The Mets have sent Tommy Pham to the Diamondbacks in exchange for shortstop Jeremy Rodriguez. A member of this year’s international free agent class, Rodriguez was ranked 47th on MLB.com’s list. Arizona signed him for a $1.25 million bonus. As a comparison, Mets’ signee Cristopher Larez, also a shortstop, was ranked 43rd on the same list and received a $1.5 million bonus.
This is a nice lottery ticket acquisition for two months of Pham. Rodriguez is currently playing in the DSL, where as the youngest player on his team, he sports a .765 OPS. The team OPS is .706 so given his youth and position, that’s strong production. By comparison, Larez has a .755 OPS while his team has a .784 mark.
Rodriguez is even further away than the two prospects the Mets acquired in the David Robertson deal. Additionally, it’s possible he spends next year in the DSL, too. That’s okay. This is the exact type of return that fans should have hoped for from Pham. The Mets got excellent value from Pham the four months that he was on the team. And hopefully the lottery ticket pays off and they can continue to reap benefits down the road.
Diaz, Alonso, Lindor, Nimmo, Alvarez are the core of the team. A lot of question marks surround this team as Ive already said.
Pham was having a good year and earned the starting position. At 35 years old he was not in the plans of the 2024 Mets. Eppler traded Pham and $1 million for essentially a draft pick that Arizona had spent $1,25m for. A two month rental for a draft pick and $O.25m. Now, that is a good deal!
35 million $ for a top 50 prospect?