Red Sox Trade Jon Lester to A's and John Lackey to Cardinals
The Oakland Athletics startled the baseball world when they signed Yoenis Cespedes, a slugging outfielder from Cuba, before the 2012 season. They made an even bigger splash when they traded him Thursday.
Acting boldly to give themselves the best chance to win their first World Series in 25 years, the A's shipped Cespedes and a draft pick to the Boston Red Sox for the All-Star starting pitcher Jon Lester and outfielder Jonny Gomes. The trade came just hours before Thursday's 4 p.m. Eastern time deadline for teams to make trades without waivers.
The A's have baseball's best record and seem well on their way to their eighth playoff appearance in the last 15 years. But for all of the celebrated innovation of their general manager, Billy Beane, they have advanced beyond the first round of the playoffs just once, in 2006, when they were swept by Detroit in the American League Championship Series.
They lost two starters to Tommy John surgery in spring training, yet patched together a rotation that still kept the team strong. But Beane fortified it July 5 by trading two top prospects to the Chicago Cubs for Jeff Samardzija, an All-Star right-hander, and Jason Hammel. In Lester, he has added a proven ace with a glittering October résumé.
The A's would seem to have the strongest rotation in the majors now, ideal for a playoff series, with Lester and Samardzija to go with Sonny Gray and the All-Star Scott Kazmir, who are both 12-3 with a sub-3.00 earned run average this season.
Lester is 6-4 with a 2.11 E.R.A. in 13 postseason appearances, including a 3-0 record and a 0.43 E.R.A. in three World Series starts. He was beloved in Boston, not just for helping the team to two championships but for overcoming cancer early in his career and expressing a desire to stay for less money.
The Red Sox seemed to dare him to back up those words, offering him a widely reported contract extension this spring worth just four years and $70 million, a figure that represented roughly half of his market value. (A similar 30-year-old left-hander, Cole Hamels of the Philadelphia Phillies, has a six-year, $144 million deal.)
Lester turned it down, but said last week that, even if he were traded, he would be open to re-signing this winter with Boston, the team that drafted him in the second round in 2002. Now he and Gomes, a former member of the A's, have another shot at October glory, while the Red Sox retool.
Cespedes, a two-time home run derby champion with tremendous pull power that should play well at Fenway Park, can be a free agent after 2015. He is hitting .256 with 17 homers and 67 runs batted in, but he has a low on-base percentage, .303.
The A's have two hitters with more homers and R.B.I. (Josh Donaldson and Brandon Moss), and a deep and versatile roster that, especially with Gomes, can probably cover his loss. They could also trade for another outfielder with power, like Marlon Byrd of the Phillies, who is available.
The deal was the third in the last few days by the Red Sox, who shipped starter Jake Peavy to the San Francisco Giants for prospects last week and dealt the left-hander Felix Doubront to the Cubs on Wednesday. The Red Sox are also said to be shopping John Lackey, the veteran right-hander who won the clinching game of the World Series last October.
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