As difficult as it is to gain any real insight into a player after just 171 plate appearances, it was obvious when watching Oswaldo Cabrera last season that the kid had it.
His maturity far beyond his years allowed the 23-year-old to remain mostly unfazed when he joined the Yankees during August, by far their worst and most tumultuous month of the regular season. When Cabrera debuted on Aug. 17, the team had lost three in a row, 12 of its last 15, and had swung the door open in the American League East, where its lead would eventually be whittled down to just 3.5 games before a September surge.
At the time of his call-up, the sky was falling on everything but Cabrera. He smacked ten hits in his first nine games — during which he started at second base, third base, shortstop and right field — and provided a jolt that was badly needed, even if the winning didn’t follow right away. When it was all said and done, the utility man batted .247/.312/.429 (.740 OPS) with a 111 wRC+ and 15 extra base hits in 44 games, six of which were home runs.
