Wagner nixes trade to Red Sox, will stay with Mets
Photo credit: John Dunn | Billy Wagner pitches against the Phillies in the eighth inning Monday.
Galleries
Phillies win three of four vs. Mets
Billy Wagner will finish the 2009 season not on a championship run with the Red Sox, but on a road to nowhere with the Mets.
Bean Stringfellow, Wagner's agent, confirmed early this morning that Wagner will invoke his no-trade clause to prevent a trade from the Mets to the Red Sox, who claimed the 38-year-old closer off waivers late last week.
Fox Sports, on its Web site, first reported the Wagner news.
As per the rules of the waivers process, the Mets and Red Sox still have until 1 p.m. Tuesday to work out a deal. But Wagner, controlling his own destiny, made two demands in return for approving the trade: that the Red Sox decline the left-hander's $8-million team option for 2010, and that they promise not to offer Wagner arbitration this offseason.
Boston was amenable to the first demand but not the second. Because Wagner is likely to be a Type A free agent, the team losing him as a free agent would receive two high picks in the 2010 amateur draft.
The Mets likely will offer arbitration to Wagner, and Wagner, determined to be a closer next year, almost certainly will decline the offer, given that Francisco Rodriguez is entrenched as the Mets' closer. So in return for paying Wagner roughly $2.7 million to ride out this lost season, the Mets will have something to show for their efforts.
Wagner has pitched twice since returning from Tommy John surgery in September of last year, throwing a pair of shutout innings. The Mets and Red Sox held extensive trade discussions, but ultimately, Wagner controlled the situation.
Now that Wagner has been pulled back, the only way he could switch teams this season would be a) if the Mets placed him on irrevocable waivers and a team claimed him, automatically getting him and his salary, or b) if the Mets released him. Both are outrageously unlikely scenarios.
