This just in, Jon Heyman is reporting that the Angels are on the verge of trading malcontent jackass OF/DH Bobby Abreu to the Cleveland Indians.
#indians, #angels on verge of abreu trade
— Jon Heyman (@JonHeymanCBS) March 30, 2012
Like Heyman, said, it is on the verge, so nothing is official yet. We don’t even know who the Angels are getting, but there are reports that outfielder Trevor Crowe was pulled from a minor league game for the Indians in lieu of a potential trade. I’ll let you go ahead and do the rest of the detective work there.
One thing everyone seems certain of is that the Halos are going to eat almost all of Bobby’s $9 million salary, which is no surprise. Saving no money and getting a marginal reserve outfielder who was a good prospect once upon a time back in return (assuming that is what the deal is finalized as) is a pretty lousy return for a guy who is still pretty useful, but Abreu’s incessant complaining this off-season combined with a poor spring in which he reported to camp in bad shape essentially squashed whatever trade value he had. So really this just boils down to the Angels surgically removing a guy who was starting to become something of a clubhouse cancer, or at least had the potential to be if he didn’t get the playing time he wanted.
Stay tuned and we will update this post with further details on the trade if/when they become available.
UPDATE #1: Heyman is now reporting on Twitter that he has heard that whatever deal Crowe was in fell apart, but that it may have nothing to do with Abreu. Clearly this isn’t getting resolved tonight.
UPDATE #2: Abreu is in the lineup today, this deal now has about as much life in it as Abreu’s bat this spring. ZING!