It seemingly has taken months (and it could take a few more days to become official) or years if you are considering the beginning of the right handed power bat narrative, but the Indians have finally landed Edwin Encarnacion after weeks of significant rumors. Jeff Passan broke the news late Thursday night of a three year, $60M deal with a $5M buyout of a fourth season:
[protected-iframe id=”4648b19df533d708041e0b9be161ea43-114320562-107853376″ info=”//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js” class=”twitter-tweet”]This is easily the biggest signing in Indians history, vastly surpassing the $14.25M AAV of Travis Hafner’s extension as well as the total value, despite it being one fewer year. While Hafner was 32, Encarnacion will turn 34 next month.
Everyone knows Encarnacion for his parrot carrying home runs, but he’s been much more than a slugger worth at least 3.6 fWAR each year since 2012 despite extremely poor defensive numbers. In the past two numbers, he has been particularly spectacular with more than 30 doubles, 30 home runs and 70 walks per year.
This move, especially following the trade for Andrew Miller, shows a distinct change in organizational philosophy well above and beyond even those changes that happened when Terry Francona first took over management in 2013. For the first time in franchise history, the Indians are a major player in both the trade and free agent market. With the starting rotation, bullpen and infield essentially set going into 2017 after a World Series run 2016, Encarnacion could be the one man to push the Indians over the top in their run to finally come through next year.
It’s only a bonus that the Indians signed the Blue Jays best hitter after all that happened between the two teams last season.
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