One of these teams must be scared or something. Either the New York Mets are afraid of trading the next Amos Otis or the Kansas City Royals fear giving up another David Cone. Both teams have robbed each other of future stars. They’ve even swapped unpopular players, Kevin McReynolds for Vince Coleman being a prime example.
Frequent trade partners in the past, you’ll never believe how long it has actually been since the Mets and Royals locked up for a midseason trade.
In 2025, the Mets did send them Diego Castillo for cash. While a trade with an asterisk, this summer is 20 years since the last time these two clubs hooked up for a trade between Opening Day and the World Series. In fact, if we want to be real nitpicky, it’s the last trade the teams have made directly with each other.
The Mets and Royals have been quiet trade partners for 20 years
In February 2021, the Mets, Royals, and Boston Red Sox were involved in a large multi-player trade. Khalil Lee came to the Mets while Josh Winckowski and Freddy Valdez went to Boston.
In December 2017, the Mets sent Burch Smith to the Royals for a player to be named later or cash. It seems like they chose the dead presidents.
Prior to that, we have to go back to 2006. The Mets were definitely in the market to add on their way to Game 7 of the NLCS. However, this trade with Kansas City was more minor than impactful.
Infielder Jeff Keppinger went to the Royals in exchange for Ruben Gotay. Gotay didn’t play a single game in the majors in 2006, returning in 2007 to bat .295/.351/.421 in 211 trips to the plate for New York. At only 24-years-old, he showed a lot of promise. The Mets didn’t buy in as he ended up as an Atlanta Braves waiver claim prior to the 2008 season. He hit just .235 for them in 88 games. Gotay wouldn’t play another major league game.
Keppinger had a much different career and got some big league work in with the Royals in 2006. In a limited 22 game sample, he hit .267. The Royals traded him the following offseason for a guy who never broke the major league line. With his new team, the Cincinnati Reds, Keppinger batted an outstanding .332/.400/.877 in 241 plate appearances. He’d hang around in the big leagues through the 2013 season, batting a light .282/.329/.384.
Multiple GMs and even an ownership change for both franchises, a 20-year drought of in-season moves between an NL and AL team is unusual especially with all of the moves they’ve made together in the past.
‘ The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties ’
‘ Some details of this article were extracted from the following source risingapple.com ’
