Agent: Encarnacion's received multi-year offers from 6 teams

The agent for free-agent slugger Edwin Encarnacion still can't believe that his client is nearing Christmas without a contract, but it's not due to a lack of offers.

"Yes," agent Paul Kinzer told Jeff Blair of the Fan 590 on Wednesday when asked if he was surprised that Encarnacion has yet to sign. "Toronto, that's where I thought he would end up, so we're kind of surprised by that. We did think he would definitely be signed by now. ... We never envisioned it stretching out this long."

Kinzer added: "Edwin has turned down multi-year offers (most in the three-year range) from six different teams (since the winter meetings). I talked to two teams already this morning. It's not that there isn't interest in him, but we made it clear from the start that Edwin wanted to return to Toronto. "

The Blue Jays offered Encarnacion a four-year, $80-million deal the day before he hit free agency, but his camp rejected it, as Kinzer said he wished to talk with other teams before making a decision. The Blue Jays, however, weren't patient, and quickly responded by going out and signing Kendrys Morales to a three-year contract.

A first-time free agent, Encarnacion wanted to explore the market before committing to Toronto, and hoped there would be a window in which he could entertain other offers before deciding. Kinzer compared that to how the Dodgers allowed Kenley Jansen and Justin Turner to spend more than a month in free agency before re-signing them.

"Signing someone two days later came as a surprise," Kinzer said. "We weren't expecting them to move (on Morales) that quickly."

Kinzer has been criticized by some for potentially overplaying his hand this winter, though he doesn't think that was the case. He also believes the compensation pick attached to his client, as well as the luxury-tax threshold failing to move up as high as anticipated with the new CBA, led to decreased interest.

"We'll come out of it OK and we'll be fine," Kinzer said. "(It was) never a case of overplaying our hand. We never had any idea the Blue Jays were going to move that fast. Everybody in baseball thought the Red Sox, Yankees, Rangers were going to come on strong in the first few days."

Kinzer said two of the teams that have expressed interest in Encarnacion have been National League sides that would use him at first base.