OT: Yankees, Tigers, D'Backs complete 3 team trade

I love this message board.  I really do.  It's a place where I can expressly acknowledge that Alexander pitched lights out to allow the Tigers to win the division in the initial post, and still get pilloried because I supposedly don't understand that Alexander pitched lights out. 

Also, you declare that "the idea that the Fister trade was someone [sic] 'contract related' is also utter bullshit."  You seem to like to toss that term around, but some might disagree with you.  The Fister trade was motivated by contract per DD.  See HERE.  Fister was arbitration eligible next year, and figured to pull down about $7M/year.  So instead of taking DD's word for it, we should take yours? 

Look, I understand why Alexander looked like a good trade at the time, and pushed Detroit over the hump for that run.  Alexander also gacked in the post-season, and was mediocre for the rest of his career.  Smoltz became Smoltz.

So what it really boils down to is when you look at the trade.  If you want to stop looking at the trade on the eve of the post-season in 1987, you're right.  It was a great trade.  If you want to look at the trade 27 years later, I think I'd rather have kept Smoltz. 

Finally, you'll note that I said the Alexander-for-Smoltz trade was worse IMO.  I even underlined it and bolded it so it would be hard to miss.  You have a different opinion - that's fine.  But they're both just opinions.

A lot of my view is 20:20 hindsight.  It really depends on your perspective, and I know that few suspected Smoltz would end up being the phenom he was.

Unlike you, though, I'd undo the trade.  Winning the division in thrilling fashion was great - especially with '84 not too far in the rearview mirror.  But Alexander underwhelmed in the ALCS, and I think his 9-0 performance before then was more of a fluke performance than a sure thing.

Remember, if you want to assume that "anything could happen" in 1987 in the post-season, to be fair you should allow that "anything could happen" during the close of the regular season too.  If you do that trade again in an "anything could happen" scenario, there's a really strong chance the Tigers miss the post-season altogether. 

In any event, it's all counterfactuals.  There's a chance that Smoltz would not have developed in the Tigers' system, would have been traded away in '88 for a pile of chewing gum, etc. 

My views are based on 20:20 hindsight.  I don't quarrel with the notion that the trade made sense at the time. 

And you raise good points about the aging roster.  But it's all counterfactuals.  Let's say Smoltz had stuck around and developed by 1989.  He could have been dealt for parts that would have made the suckitude of the 1990s Tigers significantly less than it was.  By 1989 sticking with Smoltz would look awfully defensible.