Projections

Spring training games begin next week, and considering all the talk about 2009 that we've already heard, let's say we pull back a bit and start to talking about the end results of the next month.

Yes, it's time for wild speculation, although in the case of the Indians there's not much room for that.

Here's what I would imagine our starting line-up will be, Opening Day of 2008:

Grady Sizemore CF
Asdrubal Cabrera 2B
Travis Hafner DH
Victor Martinez C
Ryan Garko 1B
Jhonny Peralta SS
David Delucci/Jason Michaels LF
Franklin Gutierrez RF
Casey Blake 3B

With the platoon in left, we'll have spots for three people on the bench, so I'm relatively sure (barring a trade) that we'll get Jaime Carroll, Shin Soo Choo, and Andy Marte.

The bullpen is also laid out pretty clearly:

Borowski
Betancourt
Perez
Lewis
Kobayashi
Fultz

Even money is that Tom Mastny gets the last spot, although Scott Elarton put up decent numbers from the bullpen in Buffalo last year, so you never now. You have to figure Brendon Donnelly has something to prove and he does have some talent. I think Mastny might be able to live on his Ortiz/Ramirez glory from the post-season.

The rotation is only a bit more interesting:

Sabathia
Carmona
Westbrook
Byrd
Laffey/Lee/Sowers

Now, at first look I'd go with Laffey winning this spot. You have to like how he pitched when he got his chance last year. On the other hand, we know Sowers has real talent and he seems like a really nice guy as opposed to, say, Cliff Lee who desperately needs a PR guy in Cleveland. That said, the intellectual part of me points to the fact that Lee is a big league pitcher who had a bad year and that the bad year was unusual for him. As much as I'd like to see the youngsters get a shot, I'm leaning towards Lee getting the final spot.

Lofgren needs a full year at Buffalo, I think, and Miller needs to throw a decent number of games without getting hurt.

Buffalo should have a hell of a rotation if my predictions hold: Miller, Laffey, Sowers, and Lofgren, plus probably Brian Slocum.

As for call ups during the season, I'll hold off on any guesses there until we see a few spring training games. My initial impulse is to point towards Laffey or Sowers and Ben Francisco or Josh Barfield, but we'll see how they do in the practice games.