Type A players bleeding money

It's not a goal to be a broken record here, but it's still astonishing how little activity there is in baseball free agency, and we're just over a month out of spring training.

There are eight Type A free agents still on the market - meaning they were statistically among top 20 percent at their position as determined by the Elias Sports Bureau - who declined arbitration. And to sign a Type A free agent, a team will have to give up a first-round draft pick. So teams must determine if shortstop Orlando Cabrera, reliever Juan Cruz, second baseman Orlando Hudson, outfielder Manny Ramirez, catcher Jason Varitek and pitchers Derek Lowe, Oliver Perez and Ben Sheets are worth a first-round pick in this June's draft.

If you're a rebuilding team, it makes a lot of sense to hold the pick and not pick up an aging free agent. So the above players are, as ESPN's Buster Olney called it, in compensation-pick purgatory.

Most of them will make out OK - and all of them will find a home eventually - but they won't get nearly what they would have gotten if they'd accepted arbitration (a one-year deal with the team they'd played for last year). Scott Boras is trying to drum up business for Ramirez in the same manner as he did with Mark Teixeira, but teams know there just aren't enough bidders to drive up the price. And it looks like the Dodgers and Giants might ready to move on with somebody else in their outfield. There are only a few teams willing to take on such a huge salary, after all.

Two players this week classified as Yankee busts have already taken massive pay cuts: The Indians signed Carl Pavano and the A's are signing Jason Giambi. In the next few weeks, they won't be alone.