaya already knew that he couldn’t get Oswalt by himself because the Mets didn’t have a hitter to deal. The Astros, though, did like Baltimore shortstop Miguel Tejada, but although the Orioles and Astros spoke, Baltimore required not only Oswalt but third baseman Morgan Ensberg and a prospect. When the two-team talks collapsed, Baltimore VP of baseball operations Jim Duquette determined that the two teams most interested in Oswalt were the Mets and Texas.
Minaya and Texas GM Jon Daniels both got calls from Duquette, and the situation began expanding. When the Mets heard that they could potentially land Oswalt, they were prepared to do anything in their power to do so, and they also internally discussed whether they could get a 72-hour window to sign him. Either way, however, the Mets believed that the fantastic right-hander could be re-signed.
They wouldn’t necessarily have proposed the best package for him, though.
One of the most interesting revelations about the events is that in one of the Texas-Baltimore proposals the principals were Texas third baseman Hank Blalock and pitching prospects John Danks and Thomas Diamond going to Baltimore for Oswalt and Ensberg. There was also another discussion that involved Houston reliever Brad Lidge heading to the Rangers.
As for the Mets’ package, there’s a discrepancy regarding who was involved from the Mets and whether Baltimore requested Mike Pelfrey. Names that were discussed, though, included Lastings Milledge, Aaron Heilman and Brian Bannister, but Minaya never made a final offer to Baltimore.
The trade deadline was at 4 p.m. on Monday, July 31, and at his home in New Jersey on Saturday night, Minaya believed that a trade had a shot, as he and the Orioles were discussing various players. The next morning, the GM flew down to Miami (where the Mets were going to be headed after their weekend series in Atlanta), and the involved teams began nearing a deal that day. The Mets were encouraged that a deal could go down, but later on Sunday, the Astros called Baltimore and told the O’s that Oswalt wasn’t getting dealt. Duquette then called Minaya with the verdict.
As for why it didn’t happen, another discrepancy exists – whether Houston owner Drayton McLane ultimately determined that Oswalt, his favorite Astro, couldn’t be dealt, or whether the swap collapsed because Baltimore was never going to be allowed to make the deal. Eventually, Oswalt re-signed with Houston.