Carlos Pena to the Cubs

Carlos Pena and the Chicago Cubs reached an "Adrian Beltre Bounce-Back" like agreement, a 1 year deal for $10M.

With the way the market has gone so far this offseason, this has to be considered a great deal for the Cubs. If Ty Wigginton can get a 2 year deal as a weak hitting, no field utility player and Jayson Werth can get $126M then Carlos Pena at $10M qualifies as a steal.  The Cubs needed a first baseman, preferably lefty, with power and they got just that for only a one year deal.

Yes, Carlos Pena had a dreadful 2010, but a lot of that was a product of bad luck.  There is this thing called BABIP which stands for batting average on balls in play and for his career Carlos Pena's BABIP is .279. That means that we can reasonably expect for 28% of the balls Pena puts into play to become hits. Last year, Pena's BABIP was .222 which tells us that an inordinate amount of balls that Pena put into play were turned into outs.

It is possible that Pena is suddenly a significantly worse hitter now than ever before, but it's also possible that it was just a matter of chance. Pena is still relatively young (33) and walked and struck out at the same rates as last year, so while he may not be the player he was in 2007-2008, the Cubs are betting on his 2010 being a product of some bad bounces and for only a one year commitment at $10M, it's a bet worth taking.