Cubs, Dexter Fowler Avoid Arbitration

The Cubs and outfielder Dexter Fowler have avoided arbitration by agreeing to a one-year deal worth $9.5MM, reports Jon Heyman of CBS Sports (Twitter link). As MLBTR’s Arbitration Tracker shows, Fowler had filed at $10.8MM, while the club countered with an $8.5MM figure. His $9.5MM salary falls $150K shy of the midpoint of those figures and is $500K north of his $9MM projection from MLBTR contributor Matt Swartz.

Chicago acquired the 28-year-old Fowler (29 in May) this offseason in exchange for infielder Luis Valbuena and right-hander Dan Straily. Fowler spent just one year in Houston, where he batted .276/.375/.399 with eight homers and 11 steals. Another season of his characteristically high on-base percentage (career .366) should position him well as a free agent heading into his age-30 campaign next winter.

Fowler figures to be the Cubs’ everyday center fielder in 2015, although defensive metrics such as Ultimate Zone Rating and Defensive Runs Saved suggest that he’s perhaps be better off in a corner spot — likely left field, given the sub-par marks that his arm receives. Despite those defensive shortcomings, Fowler has been plenty useful throughout his career, as evidenced by a lifetime .271/.366/.419 batting line. He’s walked at better than a 13 percent clip over the past two seasons and cut his strikeout rate to roughly 21 percent in that time as well, so he should be a nice boost for a Cubs team that had the worst strikeout rate (24.2 percent) in all of Major League Baseball and finished with the game’s third-worst team OBP (.300).