2009 February 20 « Mike Scioscia's tragic illness

If I Post About Orlando Three Times in a Row, Maybe He’ll Appear

February 20, 2009 at 11:47 am | Posted in Orlando Hudson | 18 Comments

…and according to MLBtraderumors, he has.

According to XM Home Plate, the Dodgers signed Orlando Hudson.

No salary details yet, obviously. I think I made myself pretty clear yesterday on this. He’s a good player, I’ll be happy to cheer for him… but handing Arizona the 17th overall pick is an absolute killer. I can’t stand the idea of tossing away picks like that. And the fact that the front office is apparently okay with that continues to sadden me.

The Diamondbacks must be thrilled, and that alone is enough to know that this was a mistake.

And you know what? I didn’t mention this yesterday, but I should have. If you really really needed a second baseman, Ray Durham could have been had for half the price, zero draft pick compensation… and coming off a superior offensive year. He’s not the defender that Hudson is, granted, but is that worth giving away a first round pick to our biggest rival? It’s mind blowing.

I suppose it remains to be seen whether this benches/demotes DeWitt, or pushes him to third base, with Blake to left and Pierre to the bench. That would be the most efficient use of the pieces involved, but if that’s the case it’s still a problem, because if you’ve got a left fielder that’s not named Manny Ramirez, it really needed to be Adam Dunn or Bobby Abreu.

On the plus side, I suppose, now today’s earlier post about Orlando Cabrera was much ado about nothing.

Update: We now have salary numbers from MLB.com:

The deal is worth $3.4 million with another $4.6 million in possible incentives.

So if he hits all his incentives, that’s eight million dollars? How is that cheap? Wasn’t half the point that we were going to be able to get a decent player at a great discount? Granted, we don’t know what the incentives are yet or how easily obtained they’ll be, but some of them had better be “win Cy Young Award” or “land on the moon”. Oh, and by the way, let’s enjoy the Hudson that no longer calls Arizona home: his 2008 home/road splits were a .939 OPS at home… .718 OPS on the road. Fantastic. This keeps getting better and better.

And No, I Don’t Want Orlando Bloom or Orlando Jones, Either

February 20, 2009 at 9:01 am | Posted in Blake DeWitt, Orlando Cabrera, Orlando Hudson | 5 Comments

Hey, remember yesterday when I said that even though I think Orlando Hudson is a good player who might help the team, the cost of giving up the 1st round pick was too high of a price to play for one year, so let’s pass? What about giving up a 1st round pick for an older player who’s not as good?

PHOENIX — The Dodgers, apparently uncertain they can work a deal for second baseman Orlando Hudson, have also begun talks with free-agent infielder Orlando Cabrera.

Cabrera, a two-time Gold Glove shortstop, told the club he would be willing to move to second base, where Blake DeWitt came to camp as the heir apparent to the retired Jeff Kent. Shortstop is locked up by Rafael Furcal, who signed a three-year deal, although Cabrera would provide insurance if Furcal was injured again.

This makes even less sense. While the 1st round price tag is what’s making me want to avoid Hudson, I at least admit that he’s a productive player who would be a short-term upgrade on the unproven Blake DeWitt at 2B – fine.

But Cabrera? Well, first of all, he’s not a second baseman. Oh sure, he says he’s willing to play it, but he’s only got 33 games of experience there, and no real time put in since 1998. Even worse, look at his bat. There’s no comparison between the Orlandos – while Hudson improved his OPS+ for the 4th straight year to 108, Cabrera declined to an 84 OPS+, making him 16% worse than the average AL hitter last year. In fact, he’s only been league average once in his career – way back in 2003 – and at 34, that’s unlikely to change now.

And that’s really the main point. Again, while he’s not worth a top pick, Hudson is likely to be better than DeWitt in 2009. Not only is Cabrera not better than Hudson, he’s not even better than DeWitt! Who’s more likely to produce in 2009? The 34 year old coming off an 84 OPS+ season, or the 23 year old coming off an 91 OPS+ season? Forget the salaries or the picks involved, DeWitt was a better player last year and he’s likely to be so this year. There’s an argument to be made for bumping him for Hudson; there is no such argument to do the same for Cabrera.

To recap, the second base rankings are as such: DeWitt + keeping 1st round pick + no additional salary > Hudson - 1st round pick > Mark Loretta + keeping 1st round pick + no additional salary > Tony Abreu + keeping 1st round pick + no additional salary > Ivan DeJesus Jr. + keeping 1st round pick + no additional salary > Orlando Cabera – 1st round pick.

I didn’t want to spend a 1st round pick on Hudson, and he’s clearly better than Cabrera. Why would we want to waste a 1st round pick on him?