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On Saturday afternoon, the Cleveland Indians beat the Chicago White Sox 4-3 despite another poor outing from Ubaldo Jimenez.
Back in 2010, the Tribe paid what could have been a hefty price to acquire Jimenez from the Colorado Rockies, but so far, the prospects have yet to work out for the Rockies. Alex White has since been traded to acquire reliever Wilton Lopez and that has yet to pay dividends as Lopez has struggled in his first season with the team. Drew Pomeranz was recently brought back up to the big club but his MLB numbers are underwhelming at 4-10 with a 5.01 career ERA.
The question is, does the limited success by the traded prospects mean the Jimenez trade worked out for Cleveland? At the conclusion of this season, the team will have spent about $10 million on Jimenez and there is a team option for 2014 at $8 million, or a $1 million buyout. I would have to say that I expect the buyout. 19-25 with an ERA north of five. His 17 losses were the most in baseball last season. Last season he was good at home and brutal on the road, this season the exact opposite so it is tough to get a gauge on how he could perform for the Indians going forward. They may feel that another season of multi-millions for Jimenez is not in their best interest. If so, I hope he returns to the National League where he has his best chance to be successful.
If you are the Indians you have to hope that Trevor Bauer will be ready to rock at the MLB level soon, and the organization has a few guys coming up after him like Danny Salazar and Mitch Brown so I would be surprised to see the team continue to spend money on Jimenez as he is about to be 30 and looks to be on the decline. Since his fantastic 2010 season, Jimenez has regressed to just 35-47 with an ERA that pretty much doubles his ’10 mark of .288 plus his WHIP has gone up as well.
Craig Ballard is a NFL/NBA/MLB writer for www.RantSports.com. Follow him on Twitter @craigballard77, and you can find all of his articles HERE
