Cleveland Indians: The 6 “worst” deadline deals in Tribe history

Bad Trade No. 4: Say it ain’t so – there goes Shoeless Joe

I’m not sure there was a trade deadline in 1910. But the rules of this search are any trade in July or August. This trade was made in August. And it was terrible.

On July 30, 1910 the Philadelphia Athletics sent Shoeless Joe Jackson to Cleveland to complete an earlier trade (Bris Lord to Philadelphia for Morrie Rath and a player to be named). Bris Lord played parts of three seasons for Philadelphia. Rath played the rest of the year with Cleveland. But oh that Shoeless Joe.

Jackson hit .408 in 1911. Then .395. Then .373. His worst year in Cleveland was .308.  Had he stayed in Cleveland this would have made the top five deadline deals article.

But he didn’t.

He was hitting .327 in 1915, when the dreaded deal went down.

On August 21, 1915 the White Sox sent Braggo Roth, Ed Klepfer, Larry Chappel and $31,500 to Cleveland for Jackson.

The players were nice, but the money was probably the key attraction. On April 9, 1916 the Indians sent three players and $55,000 to the Red Sox for Tris Speaker.

Still, this article isn’t about how the Indians spent their money. It’s about bad trades in July and August. And getting rid of Joe Jackson was bad.

If you believe movies like Field of Dreams or Eight Men Out, Shoeless Joe was just a pawn in the Black Sox scandal. If that’s true, you could make the argument that Jackson would be in the Hall of Fame had he remained a Cleveland Indian.

And what is it with the Red Sox selling Hall of Fame outfielders?