Philadelphia Phillies won 3 teams’ all-time worst trades
By Tim Boyle
The Philadelphia Phillies won the worst Rays trade when they landed a young kid named Bobby Abreu.
The Tampa Bay Rays—or Devil Rays as they were originally known—haven’t been around long enough to amass too many horrific trades. They’re actually known today as savvy dealers although this wasn’t always the case.
A young outfielder named Bobby Abreu was taken by the Rays (let’s drop the Devil for the sake of the children because they don’t know any better) and then traded that same night to the Phillies for shortstop Kevin Stocker.
Stocker was an okay shortstop for Philadelphia, hitting .262/.347/.350 in his five seasons with them. He was most known for coming up in the middle of the 1993 season and hitting incredibly well for them.
With the Rays, Stocker batted .250/.329/.347 in two and a half years. Meanwhile, Abreu regularly hit over .300, had only one Phillies season with an OBP under .400, and was one of the league’s best at stacking up metrics we wouldn’t appreciate until about a decade or two later.
Abreu’s Phillies totals include a .303/.416/.513 slash line, 348 doubles, 195 home runs, and 254 stolen bases. Although his numbers may not have measured up to some of his peers of the day, this was an absolute steal for the Phillies and a dud of a deal for the other organization involved.