re: Anyone watch the reggie Jackson doc on prime

quote:

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If there was no free agency and players weren't greedy that A's team could've won 10 World Series in a row (they won 3 in a row, 72, 73, 74)...and you never hear of the Big Red Machine (a powerhouse in 1972) but didn’t capture its first World Series until Oakland sold off its team in 75.

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This is completely false. The only guy of the Oakland core gone in '75 was Catfish Hunter. All of the other guys were there, and the A's got swept in the playoffs by Boston. Cincinnati won in '75 and then again in '76.

Reggie and Ken Holtzman were traded to Baltimore before the '76 season because at that point free agency had been instituted and Reggie had one year left until his contract was up and was eligible for free agency. So Charlie Finley traded him, and he tried to do the same at the '76 trade deadline (which was June 15 in those days) by selling Rollie Fingers and Joe Rudi to Boston, and Vida Blue to the Yankees. Commissioner Bowie Kuhn voided those deals and all of those players stayed the rest of the season with Oakland, which finished second in the AL West in '76.

The club didn't truly break up until after the '76 season. Fingers signed with San Diego, Rudi went to the Angels, Sal Bando signed with Milwaukee, Bert Campaneris went to Texas, And Reggie signed with the Yankees. Blue was traded to San Francisco after the '77 season, but only after a trade to Cincinnati was voided.

Finley was notoriously cheap. As much as I can't stand the players union for many things, to call the A's players greedy is not completely accurate. Finley was essentially his own front office save for a young teenage assistant named Stanley Burrell, otherwise known as MC Hammer.

The story about Catfish Hunter becoming a free agent is rooted in Finley reneging on a deal to pay Hunter annuities as stated in his contract and wanting to pay the money up front once he realized how much the annuities would cost him. Case went to an arbitrator, who ruled Hunter a free agent. The players eventually got free agency over another case where Andy Messersmith of the Dodgers didn't sign his renewed contract, and the case went to an arbitrator, who ruled for Messersmith and the players to set the precedent for free agency.