Dick Wagner, a former president of the Cincinnati Reds and Houston Astros who later became a top executive in the commissioner’s office, died Thursday in Phoenix, Ariz. He was 78.

Among the moves he helped engineer with the Reds were the acquisition of pitcher Tom Seaver from the New York Mets in 1977, the firing of manager Sparky Anderson in 1979 and the trade of outfielder George Foster to the Mets in 1982. Wagner also dealt Seaver back to the Mets after the 1982 season.

Raised in Nebraska, Wagner began his baseball career in 1946, when he left the U.S. Navy and was hired by the Detroit Tigers as general manager of their Thomasville farm team in the Georgia-Florida League.With the Tigers and Pittsburgh Pirates, he worked for teams in Flint, Mich., and Lincoln, Neb., and he was selected minor league executive of the year by The Sporting News in the late 1950s.

As a high executive of the team, Wagner helped build the Big Red Machine into a team that won consecutive World Series titles in 1975 and 1976. He took over as president in 1978.

An opponent of free agency, he allowed many of the Reds stars of the ‘70s to leave for higher salaries elsewhere.

After putting together baseball’s best record in the strike-interrupted 1981 season, the Reds wound up with the NL’s worst record in 1982. Before Marge Schott became controlling owner, she hired an airplane to pull banners over Riverfront Stadium urging the team to fire Wagner.

Wagner became the Astros’ president and general manager in September 1983, then resigned after the 1987 season when he lost a power struggle with manager Hal Lanier.

Two months later, he became a special assistant in the commissioner’s office and worked closely with AL president Bobby Brown.