The 2013 Cleveland Indians thread

[John]

Are there any thoughts on Cleveland's 1st round pick? Everything I have read on Clint Frazier sounds great. I have read that he has insane bat speed and tremendous raw power.

I was very pleased with the pick. By all accounts, it was down to Frazier and Colin Moran. Between those two, I heavily favored Frazier. Moran possesses arguably the most polished bat in the draft. His ability to hit for average is far better than Frazier's at this time, and probably always will be. What turns me off to Moran is that his hit tool is really his only standout tool. He doesn't hit for big power, he's not terribly athletic, he has awful speed, and his defense at 3B is questionable at best. I don't care how good your hit tool is; I want more than one excellent tool for the #5 overall pick.

By contrast, Frazier has the potential to boast five above average to outstanding tools. Most exciting is his light tower power; he supposedly hit 16 of 24 balls for home runs at a private tryout for one team. That's no fluke; the guy has Popeye-like arms and he can mash. The concern is that he has pretty much maxed out on size and thus isn't terribly projectable, but what's there right now is plenty good for me. I like that he brings speed and athleticism to the table. He may even be capable of playing center field, though it's more likely he'll end up in right (where his power will play).

When you're drafting as high as #5, I think you need to be willing to take a risk on star-level potential. Moran was the safer bet. He almost certainly will be a regular contributor to the Miami Marlins, who tapped him with the #6 pick. Frazier has a lower floor than Moran. He might never harness his talents or develop his hit tool, which is his weakest tool at the moment. But kudos to the Indians for gambling on Frazier's star potential. These are the kinds of worthy, calculated gambles a franchise must take if it wishes to achieve greatness.

[Ghosts]

You're all invited to be charter members of the Corey Kluber Society.

Today's the day he out-duels Strasberg and the legend takes hold for real.

Charter membership closes shortly. Don't you want to say you were there first?

[Bill]

Card carrying member of the CKS!

[Ghosts]

Card carrying member of the CKS!

I know the Kluber-mania is a bit much, but the more you look at this guy's splits (of all kinds) the more promising his performance thus far is...

His BABIP remains ABOVE the MLB average.

His K's have actually always been there, but his BBs have steadily improved, resulting in this K/BB ratio.

Now, I'm not going to pretend that he's going to keep getting better. Of course if he did, he'd be Bob Feller by year's end. But there doesn't seem to be much flukey with what he's accomplishing. There was a bit of luck today, especially in the 7th, but more important than wins and losses he's showing to be a guy who has the stuff and -- more importantly -- the brains to be a pitcher.

God, I wish we could bottle his approach to hitters and force feed it to the rest of the staff.

I'm telling you, next year between Masterson, Bauer, Kluber, McAllister, Carrasco, and Danny Salazar (remember thatname), the Tribe is well on their way to having an above-average (if not better), and very young, rotation.

If Chiz can somehow become what he should, Lindor continues on his current trajectory, and the front office can swing a *major* free agent (almost certainly a RF/DH figure) next year -- this team is absolutely going to be a real deep post-season threat in 2014 and beyond.

Between that rotation, and then Santana, Swisher, Kipnis, Asdrubal/Lindor, Chiz, Brantley, and Bourne, there are plenty of pieces there.

And between Ubaldo and Reynolds we're talking $12m in money for next year. And if they deal Asdrubal -- which I think they should if they can get a couple of AA/AAA elite prospects -- they are going to clear another $10m in payroll from next year's total.

I don't know if I'm alone with Asdrbual, but I just don't see how you can let a talent like that walk for nothing. And with Lindor there's no way he's staying here past next year, anyhow.

[Dinosaurs]

Card carrying member of the CKS!

I know the Kluber-mania is a bit much, but the more you look at this guy's splits (of all kinds) the more promising his performance thus far is...

His BABIP remains ABOVE the MLB average.

His K's have actually always been there, but his BBs have steadily improved, resulting in this K/BB ratio.

Now, I'm not going to pretend that he's going to keep getting better. Of course if he did, he'd be Bob Feller by year's end. But there doesn't seem to be much flukey with what he's accomplishing. There was a bit of luck today, especially in the 7th, but more important than wins and losses he's showing to be a guy who has the stuff and -- more importantly -- the brains to be a pitcher.

God, I wish we could bottle his approach to hitters and force feed it to the rest of the staff.

I'm telling you, next year between Masterson, Bauer, Kluber, McAllister, Carrasco, and Danny Salazar (remember thatname), the Tribe is well on their way to having an above-average (if not better), and very young, rotation.

If Chiz can somehow become what he should, Lindor continues on his current trajectory, and the front office can swing a *major* free agent (almost certainly a RF/DH figure) next year -- this team is absolutely going to be a real deep post-season threat in 2014 and beyond.

Between that rotation, and then Santana, Swisher, Kipnis, Asdrubal/Lindor, Chiz, Brantley, and Bourne, there are plenty of pieces there.

And between Ubaldo and Reynolds we're talking $12m in money for next year. And if they deal Asdrubal -- which I think they should if they can get a couple of AA/AAA elite prospects -- they are going to clear another $10m in payroll from next year's total.

I don't know if I'm alone with Asdrbual, but I just don't see how you can let a talent like that walk for nothing. And with Lindor there's no way he's staying here past next year, anyhow.

The BABIP thing (and the HR/9 thing) have actually always been the issue for Kluber, even in the minors. He's been a strong strikeout guy and as you said he's made progress in providing a great K/BB ratio to the point now that despite his BABIP issues he's serviceable. I've been hopeful coming into this season that he would make enough of an improvement in BABIP (or hell, even get a lucky year despite a possible true talent level of being a very well hit pitcher when a batter does get the bat on the ball) that his other strong peripherals would possibly bring him to being a mid-rotation arm.

All-in-all, I don't think Kluber has much to worry about with when (if) Brett Myers comes off the DL this season. I think Kluber has certainly seized the opportunity and ran with it towards securing his role in the rotation. If he can make progress in reducing that BABIP and HR/9 rate then I'd say watch out, because he really has mid-rotation or better stuff.

[Bill]

Writing in the game length thread reminded me of one of the trivia questions on the TV broadcasts a couple weeks ago. I was forwarding through the break and listening to the radio feed, then the answer to the trivia question popped up was Dennis Eckersley (The question was about most consecutive no-hit innings for an Indian I think). I quickly thought to myself, "Wait, I HAVE to hear how Manning responds to this." I rewinded for a rare moment when I WANTED to hear the TV feed.

Much to my chagrin, he handled it very professionally. He just said it was the Eck and described the days when it happened since he was on the team then. I would think there would be an unspoken rule about no Eckersley trivia.

[Tyler]

Writing in the game length thread reminded me of one of the trivia questions on the TV broadcasts a couple weeks ago. I was forwarding through the break and listening to the radio feed, then the answer to the trivia question popped up was Dennis Eckersley (The question was about most consecutive no-hit innings for an Indian I think). I quickly though to myself, "Wait, I HAVE to hear how Manning responds to this." I rewinded for a rare moment when I WANTED to hear the TV feed.

Much to my chagrin, he handled it very professionally. He just said it was the Eck and described the days when it happened since he was on the team then. I would think there would be an unspoken rule about no Eckersley trivia.

What am I missing? Apparently there's drama between the two? I know nothing about off-the-field stuff for most of those Indians teams.

[Bill]

Oh yes, sometimes I forget how old I am...and how many times I've read The Curse of Rocky Colavito.

Indians history lesson for the day. From the Rick Manning Wikipedia page (yes Virginia, there is a Wikipedia page for Rick Manning...):

(blah, blah, blah, Manning got hurt one year) The injury would lead to Manning playing a major role in Cleveland's trade of Hall of Fame pitcher Dennis Eckersley. Eckersley was traded with Fred Kendall on March 30, 1978 to the Boston Red Sox for Rick Wise, Mike Paxton, Bo Díaz, and Ted Cox. In the book The Curse of Rocky Colavito, author Terry Pluto noted that the trade was necessitated by an awkward situation, namely that Eckersley's wife Denise had left him for Manning after Rick had stayed with the Eckersleys while recovering from his back surgery, and in that time became romantically involved with her.

Of course, not to mention that Eck went on to be a HoFer and Manning is best known for catching the last ball of a perfect game and being a meh announcer.

[Lions]

Wait... Dennis Eckersley was married to Denise Eckersley?

[John]

(blah, blah, blah, Manning got hurt one year) The injury would lead to Manning playing a major role in Cleveland's trade of Hall of Fame pitcher Dennis Eckersley. Eckersley was traded with Fred Kendall on March 30, 1978 to the Boston Red Sox for Rick Wise, Mike Paxton, Bo Díaz, and Ted Cox. In the book The Curse of Rocky Colavito, author Terry Pluto noted that the trade was necessitated by an awkward situation, namely that Eckersley's wife Denise had left him for Manning after Rick had stayed with the Eckersleys while recovering from his back surgery, and in that time became romantically involved with her.

Oh wow, I had no idea about that! Thank you for that juicy tidbit, Bill! It's unbelievable how personal issues like that can influence the fortune of an entire franchise.

[John]

Is anybody watching today's totally insane Indians-White Sox game? The White Sox, who have scored the fewest runs on any American League team, scored five runs against AAA call-up and semi-pro rapper Trevor Bauer. That's bad. What's worse is that Bauer gave up those runs while recording just two out. 49 pitches into his first inning of work, Bauer was hip-hopping his way to the showers. The inning ends with the Sox up 5-0 and that's all she wrote for game one of a doubleheader. Pray Matt Albers goes deep enough to save the bullpen for game two and forget about this lost game, right?

Uh... wrong. As I write this, the Indians just finished batting in the top of the 5th, an inning in which they scored three runs thanks to four doubles. That's pretty good if they've cut the deficit to 5-3! Well, actually, they're currently leading the game... by nine runs.

You see, the Indians responded to that five-run 1st inning by the Sox with a five-run 2nd inning of their own. Unsatisfied with that effort, they added six more runs in the 4th. The three-run 5th is their third crooked number up on the board today.

So, first, how about this game, huh? How demoralizing does this have to be for the Sox? More importantly, how empowering will this be for Cleveland? Might this signal a step-up for the team? Can they capitalize on momentum gained here?

Second, how are we all feeling about Trevor Bauer right about now? He arrived in Cleveland this off-season with a great deal of hype as well as a bunch of question about his makeup and warmup habits. After this disastrous start, he has a 5.29 ERA in the majors this year. He returns to AAA, where his ERA is a little better (4.13) but still not befitting a pitcher with his supposed talent. Do you still have confidence in the kid, Indians fans?

[Bill]

I spent a good bit of time watching the Tribe last night. I attended the meeting of the CKS (albeit a day late). Kluber looked pretty pedestrian Thursday. Occasionally wild, pretty hittable, not his best performance.

After that, I saw the score of the live first game was 14-9 in the sixth, so felt compelled to watch. I only caught the first 5 innings. Bauer looks terrible. He has no idea where the ball goes once it leave his hand. He has like a 92-mph sinker that he threw for a strike a few times down in the zone. That looked like a viable pitch, though the Sox would just take that pitch and wait for another. Everything else looked really hittable. Clearly he doesn't fool anyone. A little depressing. Our recent wild pitchers (I'm thinking of Ubaldo and Fausto Carmona) have at least had so much movement that they just couldn't control it. Bauer doesn't even have that much movement. Sigh.

It's great that we won both games yesterday. It's still extremely troubling that we gave up 18 runs to the worst hitting team in the AL.

[Zephyrs]

1.5 games back at the All Star break is a great feeling. Detroit is an impressive team and our Indians are still within striking distance. I know we were here last season and fell to pieces but, we have seen some exciting baseball so far this season and I am hopeful that we can keep it up.

[Bill]

Agree with Scott. At the very least, they are a watchable product. In the end, I think they will fall short, if only because they just don't matchup well with the Tigers head-to-head. But I definitely think they can be over .500 and continue to be watchable.

A couple things I have been pondering as I have watched them quite a bit over the last two weeks...

a) I wonder if they will make a move at the deadline. I'd be surprised to see them go all in and do something crazy, but I could see them getting some bullpen help.

b) Since Lonnie Chisenhall has come back, I can at least see why he was a first round pick now. He is starting to hit mistakes with authority. Not just the hits either, a lot of his foul balls are hit hard. That said, he still can't cover the outside of the plate because he doesn't go the other way. And it looks like he still guesses or can't recognize certain offspeed pitches as he still looks bad at times especially with 2 strikes. But a lefty power bat at 3B would be a welcome surprise in the second half. Not sure what to expect here.

[Mike Dunn]

Why are none of you Indians fans talking about the Indians nearly in the playoffs?!?!?

I for one am pulling for them over tough talkin' Texas (apologies to any Rangers fans here).

So Francona for MOY?