Juan Uribe Player Card | Baseball Prospectus

Juan Uribe

SS/3B

CLE

Age: 46

Birth Date: 1979 Mar 22

Birthplace: Palenque, Dominican Republic

Height: 6' 0"

Weight: 245 lb.

B/T: Right/Right

Season	G Games	PA Plate Appearances	WARP Wins Above Replacement Player	DRC+ Deserved Runs Created plus - Measures batter contributions, not just results. 100 is average. Higher is better, lower is worse.	SD± DRC+ Standard Deviation - Our measure of uncertainty surrounding a player’s DRC+	DRAA Deserved Runs Above Average - DRC+ converted to runs	BRR Base Running Runs - Measures the number of runs contributed by a player's advancement on the bases -- opportunity and park adjusted	DRP Deserved Runs Prevented - Total summary of all fielding contributions
Career	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-
Current Season	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-

4/03/2014

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Bret Sayre, Mike Gianella

9/10/2013

What You Need to Know: The Pirates Make it Official

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5/11/2012

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At-a-glance reports will be available on our new player cards shortly.

2016-08-05 : Cleveland Indians released 3B Juan Uribe.
2016-08-01 : Cleveland Indians designated 3B Juan Uribe for assignment.
2016-02-28 : Cleveland Indians signed free agent 3B Juan Uribe.
2015-11-02 : 3B Juan Uribe elected free agency.
2015-07-24 : New York Mets traded RHP John Gant and RHP Rob Whalen to Atlanta Braves for 3B Juan Uribe, LF Kelly Johnson and cash.
2015-05-27 : Los Angeles Dodgers traded 3B Juan Uribe and RHP Chris Withrow to Atlanta Braves for 3B Alberto Callaspo, LHP Eric Stults, LHP Ian Thomas and RHP Juan Jaime.
2013-12-24 : Los Angeles Dodgers signed free agent 3B Juan Uribe.
2010-11-30 : Los Angeles Dodgers signed free agent 2B Juan Uribe.
2010-11-07 : SS Juan Uribe elected free agency.
2010-01-05 : San Francisco Giants signed free agent SS Juan Uribe.
2009-11-05 : 3B Juan Uribe elected free agency.

Date On When the player was placed on IL or injured	Date Off When the player was activated from IL or returned	Transaction Action taken by team	Days Total days missed by player	Games Approximate team games missed by player	Side The side of the body where the injury occurred	Body Part The part of the body where the injury occured	Injury A description of the injury
2016-07-03	2016-07-04	DTD	1	-	Not Known	Finger	Contusion
2016-06-13	2016-06-18	DTD	5	-	Not Known	Groin	Testicle
2015-09-26	2015-10-09	DTD	13	-	No Side	Chest	Soreness
2015-09-21	2015-09-23	DTD	2	-	No Side	Chest	Contusion
2015-04-12	2015-04-14	DTD	2	-	Left	Hamstring	Tightness
2015-03-29	2015-03-30	Camp	1	-	No Side	Viral Infection	Other
2014-09-20	2014-09-21	DTD	1	-	Not Known	Ribcage	Soreness
2014-08-16	2014-08-31	15-DL	15	-	Right	Hamstring	Strain
2014-05-21	2014-06-26	15-DL	36	-	Right	Hamstring	Strain
2014-05-09	2014-05-14	DTD	5	-	Right	Hamstring	Strain
2013-06-16	2013-06-19	DTD	3	-	Not Known	Low Back	Tightness
2012-07-03	2012-07-05	DTD	2	-	Right	Ankle	Sprain
2012-05-14	2012-06-11	15-DL	28	-	Left	Wrist	Degenerative Arthritis
2012-05-05	2012-05-07	DTD	2	-	Left	Wrist	Soreness
2012-05-01	2012-05-04	DTD	3	-	Left	Wrist	Soreness
2012-04-18	2012-04-22	DTD	4	-	Left	Wrist	Soreness
2011-07-24	2011-09-29	15-DL	67	-	Not Known	Pelvis	Sports Hernia
2011-05-21	2011-06-06	15-DL	16	-	Left	Pelvis	Sports Hernia
2011-05-15	2011-05-15	DTD	0	-	Left	Hand	Soreness
2011-05-04	2011-05-05	DTD	1	-	Left	Hand	Contusion
2011-04-23	2011-04-26	DTD	3	-	Right	Thigh	Tightness
2011-04-01	2011-04-02	DTD	1	-	Left	Elbow	Contusion
2010-10-17	2010-10-19	DTD	2	-	Not Known	Wrist	Contusion
2010-08-20	2010-08-22	DTD	2	-	Left	Foot	Contusion
2010-07-31	2010-08-03	DTD	3	-	Not Known	Hamstring	Soreness
2010-07-06	2010-07-11	DTD	5	-	Left	Digit 4	Soreness
2010-05-21	2010-05-21	DTD	0	-	Left	Hamstring	Soreness
2010-04-25	2010-04-27	DTD	2	-	Right	Elbow	Tightness
2009-08-05	2009-08-11	DTD	6	-	Left	Hamstring	Soreness
2009-08-02	2009-08-04	DTD	2	-	Left	Hamstring	Soreness
2009-06-21	2009-06-24	DTD	3	-	Left	Hamstring	Soreness
2009-06-18	2009-06-20	DTD	2	-	Left	Hamstring	Soreness
2009-06-14	2009-06-17	DTD	3	-	Left	Hamstring	Strain
2008-05-16	2008-05-31	15-DL	15	-	Left	Hamstring	Strain
2007-03-26	2007-03-29	Camp	3	-	Right	Calf	Strain
2006-08-05	2006-08-12	DTD	7	-	Not Known	Low Back	Stiffness
2006-05-25	2006-05-27	DTD	2	-	No Side	Skull	Contusion
2006-04-13	2006-04-17	DTD	4	-	Left	Ribcage	Soreness
2005-06-20	2005-06-28	DTD	8	-	Not Known	Low Back	Soreness
2005-04-27	2005-05-03	DTD	6	-	Left	Foot	Soreness
2004-09-22	2004-09-23	DTD	1	-	Not Known	Low Back	Soreness
2003-03-18	2003-06-03	60-DL	77	-	Right	Foot	5th Metatarsal

1 year/$4M (2016). Signed by Cleveland as a free agent 2/16. May earn additional $1.5M in performance bonuses. DFA by Cleveland 8/1/16. Released 8/5/16.
2 years/$15M (2014-15). Re-signed by LA Dodgers as a free agent 12/24/13. $2M signing bonus. 14:$6.5M, 15:$6.5M. Acquired by Atlanta in trade from LA Dodgers 5/27/15. Acquired by NY Mets in trade from Atlanta 7/24/15. (Mets responsible for $2.5M of $3,147,541 remaining on combined 2015 contracts for Uribe and Kelly Johnson.)
3 years/$21M (2011-13). Signed by LA Dodgers as a free agent 11/30/10. 11:$5M, 12:$8M, 13:$7M, plus $1M paid in 2014.
1 year/$3.25M (2010). Re-signed by San Francisco as a free agent 1/5/10.
1 year/$1M (2009). Signed by San Francisco as a free agent 1/29/09 (minor-league contract). Contract purchased by San Francisco 4/4/09.
1 year/$4.5M (2008). Re-signed by Chicago White Sox 11/7/07. Performance bonus:$50,000 each for 250, 300, 350 plate appearances.
3 years/$9.75M (2005-07), plus 2008 club option. Re-signed by Chicago White Sox 12/04. 05:$2.15M, 06:$3.15M, 07:$4.15M, 08:$5M club option, $0.3M buyout.
1 year/$0.35M (2004). Signed by Chicago White Sox 3/04.
1 year/$0.3M (2003). Re-signed by Colorado 3/03. Acquired by Chicago White Sox in trade from Colorado 12/03.
1 year (2002). Re-signed by Colorado. 2/02.

Year Contract Year	Age Seasonal Age	Team Signing Team	Salary Salary or other detail	Service Time Accured service time
2002	23	COL	$222,000	-
2003	24	COL	$300,000	-
2004	25	CHA	$350,000	-
2005	26	CHA	$2,150,000	-
2006	27	CHA	$3,150,000	5.089
2007	28	CHA	$4,150,000	6.089
2008	29	CHA	$4,500,000	-
2009	30	SFN	$1,000,000	8.089
2010	31	SFN	$3,250,000	9.089
2011	32	LAN	$5,000,000	10.089
2012	33	LAN	$8,000,000	11.089
2013	34	LAN	$7,000,000	12.089
2014	35	LAN	$7,500,000	13.089
2015	36	LAN	$7,500,000	14.089
2016	37	CLE	$4,000,000	-
Total			$58,072,000	14.089

Year	Comments	Buy now
2016	All Juan Uribe wants to do is take fastballs out over the plate and send them right back where they came from. For some reason, pitchers remain willing to accommodate his blunt-force approach. Uribe was traded twice midseason in 2015, announcing his arrival in Queens with a wall-banging walk-off double against his former Dodgers teammates on July 26th. From there it was unremarkable, and he made just a cameo appearance in the playoffs due to injury. His hyper-aggression at the plate will make him a model pinch-hitter. Or maybe that's just what baseball thinks the ideal pinch-hitter is supposed to be.	Buy it now
2015	You'll notice a mini-theme running through this book, which is that we can be really dumb sometimes. So here's what we said in the 2013 version about Juan Uribe: "The bet here is that the Dodgers cut bait by Opening Day." Nearly 8 WARP over two seasons later, here's what we have to say about that: oooooops. His swing isn't picturesque and neither is his body, but after the rough (horrible, terrible, awful) first two years with the Dodgers that prompted the comment above, Uribe is now one of the most valuable members of the team. He hits plenty for third base, particularly given his consistently above-average defense, and in return for the wins he puts on the board, the Dodgers will pay him a whopping $6.5 million this season.
2014	Uribe's first two seasons in Dodger blue were an unmitigated disaster, as he flirted with the Mendoza line and showed little in the way of secondary skills. He picked an opportune time to mend and clear fences, finishing with a pair of homers in the NL Division Series. Uribe has earned more than $40 million playing baseball, which isn't half bad for a guy whose career on-base percentage sits under .300. His 2013 OBP was, at .331, the highest single-season rate of Uribe's career, and enough to give his GM amnesia. Colletti re-upped him for two years.
2013	Two-thirds of the way through his three-year, $21 million deal, Uribe has already taken his seat alongside Jason Schmidt and Andruw Jones among Colletti's biggest boondoggles. Again, injuries kept him out of the lineup. This time, left wrist inflammation robbed him of his power and reduced him to the role of not-so-innocent bystander. He got just 92 plate appearances upon coming off the DL on June 11, raising the question of why the Dodgers bothered to keep him on the roster at all. The bet here is that the Dodgers cut bait by Opening Day.
2012	Even coming off two relatively strong seasons, this corpulent hacker looked like a dubious choice as the Dodgers' top free-agent expenditure last winter, but few envisioned that his performance would completely crater. In September, he underwent surgery to repair a sports hernia. His woes did provide dark comedy in the form of "Emo Juan Uribe," a Tumblr blog featuring pithy, depressing assessments of his season ("Teammates changed Juan Uribe's walkup song to crickets") set over a photo of him forlornly slumped against the wall in foul territory. He'll cheer up knowing that his salary jumps from $5 million to $8 million for both 2012 and 2013. Dodger fans, not so much.
2011	Even beyond his pennant-clinching homer, Uribe’s two Giants seasons ranked among the top three of his 10-year major league career, which isn’t as much of a back-handed compliment as it might seem. A player who can fill in capably at all three infield skill positions while hitting for power and not killing you with outs is valuable, and thanks to an unexpected improvement in his walk rate in 2010, Uribe was that player again last year despite a 40-point drop in batting average. He drew an unintentional walk once every 20 at-bats in his first eight big-league seasons, but improved that number to one every 14.6 at-bats in 2010 and added 10 free bases via manager’s order or hit-by-pitch. Of course, there’s no guarantee that Uribe won’t revert to his hacktastic ways in 2011 and beyond, and even if he doesn’t, the three-year, $21-million the contract the Dodgers gave him over the winter was too generous in both dimensions.
2010	Where did that come from? In the latest strange turn in an odd career, Uribe\'s incarnation as a utility bopper was remarkable. While a good chunk of it was a 40-point spike on his BABIP, it\'s notable that his home-run rate didn\'t change much, and the other big improvement was cutting his infield flies almost in half from 2007-08. The BABIP will drop, but if he can continue to avoid popping up as much as he had been, he should retain a good chunk of last year\'s value, plus chip in as a useful part-timer at second and third. With the decision to sign Mark DeRosa, it\'s unlikely he\'ll be back with the Giants, but Uribe\'s a worthwhile risk for somebody\'s oft-used utilityman.
2009	We still don’t understand the quick $4.5 million the Sox gave Uribe within weeks of the 2007 World Series. Yes, he finished 2008 as the third baseman of a playoff team, but that was by default after Crede’s back ended his season, Fields’ knee sapped his, and Uribe lost his second-base job to a mid-May hamstring tear and Alexei Ramirez. Uribe is a miserable hitter (.241/.284/.409 over the last four seasons), an overrated fielder, gives away extra outs on the bases (16 steals and 30 times caught stealing with Chicago), and has received poor marks for his conditioning and commitment. He’s not yet 30, but he’s lucky he has lasted this long.
2008	It was a bit of a surprise that the Sox quickly re-signed Uribe, especially after complaints about his work ethic and weight followed a couple of years of really uninspired batsmanship. He's now out of a job in the wake of the acquisition of shortstop Orlando Cabrera, but he might be seen as something resembling veteran insurance against Richar's potential failure to hold the job at the keystone. Uribe's a decidedly strange sort of shortstop, an impatient pull hitter whose offensive game depends on getting around on a pitch and punching it into the left-field corner. It's a fun gambit in the Cell, but you can count on one hand the stadia in which his style works: the Cell, Minute Maid . . . hmm, half a hand, maybe?
2007	One has to wonder what Juan Uribe does with his offseasons. Last year, he skipped winter ball and came into the season looking out of shape. This winter, he was implicated in a double homicide in the Dominican Republic, ultimately avoiding prosecution. He hit just .167 last April and appeared to be playing Home Run Derby at the plate all year, hitting 21 dingers while drawing just 13 walks and struggling intermittently with a back injury. On the season, Uribe combined a .257 OBP with a .441 slugging average. A major leaguer had combined an OBP under .260 with a slugging average over .440 in a season of 350 or more plate appearances just once before, in 1983, when Tony Armas did it. Of course, the White Sox are relatively used to this sort of thing--the man Uribe replaced, Jose Valentin, hit .216/.287/.473 in his last season in Chicago. The good news, particularly to those concerned about his conditioning, is that Uribe will have to earn his $5 million team option for 2008 this season. That and his defense, which has been decidedly slump-proof, portend a rebound in 2007.
2006	Uribe can be a valuable player even in a down year at the plate. People associate good shortstop defense with an Omar Vizquel type of offensive profile--a contact hitter who steals a lot of bases--so players like Uribe and his predecessor Jose Valentin often wind up underrated. His 4.5 WARP (Wins Above Replacement Player) last season compared favorably to the more famous (and more liberally compensated) Orlando Cabrera and Edgar Renteria.
2005	The White Sox have a frustrating tendency to make good decisions in inverse proportion to the amount of money at stake. They can be counted on to bungle any move that would make front-page news; but they did well to pick up Juan Uribe from the Rockies, a player who can pick it at either middle infield position and had more upside than organizational filler Aaron Miles. Uribe's power is almost invariably described as 'surprising' since he's not a big guy and doesn't have a particularly hefty swing. PECOTA is more concerned about his batting average, which is liable to decline given his lack of selectivity at the plate.
2004	The organization kept getting annoyed with Uribe for what he was not. He failed to improve much after his debut, and despite repeated trials, he was never going to be useful at the top of the order. As good as he is defensively, he was stiff after missing the first two months with a stress fracture in his foot, making a few more errors than they considered acceptable. Still, the Rockies overreacted. Although he's offensively Neifi-riffic, Uribe is still young enough to be useful, and he plays an outstanding short. Between his glovework and the fact that he can bunt better than his new manager ever could, he could wind up getting a good chunk of playing time at Joe Crede's expense if Crede doesn't improve. Jose Valentin would slip over to third in that case. At the very least, Uribe makes for a nice bit of insurance and a good utility infielder for a team in win-now mode.
2003	Too thick-headed to be a star? Uribe hasn’t taken the time to learn English and it’s hindering his progress. He’s supporting a huge extended family on his minimum salary, and on the trip to Shea last year he’d bought tickets for dozens of friends and family members, and then spent the series trying to prove he could hit 600-foot homers. He wound up hitting 3-for-20 with no extra-base bits. He’s fast enough to steal a lot more bases than this. Hurdle stuck by him at first, but started to lose patience by season’s end. They’re done screwing around with him. They forced him to train all winter and had him report to Denver in January to work on "the mental and physical aspects of the game" with the new coaching staff. Not that anyone noticed, but he doubled his walk rate last year. Espy can work with that. Now that Rey Sanchez and Orlando Cabrera have their historic seasons behind them, Uribe’s the best fielding shortstop in the National League.
2002	Uribe accelerated the departure of Neifi Perez with a good showing during the incumbent's thumb injury in April. He is a similar player to Perez, with a lot more power, less speed, and less glove. With Uribe, Petrick, Ortiz, and Pierre, the Rockies have the inexpensive up-the-middle core of a contender. What they need is 100 more walks a year from those guys, collectively.
2001	Juan Uribe flashes an outstanding throwing arm, especially from deep in the hole. Neifi Perez claims Uribe is the guy who will make him move to second base, but it’s more like he’s the guy who could end Perez’s career as a Rockie. In another year, the projection will show you 20-homer power in Coors, which will be good for an All-Star appearance or two as long as the real shortstops all stay in the AL.
2000	He’s a defensive wizard who handled the jump to Asheville with little difficulty. Uribe has the arm, the range and the consistency you look for in a major-league shortstop. His offense has a long way to go, and it would be really nice if he had a stronger knowledge of the strike zone, but he’s ready to move up to high-A.

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