Edward Cabrera silences his early skeptics with a dazzling Cubs debut

Wait, wait, wait. I was assured the Chicago Cubs already lost the Edward Cabrera trade.

After former top prospect Owen Caissie had himself a big weekend in Miami, including a walk-off home run on Sunday, there was no shortage of folks online second-guessing Jed Hoyer's decision to trade him for the hard-throwing right-hander this winter.

Then, Cabrera made his Cubs debut - and, all of the sudden, it got real quiet.

Cabrera turned in six scoreless innings of one-hit ball, leading Chicago to a 7-2 series-opening victory over the Los Angeles Angels Monday night, punching out five in an effort where 'he had everything going,' according to manager Craig Counsell.

He quickly settled in, limiting the Angels to scattered weak contact, needing just 80 pitches to get through six before handing things over to Colin Rea for the final three frames. The big takeaway? The swing-and-miss that made him such an enticing trade target for the Cubs was on full display.

Edward Cabrera's reworked arsenal paid off big in his Cubs' debut

Monday's start surely had Cubs fans dreaming of an Edward Cabrera-Cade Horton 1-2 punch atop the rotation in October - and I can't say I blame them. There's a long way to go between now and then, but there's no question that the stuff plays and a revamped repertoire may help him take things to a new level.

With Miami last year, he threw his four-seamer a career-low 13 percent of the time - but, continuing a trend we saw in spring training, Cabrera leaned heavily on the pitch against the Angels, turning to it 28.7 percent of the time while averaging 96.4 MPH.

This was the hope. You bring Cabrera and his skill set to Chicago, let him get in the lab with pitching coach Tommy Hottovy, and good things will happen. It's just one start, but good things certainly happened on Monday night - and let's hope it's a sign of things to come.