Wednesday: Ugly Trade #5

......

Seriously....

This one is a personal favorite, because I don't think a lot of people know about it. It certainly surprised me when I found out about it. These are actually two different deals, but since they involve the same teams and only happened about a month apart from each other I've lumped them into one deal.

Trade 1:

The Cleveland Indians send: Eduardo Perez

The Seattle Mariners send: Asdrubal Cabrera

Trade 2:

The Cleveland Indians send: Ben Broussard

The Seattle Mariners send: Shin-Soo Choo, Shawn Nottingham, and cash

.....

You read those right people. Bill Bavasi (probably one of the worst GMs ever) strikes again. True Bavasi made a lot of horrible deals, but these two might be the worse; you could argue the Eric Bedard trade, but the Ms knew they were getting an injury risk, and Adam Jones hasn't exactly been a superstar in Baltimore. 

In 2006, in some sort of horrible effort to find offense, Bavasi traded for two horrible players. At 36 (yeah, they traded for a 36 year old), Perez was off to a quick start for the Tribe, posting a .979 OPS in 37 games. Shockingly enough (please, sense the sarcasm) he would play only 43 games for Seattle, as a part time DH against lefties, and post an OPS of .545. Broussard was a 29 year old who was supposed to have power and never found it; so, naturally you would want him in a pitchers park... oh Bavasi. At the time of the trade he was hitting .321 in Cleveland with 13 home runs, but once he came to Seattle he hit only .238 with 8 bombs. Broussard was primarily a super utility guy who played awful defense and never had any ability to hit in Safeco. 

how did this trade happen?

Meanwhile, in Cleveland, Mark Shapiro was giddy as a schoolgirl. These trades were pure thievery. Shin-Soo Choo would remain one of the most underrated players in the game, until 2010 when he would post back-to-back 20-20 seasons. Choo has become a 5-tool player; his defense is amazing in right field, his career slash line is .295/.388/.483, and as stated above he's become a consistent 20-20 player (and at only 28 he could make a jump to 30-30).

Pretty sure Bavasi is pure evil

Asdrubal Cabrera has remained an unknown, but 2011 might be his coming out party. He's been a versatile starter for the Indians, playing second, short, and third; he hasn't excelled at either position, but with time to practice at one spot he could become a really good fielder. He's been nothing but consistent with a bat, posting a slash line of .284/.346/.400 in Cleveland. He has 20 steal potential (his career high is 17) and is starting to develop power; he has 4 bombs so far in 2011 and could become a consistent 15-20 player.

This may seem paranoid, but I have this theory that Bill Bavasi was never working for the Mariners. I think he was secretly trained by the other 29 teams in the league to give them great young talent for free. Oh Seattle fans, what could have been?