One Year Later, The Seattle Mariners Land Nelson Cruz

One year after reportedly turning down a five year $75 million contract to play with the Seattle Mariners, Nelson Cruz signed a four year $57 million deal to hit in between Robinson Cano and Kyle Seager. If the rumored offer from last year was indeed true, then Cruz, who played last year for the Baltimore Orioles on a one year $8 million deal, ultimately left $10 million on the table.

Cruz, who turned 34 in July, hit a major league leading 40 HR for the Orioles in 2014 and would appear to be a significant upgrade over the Mariners left field, right field, or DH production from this past season. The .277/.333/.525 line by Cruz far outshines the .190/.266/.301 numbers put up by various Mariners DH, including mid-season acquisition Kendrys Morales.

What Mariners fans should be concerned about is whether or not the team is paying for last year’s production instead of the likely production in the middle of Seattle’s lineup. Keith Law of ESPN, in an Insiders column published Monday, emphasized that players like Cruz, who aren’t terribly athletic and rely heavily on power, tend not to age well and the Mariners are paying for Cruz through age 37.

While Zips projections for next season are not yet available on Fan Graphs, Law indicated that Dan Szymborski of Zips foresees only 5.8 WAR from Cruz over the next three seasons.

Steamer projections that are available on Fan Graphs place Cruz at .256/.317/.471 with 30 HR, 91 RBI, 77 runs, and a 1.5 WAR for next year (being a mediocre OF and with DH providing no defensive value, Cruz is projected to provide negative defensive value). The projections were made assuming a neutral park, as Cruz was then a free agent, so switching to playing 81 games in Safeco should suppress those numbers slightly.

While Safeco allows fewer runs than Camden Yards, it is actually a little bit more HR friendly. By overlaying Safeco’s dimensions onto all of Cruz’s HR from last season, using ESPN’s Home Run Tracker, it becomes apparent that only one HR, a severe pull hit to left field, would not have left the park in Seattle. Interestingly, the same HR would have stayed in the park in Baltimore.

So maybe conservatively, the move to Seattle has Cruz producing round a .250 BA, an OBP a little higher than .300, and slugging in the .450 to .460 range. That’s still a significant upgrade on a team that finished 27^th in OBP and 21^st in SLG last season.

While I agree with Law that the age 36 and 37 years may be brutal, it seems that at this juncture in the Mariners revival, the team must overpay and overextend to get players to come to Seattle. News flash. Robinson Cano didn’t sign last season just to be closer to the great outdoors of the Pacific Northwest.

Since GM Jack Zduriencik doesn’t seem willing to deal young major league talent or top prospects like James Paxton, Taijuan Walker, Alex Jackson, or D.J. Peterson for veterans like Matt Kemp of the Los Angeles Dodgers or Carlos Gonzales of the Colorado Rockies (and he shouldn’t), Nelson Cruz was the best possible option.

The Mariners surely would have liked to have those 40 bombs in the lineup last year. Perhaps they’ll get the 30 Steamer is projecting. But, at any rate, Nelson Cruz, is a major upgrade in the lineup, even if only for 2015.