The “White Flag Trade” revisited, 25 years and counting
Robert Hernandez rejected a short an insulting contract extension offer, which put him on the chopping block as a headliner of 1997’s White Flag Trade.
On the morning of Aug. 1, 1997 White Sox fans woke up to this headline in the Chicago Tribune:
Surrender! Sox Deliver a San Francisco Treat:
Hernandez, Alvarez and Darwin go west
As Sox Chances Go South
The White Sox had done something almost unprecedented in the history of Major League Baseball: They traded away the guts of their pitching staff while only 3½ games out of first place in the Central Division.