How Good Was Deion Sanders Actually?

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I had forgotten all about just how much talent this guy had.

He is in the NFL hall of fame.

I heard his name mentioned, way back when.  That is all.  I had to use Wikipedia to find out who he was, what he did, and how well he performed.  Looks like he bounced around quite a bit.  Do teams usually trade away their best players that often?

Depends. Teams don't like hiring or keeping players who have major external commitments. Anything that makes a player be perceived as 'difficult' tends to really hurt how much teams wish to work with them, having major external commitments certainly qualifies.

Sanders having commitments to teams in two different sports would have represented a significant complication when drawing up contracts; beyond that there's the personal investment (time, energy, etc) when both teams would prefer to have someone who's 100% there for them, not to mention the risk of injury. Playing some other sport professionally is a big gamble to consider when signing or keeping a player.

From another angle, a player who's always being traded constantly needs to learn to mesh with a whole new set of players and the new team's playing style. Being able to do that over and over again successfully is an argument in his favour, not against him.

It's incredibly rare for someone to play at a professional level in more than one sport. It's even more rare for someone to excel in both. One doesn't need to be 'the best player on their team' for it to be impressive, even maintaining a journeyman career in both would have been a major accomplishment.

Thanks, FE.  That answers my question better than Wikipedia could.

YW.

Like a lot of topics, there's so much beneath the surface that's relevant. I think people (generically) like to reduce topics that involve competition down to 'tale of the tape' comparisons, when there's so many more factors in play that maybe just aren't as obvious.

Could have been MVP of the 92 World Series based on how he played. Mind you, the pitchers were likely getting the award if the Braves beat the Blue Jays. The Blue Jays had a hard time getting the guy out.

A lot of the switching teams we see nowadays is thanks to free agency, not trades. Sign a one or two year contract, and when that is up, leave for greener pastures and more money.