The word around baseball is that Chris Carter, whom the Mets were allegedly going to receive as the player-to-be-named-later in the Billy Wagner trade has been designated for assignment. This is significant because if you can recall, Carter was previously placed on waivers over the summer with the intent of shipping him to the Mets.
However, the Yankees claimed him in an effort to cause roster management issues for the division-rival Red Sox. Being that this is the second time, the Red Sox only have two options.
They can either release him, which would make him a free agent or they can put him on waivers.
If the Red Sox took the first route then the Mets would have just as good of a chance of acquiring him as the other 28 MLB teams, potentially vying for his services.
If Sox were to take the latter route, which involves placing Carter on waivers. The Mets would have to wait for every team in the American League, as well as National League teams with a worse record then theirs to pass on a waiver claim.
Either way there is no guarantee that the Mets will be able to get him.
This seems to indicate one of two things to me. Either Carter was never actually involved in this trade or Omar Minaya made yet another roster management blunder. More details regarding the situation should be made available within the coming days.
To be honest, while I do not endorse making poor trades, the truth of the matter is that this trade was done solely to shed Wagner’s remaining salary.
No offense intended to Carter, but the career minor leaguer is not all that great of a player and probably wouldn’t have fit into the Mets’ 2010 plans anyways. However, it certainly wouldn’t have hurt such a depleted organization to have some depth at the Triple-A level.
