I saw this floating around Twitter over the past several days It’s loads of fun. From the New York Daily News in November 2007, talking about the Yankees and Marlins and a trade for Miguel Cabrera that never happened:
Brian Cashman met with the Marlins at about 6 p.m. last night at the GM meetings. No offers were made, but a source with knowledge of the situation said the Marlins made it clear that the Yankees would have to include either Phil Hughes, Joba Chamberlain or Ian Kennedy in any trade for Cabrera, something the Yankees are not willing to do. The Yankees would likely offer a deal involving their next tier of prospects, which includes Alan Horne, Humberto Sanchez, Ross Ohlendorf and Jose Tabata.
This came right after Alex Rodriguez opted-out of his $250 million deal and was a free agent. The Yankees, of course, signed him to his current $275 million deal a little over a month later. In the meantime, they could have traded off, say, Joba Chamberlain for the current two-time MVP and could have let Rodriguez dangle.
That sounds awesome now. But at the time people thought Chamberlain, Hughes and Kennedy were the cat’s meow. And Miguel Cabrera, while clearly a huge talent, wasn’t quite what he is now in most people’s minds. And of course Alex Rodriguez was the best player in the game who, two short years later, would lead the Yankees to their last World Series title.
So, yes, it stings now. But at the time it wasn’t a crazy line of reasoning on Cashman’s part. And while people say hindsight is 20/20, in reality, it’s not. Hindsight obscures a lot of stuff we knew back then — or at least thought we knew back then — but have since forgotten.
