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Melky Cabrera Extended Qualifying Offer By Toronto Blue Jays

By Hayden Kane

Peter Llewellyn-USA TODAY Sports
Peter Llewellyn-USA TODAY Sports /
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Melky Cabrera is eligible to be a free agent this winter and is coming off an outstanding season for the Toronto Blue Jays. On Saturday the team announced that they have extended him a $15.3 million qualifying offer as the MLB off-season gets underway.

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Step back from an understanding of the MLB market for a moment. Forget that you know professional baseball players make an obscene amount of money. Forget that you know that MLB teams pay about $6.5 million for a win above replacement (WAR), if you are interested in such things.

Forget all of that and think about this sentence for a moment: Melky Cabrera technically has the option to get paid $15.3 million for one season of professional baseball in 2015.

Coming off a great 2014 campaign and headed for free agency, Cabrera was extended a qualifying offer by the Toronto Blue Jays on Saturday. This was the move everybody expected.

Since the qualifying offer system was put into place, teams have often used it with the primary interest of getting the protection of the draft pick compensation if the player signs elsewhere. In the case of the Blue Jays, however, this might be a way to buy themselves some time to negotiate a three or four year deal with Cabrera.

There is no doubt that Cabrera was outstanding in 2014. In 139 games he batted .301/.351/.458 and was a 3.1 WAR player. Those numbers are certainly worthy of a qualifying offer and a contract from the Blue Jays if that is what happens.

Considering where Cabrera was a couple seasons ago, coming off a PED suspension and with the stain of an odd attempted cover-up, it is a credit to just how well he has played that he was extended this offer and has likely earned himself a multi-year deal this winter.

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