Every spring I collect several projections sources and average them together to do a meta-projection. Last year I pulled projections from Baseball Prospectus, ZiPS, Steamer, ESPN, and Baseball Reference.
Today we’ll look at former Met Asdrúbal Cabrera, who was finally traded in the 2018 tear-down. Last March we noted how Cabrera was the only veteran of value not traded from the 2017 Mets, despite being the only one who asked for a trade. He was only owed 8.5 million last year which seemed like a good deal.
2018 Average Projection: 545 PA, 477 AB, 125 H, 16 HR, .264/.326/.426
2018 Actual: 592 PA, 546 AB, 143 H, 23 HR, .262/.316/.458
2018 Mets: 407 PA, 375 AB, 104 H, 18 HR, .277/.329/.488
So Cabrera was outperforming his projections while he was on the Mets and started to underperform when he got traded to the Phillies. As a Met he was getting on base the predicted amount but was developing a lot more power (like 2016 Cabrera). The projection that got Cabrera closest was ESPN, which makes sense since they have a habit of overprojected established veterans. You can see the rest of the projections here.
With all of the Mets signings and trades in the infield this off-season, it’s clear that Cabrera’s time in New York is over (which is refreshing that the Mets aren’t signing all their old free agents like they’ve done the last couple of years. Cabrera was a big part of why the Mets made the 2016 Wild Card, thanks for the memories and for outperforming your projections last year!
