It may be hard to wrap your mind around this if you weren’t around then, but before 1986, Major League Baseball’s non-waiver trading deadline was June 15 -- i.e. it would have been today -- rather than July 31.
June 15 Was Once MLB’s Trading Deadline
And this was in an era when the two leagues still had quite separate identities and were rivals in a true sense rather than the NFL-style conferences they are now. So if you wanted to improve your team and make a blockbuster deal, you had to do it when there were only 54 games gone in the season -- one-third of the way -- as there were for the Chicago Cubs in 1964, when they made a deal with the St. Louis Cardinals that they were just positive would improve their standing that year.
In hindsight, Brock-for-Broglio, is, of course, one of the most lopsided trades ever. (Four other players changed sides, but none of them did much of anything for their future club, so the deal boils down essentially to the two principals.) Lou Brock is in the Hall of Fame, and for many years he held the career and season stolen-base records. He immediately led the Cardinals to the pennant in 1964, and two others later that decade. Four other bit players switched teams in that deal, but in terms of career WAR, the Cardinals made out like bandits. Brock had 37.8 WAR for them; Ernie Broglio would have helped the Cubs more if he didn’t play at all, as he posted -1.8 WAR before retiring two years later.
But from the perspective of the time, as written by newspapermen (and they were all men in 1964), the Cubs were viewed as the big winner. Broglio, a 27-year-old righthander, had gone 18-9 with a 2.99 ERA for the ‘63 Cardinals; Brock was floundering around the .250 mark for the Cubs. Whispers were that he’d never make it.
Other whispers, though, the Cubs should have listened to. Word was that Broglio had arm problems, which proved to be true: He won only seven games in a Cubs uniform and was on and off the DL during most of his two years there. Cardinals management knew that Brock could run and set him free to do so; the Cubs had tried to make him into a Billy Williams-type power hitter, which he was ill-suited for (only once did he hit more than 16 HR in a season).
But as bad as that June 15 deal was, the Cubs made another trade on that date that isn't mentioned as much, but was perhaps even bigger for the team; it delivered an NL East title to Chicago in 1984. The Cubs sent Joe Carter (who they had drafted No. 1 in 1981) and Mel Hall (plus two nobodies) to the Indians for Rick Sutcliffe (and two other almost-nobodies, Ron Hassey and George Frazier). Sutcliffe had fallen out of favor in Cleveland, but was an instant success in Chicago, becoming only the second pitcher (at the time) to win 20 games split between the leagues (the other, Hank Borowy in 1945, also led the Cubs to the postseason; there has since been one more such pitcher, Bartolo Colon in 2002). Sutcliffe won the Cy Young Award and probably should have won a second in 1987, and helped the Cubs to the playoffs again in 1989.
Carter, of course, wound up hitting 398 career home runs and was a World Series hero for the Blue Jays. But even at that, the Cubs came out even in this deal, adding up the WAR for the principals. Sutcliffe gave the Cubs 21.3 WAR; Carter had 17.1 future WAR and Hall 4.2.
Maybe you're looking for a non-Cubs June 15 deal that made significant news. Look no further than Tom Seaver being dealt to the Reds in 1977. This was the first big deadline deal made due to impending free agency; the Mets knew he'd leave and wanted to get something, anything, in return. They got four players: Doug Flynn, Steve Henderson, Dan Norman and Pat Zachry. This might have worked out OK for the Mets if Zachry, who had been co-NL Rookie of the Year (with Butch Metzger, perhaps two of the worst RoY ever) in 1976, had maintained his level of performance.
But Zachry got hurt and gave the Mets only 7.6 WAR; between Henderson, Flynn (who was an awful hitter) and Norman, they combined for only 2.5 more. Meanwhile, Seaver gave the Reds 18.6 WAR and a no-hitter (no Met has yet thrown one) and for good measure, 10.9 more WAR between the White Sox and Red Sox, and posted his 300th win in New York wearing those wacky red-white-and-blue 1980s White Sox colors.
Still, if you were a major league GM, would you want to have to make the decision today whether to punt on the season and sell? Or go “all-in” and get a rent-a-player for a run at the postseason? MLB made a smart decision, giving teams another six weeks to see what their needs were. And giving fans something to obsess about all through the month of July.
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