Upon Further Review...Don Young for Roberto Rodriguez

In the last blog we looked at a strange deal where apparently Don Young was sent to the A's Iowa farm club by the Cubs in exchange for a purchase of Roberto Rodriguez from the Cubs' Tacoma club. Now we find this from the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal of June 25, 1970.


"Outfielder Don Young was sold to Des Moines of the American Association, farm club of the Oakland A's. Pitcher Jim Dunegan, a converted outfielder, was optioned to Tacoma. Lefthanded pitcher Larry Gura was recalled from Tacoma where he had a 3-4 record. The Cubs also bought the contract of righthanded relief pitcher Roberto Rodriguez from Tacoma. Rodriguez was obtained by San Diego May 25 in a conditional deal from the A's. His contract was sold to Tacoma Tuesday and brought by the Cubs Wednesday."

" a conditional deal"

Still looking but possibly a condition of that deal was that Rodriguez would either have to be returned to the A's or compensation would have to be worked out. That would make the Young-to-Iowa quid pro quo make sense...

Interesting....

Don Young and the Oddball Trade

Don Young will be forever linked to the Cubs collapse in 1969, if you need a rundown of that, you can look it up many places on the web.

He was sent outright to Tacoma by the Cubs before the 1970 season, and mid-season went to Iowa, the AAA team for Oakland. No transaction was listed for this.

After some research, I found this article from The Bryan Times of June 25, 1970.

It mentions Young being sold to Iowa as compensation for the Cubs purchasing Roberto Rodriguez from Tacoma.

This doesn't make a lot of sense on the surface. Rodriguez started the season with Oakland, but supposedly went to the Padres and THEN was bought by the Cubs.

Further study is warranted.

Rodriguez/quez from Check Out My Cards, Don Young from the great Wrigley Wax blog