Jason Bay And The Worst Mets Trades Of The Last 15 Years

Earlier this week, I broke down the Mets worst free agent signings of the last decade, highlighted by the disastrous Jason Bay signing last year. Of course, the Bay signing was a double edged sword - the Mets get the bad Bay now, and missed out on the terrific Bay nearly a decade ago.

They traded Bay, along with Bobby Jones and Josh Reynolds to the Padres for Jason Middlebrook and Steve Reed in 2002. Bay would bash 181 homers over the next seven years, production the Mets were hoping for when they signed Bay last year. If only they'd held on to him back then, those homers would have been at Shea!

Of course, hindsight is 20/20 and the Mets have traded plenty of guys who turned into stars later on (Nolan Ryan anyone?). This list strikes a healthy balance between those guys who came out of no where to become stars, plus trades that looked bad at the time and got worse as time went on.  Get ready for some All-Stars lost, outstanding seasons missed and an awful lot of valuable arms traded away for nothing. (All trade info from the indispensable UltimateMets.com)