You may have heard that the Baltimore Orioles backed out of their agreement with former Oakland A’s reliever Grant Balfour after the physical examination. In a vacuum that shouldn’t be a surprise, but the problem seems to be that…there was nothing actually wrong with him as Balfour himself and various doctors could tell. This has apparently led to Balfour considering filing a grievance against the O’s, and I think he might be on the winning end of this one. The story is compiled at MLBTR. The gist is that most folks think the O’s just changed their minds at the last minute and used the physical as a veil.
Moe at Cubs Den briefly considered Balfour as a potential relief candidate for the Cubs. It would be pretty awesome to have an established closer (even though most Cubs fans think it’d be useless to build up the bullpen if the offense can’t score enough runs anyway) but I don’t think this will happen. Of course, the Cubs should contact Balfour’s agent and see if they can sneak a lower-$ deal, but if there really is nothing wrong with Balfour, he likely prices himself out of a rebuilding-team-closer price range. Balfour is a better reliever than the one the Cubs just signed, Jose Veras. Therefore it stands to reason that Balfour can still score close to his original deal of two years/$15MM. Also, we have to take into account the fact that the Cubs have been stockpiling enough arms to invade a small country, so perhaps another bullpen arm isn’t necessary. But I digress.
Balfour has to be pissed right now. I was thinking about this earlier and the analogy that pops up is that Balfour was promised a job based on his qualifications by a potential employer, and then the employer reneged on the agreement with a seemingly suspect reason. It’s no wonder that he’s exploring a grievance and again, I wouldn’t be surprised if he won easily. This is damaging in a couple ways–one, it wasted Balfour’s time that could have been used towards negotiating with other parties, time that those other parties used to woo other free agents (though MLB GMs probably multitask better than I do so some of them probably kept their eyes and ears on the prize despite the now-broken contract). Two, it’s damaging to Balfour’s stock in a somewhat intangible way. Even if he’s truly healthy, there’s been a shroud of doubt cast over him. As Harry on Twitter said, the Orioles may very well have found something wrong with Balfour unrelated to the MRIs they were talking about in the MLBTR article. However, because of HIPAA, that issue cannot be easily divulged, though Balfour likely allowed sharing of his medical information by telling the media that his MRIs were fine.
We’ll keep checking on this situation, but depending on who you are, do you believe Balfour or the Orioles here? While nobody really signed any papers, think about the analogy I posited above, or the analogy of using a real estate agent’s time and then backing out just before closing the deal on the house. It’s like the O’s just got really cold feet and tried to justify it somehow with a bad physical exam (whether real or imagined). I don’t know what to make of it, but if Balfour really IS healthy and signs with another team (and plenty will be interested in a healthy, effective reliever with closer experience), he’s going to have some extra fire if and when he faces the O’s. Speaking of, if he somehow does latch on with the Cubs, they play Baltimore in August of next year. That could be very fun to watch if it happens.