Cleveland Indians (93-69, .574, 2nd in AL Central)
One game short.
One more bloop single. One more win in a game in late June when the legs start to get heavy. One more weird loss for the Red Sox or Yankees. One game is a bigger deal when you're sitting at home at the end of the season watching four other teams fight it out for the AL Pennant.
In discussions with The Tank this week, he's holding tight to the assertion that the Indians are going to fall back this year.
"The Indians were the best team in baseball for the second half of last season," said Tank. "The young talent on that team is incredible. I think they will take a step back this season without Crisp and Millwood, but they are set up to make a run in the long term similar to their success in the 90s. More than the division, I think the Indians are going to be fighting with the Red Sox, A's, and Blue Jays for the wild card down to the wire."
I tend to agree with that. Moreso than the Twins, the Indians will make a run at the White Sox this year. As I'd said in one of our discusssions, the White Sox will have the first and best chance to trip up the White Sox this year. Frank points to the pitching depth with Chicago as giving them flexibility and I agree, but in the division, the Indians have the second strongest rotation. The Twins have the best single pitcher in Johan Santana, the White Sox have the best single rotation, but Cleveland is second as a whole.
The Indians made a huge push last year and I was on the road for the last week of the season, catching bits and pieces of the final few games as I drove through the deserts out west. I couldn't get over how they kept hanging in and hanging on. Day after day, they brought it right down to the wire for one of the best races in years. When you consider that the Yankees, Red Sox and Indians were within one game of each other at the end, it was a good year.
Frank is right, the Indians are wildly talented for a young team, however I think that they are ready to contend now, as well as later. He's also right in the late 90s parallel, where the teams just kept plugging away and won year in and year out. I honestly don't think it's their year with the White Sox in the way, but as I asked Frank, was there any one team you would have been more afraid to see in the postseason last year? Exactly.
The depth chart, as always, is below and the standouts are Victor Martinez, Jhonny Peralta and Grady Sizemore in the field and Cliff Lee, C.C. (Cookie! Cookie!) Sabathia, Paul Byrd and Bob Wickman on the hill. No matter how you slice that, it ain't bad.
Buried in there are Rafael Betancourt (2.79 ERA in 67.2 IP); Ben Broussard (a .307 OBP, despite a .255 batting average); Ronnie Belliard at 2B (152 hits, 36 of which were doubles - that means that he's hustling on the basepaths or is barely missing on home runs in addition to the 17 he hit). Uber-prospect Andy Marte, who was at the center of two major trades this off-season is perhaps the player who has gotten the most ink without actually doing anything.
Marte has been consistiently ranked as one of the top major league prospects for several years now and was moved from Atlanta to Boston in a trade to dump Edgar Renteria. Then, the Red Sox turned around and dealt him to Cleveland for Coco Crisp (a legitimate loss, but they won't miss him with Sizemore there to pick up the pieces).
Was Marte a victim of circumstance, being stuck behind Chipper Jones and Wilson Betemit in the Braves system and the best chip the Sox had to trade with in their need to fill their hole in center field, or is there a bigger problem there? It makes me wonder why two teams with strong farm systems would be so willing to part with Marte. In any event, he has time to develop with Boone and Blake ahead of him on the depth chart in Cleveland. Still, if I were an Indians fan, I'd sleep a little better at night knowing he was there as a late season call-up.
Wickman rang up 45 saves with a 2.47 ERA last year and I'd take him over any other closer in the AL Central right now. Neither righties nor lefties could hit him any more than a quarter of the time and more than anything, his teammates think he's infallible.
Plus, you gotta love a 240-pound closer. Between him and Sabathia (And the departed Bartolo Colon) what the hell are they feeding those guys in the clubhouse? Lard?
Cleveland Indians
C: Victor Martinez; Shoppach; Garko; Laker
1B: Broussard; Perez; Blake; Garko
2B: Belliard; Vazquez; Inglett
SS: Peralta; Vazquez; Flores; Ochoa
3B: Aaron Boone; Casey Blake; Marte; Merloni; Kouzmanoff
LF: Jason Michaels; Blake; Inglett
CF: Sizemore; Franklin Gutierrez; Snyder
RF: Blake; Gutierrez; Jason Dubois
DH: Hafner; Broussard; Martinez
SP: Lee; Sabathia; Byrd; Westbrook; Jason Johnson
CP: Wickman
RP: Cabrera; Mota; Sauerbeck; Betancourt; Matt Miller; Andrew Brown; Danny Graves; Karsay
One more bloop single. One more win in a game in late June when the legs start to get heavy. One more weird loss for the Red Sox or Yankees. One game is a bigger deal when you're sitting at home at the end of the season watching four other teams fight it out for the AL Pennant.
In discussions with The Tank this week, he's holding tight to the assertion that the Indians are going to fall back this year.
"The Indians were the best team in baseball for the second half of last season," said Tank. "The young talent on that team is incredible. I think they will take a step back this season without Crisp and Millwood, but they are set up to make a run in the long term similar to their success in the 90s. More than the division, I think the Indians are going to be fighting with the Red Sox, A's, and Blue Jays for the wild card down to the wire."
I tend to agree with that. Moreso than the Twins, the Indians will make a run at the White Sox this year. As I'd said in one of our discusssions, the White Sox will have the first and best chance to trip up the White Sox this year. Frank points to the pitching depth with Chicago as giving them flexibility and I agree, but in the division, the Indians have the second strongest rotation. The Twins have the best single pitcher in Johan Santana, the White Sox have the best single rotation, but Cleveland is second as a whole.
The Indians made a huge push last year and I was on the road for the last week of the season, catching bits and pieces of the final few games as I drove through the deserts out west. I couldn't get over how they kept hanging in and hanging on. Day after day, they brought it right down to the wire for one of the best races in years. When you consider that the Yankees, Red Sox and Indians were within one game of each other at the end, it was a good year.
Frank is right, the Indians are wildly talented for a young team, however I think that they are ready to contend now, as well as later. He's also right in the late 90s parallel, where the teams just kept plugging away and won year in and year out. I honestly don't think it's their year with the White Sox in the way, but as I asked Frank, was there any one team you would have been more afraid to see in the postseason last year? Exactly.
The depth chart, as always, is below and the standouts are Victor Martinez, Jhonny Peralta and Grady Sizemore in the field and Cliff Lee, C.C. (Cookie! Cookie!) Sabathia, Paul Byrd and Bob Wickman on the hill. No matter how you slice that, it ain't bad.
Buried in there are Rafael Betancourt (2.79 ERA in 67.2 IP); Ben Broussard (a .307 OBP, despite a .255 batting average); Ronnie Belliard at 2B (152 hits, 36 of which were doubles - that means that he's hustling on the basepaths or is barely missing on home runs in addition to the 17 he hit). Uber-prospect Andy Marte, who was at the center of two major trades this off-season is perhaps the player who has gotten the most ink without actually doing anything.
Marte has been consistiently ranked as one of the top major league prospects for several years now and was moved from Atlanta to Boston in a trade to dump Edgar Renteria. Then, the Red Sox turned around and dealt him to Cleveland for Coco Crisp (a legitimate loss, but they won't miss him with Sizemore there to pick up the pieces).
Was Marte a victim of circumstance, being stuck behind Chipper Jones and Wilson Betemit in the Braves system and the best chip the Sox had to trade with in their need to fill their hole in center field, or is there a bigger problem there? It makes me wonder why two teams with strong farm systems would be so willing to part with Marte. In any event, he has time to develop with Boone and Blake ahead of him on the depth chart in Cleveland. Still, if I were an Indians fan, I'd sleep a little better at night knowing he was there as a late season call-up.
Wickman rang up 45 saves with a 2.47 ERA last year and I'd take him over any other closer in the AL Central right now. Neither righties nor lefties could hit him any more than a quarter of the time and more than anything, his teammates think he's infallible.
Plus, you gotta love a 240-pound closer. Between him and Sabathia (And the departed Bartolo Colon) what the hell are they feeding those guys in the clubhouse? Lard?
Cleveland Indians
C: Victor Martinez; Shoppach; Garko; Laker
1B: Broussard; Perez; Blake; Garko
2B: Belliard; Vazquez; Inglett
SS: Peralta; Vazquez; Flores; Ochoa
3B: Aaron Boone; Casey Blake; Marte; Merloni; Kouzmanoff
LF: Jason Michaels; Blake; Inglett
CF: Sizemore; Franklin Gutierrez; Snyder
RF: Blake; Gutierrez; Jason Dubois
DH: Hafner; Broussard; Martinez
SP: Lee; Sabathia; Byrd; Westbrook; Jason Johnson
CP: Wickman
RP: Cabrera; Mota; Sauerbeck; Betancourt; Matt Miller; Andrew Brown; Danny Graves; Karsay
Labels: Preview-2006
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