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The Dodgers have acquired second baseman/right fielder Cavan Biggio from the Blue Jays in exchange for right-handed pitcher Braydon Fisher.
Right-handed reliever Braydon Fisher is headed back to the Blue Jays for Cavan Biggio, a source tells ESPN. He has split his time between AA and AAA this season and has a 5.68 ERA and 30 strikeouts and 15 walks in 19 innings, with a fastball that sits in the low to mid 90s.
— Jeff Passan (@JeffPassan) June 12, 2024
The 29-year-old Biggio has played seven different position in his career, but has primarily been at second base and right field of late. However, he does have a lot of experience at third base and first base as well, and the Dodgers of all teams are likely to utilize him everywhere. For his career, he’s a mostly average defender across the board, if anything on the side of above that line.
In six seasons with the Blue Jays, he’s posted a .227/.343/.382/.725 line across 1761 plate appearances for an OPS+ of 101. However, he has struggled since the pandemic year in 2020, putting up a .219/.327/.351/.678 line with a 90 OPS+ since, including his worst year to date in 2024 at .200/.323/.291/.614 and 80 OPS+. Of particular concern is his gradually declining walk rate and elevating strikeout rate despite his power production cratering.
Biggio’s carrying skill is basically his plate discipline, though even that is only really useful if you can do damage at some point in the count.
Biggio has one elite skill: not swinging at balls
— Céspedes Family BBQ (@CespedesBBQ) June 12, 2024
among 220 hitters w/ 1,500+ PA from '19-'24, Biggio's 15.6% chase-rate is the lowest in MLB (Juan Soto is #2 at 16.3%)
but in 5 years he hasn't done anything else well enough to become a reliable everyday player, so here we are https://t.co/aEdgjTpOXW
From the eye test, there’s a lot of moving parts to result in a swing that feels somewhat static and lengthy, especially considering the declining power. Surely the Dodgers are hoping they can get him back to an above-average hitter by making some adjustments.
Biggio is making $4.21MM this season and has about $2.49MM remaining, which makes his cost around $5.229 MM since the Dodgers have to pay a 110% tax. He’s under team control through next year andcan’t be optioned without permission due to service time, and he previously refused to be demoted by the Blue Jays.
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Going back the other way will be soon-to-be 24-year-old right-handed reliever Fisher, a former fourth-round pick of the Dodgers in 2018. In five seasons with the club, he has a 4.53 ERA in 228.2 innings across five levels, striking out an impressive 294 while walking 127 batters. This year he’s made it to AAA, but was recently demoted back to AA in June, and has a 5.68 ERA in 19 inning across the two levels, striking out 30 but walking 15 as his profile seems to be getting more extreme.
Most importantly, he seems to be mostly organizational depth, as he’s not ranked by any publication I can find. Bruce put him as an honorable mention in his 2024 preseason rankings, but he also ranks 60 players in the org, so he was outside of those guys.
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With the Dodgers getting next to nothing out of Chris Taylor, Enrique Hernandez and Gavin Lux, it seems like they’re willing to take a flier on Biggio to see if he has a brighter future than one or all of them (or I guess Miguel Vargas, but he’s been decent so far). Since Biggio was recently designated by the Blue Jays, and the Dodgers have an open 40-man spot for him, they just need 26-man roster room and the likely candidate seems to unfortunately be Taylor either through a DFA or IL stint. The Dodgers could also option Vargas or Lux, but the former has been productive and the latter was just given the vote of confidence from the manager, so it seems unlikely.
