Orlando Cabrera? Say it ain’t so!

January 15, 2009

MLB hotstove is reporting that both the Toronto Blue Jays and the Florida Marlins have interest in free agent short stop Orlando Cabrera.  While the article notes that the Jays have a “hole” at short, it also notes that J.P. Ricciardi has indicated that the Jays don’t have the money to add a “big name” free agent this offseason.  Let’s remember that we’re talking about Orlando Cabrera, so the term “big name” should be used loosely.  However, with the market coming down and players signing for less than what many expected (ie/ Giambi at just over $5 million, Burrell at $8 million), one has to wonder if J.P. is thinking twice about signing Cabrera.  Remember that the Jays were in hot pursuit of short stop Rafael Furcal (an actualy big name free agent) back in December.

Let’s hope that the Jays’ interest in Cabrera is just rumour.  As Bluebird Banter has already pointed out, the Jays signing Orlando Cabrera would be a mistake.  Let’s take a look at the reasons why the Jays shouldn’t  sign Cabrera.

1) Cabrera is a type-A free agent, meaning that the Jays would have to give up their first round pick to the White Sox if they sign Cabrera.  With an average-at-best farm system, the Jays can’t afford to give away a prospect who would likely be in their top-ten prospects by season’s end.  As ESPN’s Buster Olney has noted, teams are simply not willing to sign a type-A player at this point in time.

2) The Jays don’t have the money to sign Cabrera.  Even with the market driving down the prices of free agents, Cabrera is still likely to fetch around $7 million per season, too rich for the Jays blood.  Allocating that much to Cabrera would be a mistake, especially with what Giambi and Burrell have recently signed for.  The latter two would have been a much better signing than Cabrera.  At the same time, there are currently free agents that would help the Jays more than Cabrera who would likely sign for a similar price (Garland, Byrd) or much lower price (Hinske, Griffey). 

3) The Jays already have starting short stop (Marco Scutaro) and two capable backups (McDonald and Inglett).  For all the talk of a “hole” at short, signing Cabrera doesn’t really fill the so-called hole.  Last year, Cabrera hit .281/.334/.371 (.705) and committed 16 errors in 161 games while Scutaro hit .267/.341/.356 (.697) while committing only 8 errors in 145 games at five positions.  Granted, Cabrera does have two gold gloves to his name and sports better career average numbers than Scutaro, but on the whole, those offensive numbers aren’t much better.  Averaged over a 500 at-bat season, Cabrera’s .281 from last year would amount to only 8 additional base hits than Scutaro’s .267.  At this point in his career, Cabrera might be good for only an additional 3 HRs and, at best, 15 RBIs.  While Scutaro is hardly all-star material, he’s a quality short stop and good enough to start in 2009.  Furthermore, while Cabrera, is, at most, a minimal improvement over Scutaro, he’s certainly not worth about $5 million more in salary.

Let’s hope that the Jays interest in Cabrera is non-existant or if they are interested, that they won’t act on that interest.  Olney adds that a high ranking Jays executive has stated that “I like Cabrera, and think he could help us…But I cannot justify giving up a pick for a 34-year-old shortstop on a one- or two-year deal. It makes absolutely no sense for us. None.”  Well, I disagree that there is a lot to like about Cabrera in the first place, but at least this executive realizes that signing him, even if he is liked by the organization, isn’t a smart move.

Signing Cabrera to any deal, even an affordable one, is a mistake.  Quite simply, he’s not worth the first round draft pick we’d have to give up.

 

Written by mlblogs44north Posted in Dailies Tagged with Cabrera, Free Agency, Scutaro