First of all, let’s get this out of the way: It is the Official BP Transaction Analysis position to censure this particular move. Because the stated goal of the series (at least, whenever I happen to be writing the TAs) is to ignore all monetary factors in baseball—they can provide motivation for the owners, but they don’t have to provide it for the rest of us—this is just a team giving a player to another team for no material on-field compensation. This is bad for the team subtracting talent, no matter how they value that talent given the circumstances, and it’s bad for the teams that didn’t add that talent, especially the ones who didn’t have a shot at him thanks to waiver priority. It’s a little like a four-player game of Monopoly where one person quits and hands their money and property to their best friend. It strains against the basic notion of propriety.

It’s up to you to decide how much you care about those things, however. One thing that’s indisputable: The season is over for the New York Mets save for a month’s worth of formalities, Robert’s $20 million team option for 2027 was never going to be picked up after another disappointing, injury-marred year, and the team is now free of just over $5 million in salary obligations: $3-plus million in 2026 wages, and $2 million for the buyout of that team option. There was no reason for the Mets not to make this move, which might spur some people to wish that there was a reason, system-wise, for them not to make this move.

But the move has been made, and now that the prefacing is complete, let’s move on to the analysis.