Pre-Season

This is what I sent to a few choice people before this season started. I apologize for the funky formatting.

I was right about a few things, wrong about others. I think I was right about our key, though:

That’s right, boys and girls and children of all ages, it’s time

 for another edition of Kyle’s Completely Unbiased and Realistic

 Indians’ Preview.  Because I have nothing better to do with my time.

First, a suggestion: The Cleveland Indians used to be the Cleveland

 Naps, named after their best player, Napolean “Nap” Lajoie.  I think

 naming a team after a player is a great idea, and hereby suggest that

 the Tribe becomes either the Cleveland Pronks or, even better, the

 Cleveland Garkos.  Don’t mess with the Garkos.

Twenty years ago Sports Illustrated picked the Indians to win their

 division.  They did the same this year.  That’s a bad sign.

But ten years ago the Indians headed down a road that brought them one

 Joe Table away from a World Series championship.  So that’s a good

 sign.

Now let’s get to the nitty gritty.

Why will the Tribe do better this year?

The easy answer there is “because they have to,” but we all know that’s not true.

Let’s start with our defense.  It was bad.  It was real bad.  And

 while most people would like to blame Jhonny Peralta, the majority of our

 errors actually came at the corners with the all-star combination of

 Aaron Boone, Ben Broussard, and Eddie Perez, none of whom are still

 around.  Marte is an obvious step up and the

 Blake/Garko/Martinez/Hafner/Harry Doyle platoon at first will make it impossible to commit the same

 mistake twice.  Personally, I look for Doyle to win a Gold Glove.

Evidently I wasn’t the only one learning from Major League, as our

 man Peralta has gone and got himself some new eyeballs.  The word on the

 street is that his range has improved a great deal and that he spends

 all his time with Barfield, our fancy pants new second baseman who looks

 nothing at all like a short, pudgy Manny Ramirez, which I think is a

 plus.  And Barfield can run!  Imagine an Indians team that can steal

 bases  -  boggles the mind.

I think we can gloss over the offense, as that’s not so much a

 problem for us these days (yet another nod to the 90’s).  At the very least

 our outfield should always be hitting right around .300 since there

 are five of them.

So let’s look at the pitching.  One big difference will be the simple

 fact that our rotation at the start of the year won’t consist of a

 3-4-5 of Byrd-Carmona-Johnson.  Sure, not having C.C. hurt us, but did

 it hurt more than having Jason Johnson?  No.  Fausto Carmona seems to

 have recovered from the trial by fire that was last season, so at the

 very least he should give us a chance (again, more so than Jason Johnson).

  And one would have to assume that Paul Byrd feels some pressure these

 days, what with the really freaking impressive Adam Miller chomping at

 the bit in Buffalo.

Yes, it would be nice to have our regular rotation to start the season,

 but regardless we’ll start off better than we did a year ago.  Fun

 fact for those who feel the need to complain about C.C.’s weight:

 Cliff Lee is on the DL with the same injury that C.C. had last year.  Have

 you looked at Cliff Lee?  He’s built like me.

As much as it may have improved, my biggest concern is still our

 bullpen.  Borowski appears to be the second coming of Wickman without the

 option for buffet jokes.  Hernandez is 102.  Fultz did not have the best

 spring.  Miller is hurt again.  And Betancourt is a lot like Charles

 Nagy: you have no idea if good Rafael or bad Rafael will show up.

So why on earth would anyone pick the Tribe to win the best division in

 baseball?  It’s simple: depth.

Everyone needs starting pitching and we have plenty.  We also have a

 whole boatload of outfielders who can hit.  I would not be surprised in

 the slightest if the Indians make some big deal at mid-season.  We’ve

 got pieces to spare, from Byrd and Westbrook (who could bring in some

 great players), to pretty much all of our outfielders aside from

 Sizemore.  We have crazy depth and we can pretty much use that to go out and

 get whatever we need during the course of the season.

Prediction: AL Central Champs.  The Tigers will be the White Sox of

 ‘06.  The Twins are one good starter away from being the best team in

 baseball, but that’s one more starter than they’ll find at any point

 during the season.  The White Sox will lose most of their team in the

 great AJ Riot of ‘07, orchestrated from afar by some kid in Los

 Angeles.  And the Royals are the Royals.

I think Garko will get more and more time at first as the season

 progresses and we’ll see a core infield form the likes of which we

 haven’t seen in a decade.  We’ll see at least one starter dealt, making

 room for Carmona full time and preparing for Adam Miller.  We’ll see

 Hafner and Sizemore jerseys all over the country.  And we’ll see the

 Indians get to the post-season.

Then again, I’ve been wrong before.

Champions!

A few quick comments on the last two games:

Byrd will have games like that, particularly when a team is on a hot hitting streak like the A's were that night. I have faith in him to right himself. Let's hope he has a good final outing.

Jake Westbrook is so amazing when he's on, it's unreal. Hopefully, today was a sign of things to come.

And it was almost as if Grady was going to close the deal today with sheer force of will.

So let's talk about the lean years.

I remember sitting in a bar in Atlanta, GA watching the Tribe play the Mariners in 2001 and thinking that if Colon could win his first start, we'd be fine, because that meant he could win his second start and we'd just need one more win on top of that (how much faith I had back then). And Colon lost his first start. And we went out in the first round.

In 2002, the Indians started the season 11-1 (the one loss coming to the Angels who, at the time, were not predicted to do much, but would go on to win it all). I remember an interview with Travis Fryman after the fast start where he points out that the team was still good, even after losing so many great players.

And then the wheels came off the wagon.

I followed the team as best I could in 2003, but this was before I discovered MLB.tv and I was living in Los Angeles. I don't know that I was actually able to catch even a single game, but followed the scores online. I remember that game against Detroit with the long delay and the awful start by whoever it was when Jake Westbrook came in and pitched seven scoreless innings and someone said to someone else "hey, maybe that guy should be a starter."

I discovered the wonderful world of watching games online in 2004. I was able to follow the team regularly for the first time since I left Ohio in the spring of 2000. It was agonizing, of course. I can remember cancelling my monthly MLB.tv suscription and the operator offering me a post-season package and explaining to him that my team was no where near being in the post-season.

Fortunately, I had a new assistant at work and he was a lifelong Red Sox fan, so I could at least be happy for him.

I spent all of 2005 telling anyone who'd listen that the wheels would come off the White Sox wagon and we'd catch them. No, really, I was saying this before the All-Star break. At one point, people actually started believing me. And we all know what happened in the last week.

I had high hopes in 2006. We all did. I even sent out my first pre-season Tribe breakdown to anyone unfortunate enough to have given me their e-mail address.

I did the same before THIS season started. And the number reason I gave for why the Tribe would win the divison? Depth. As I've mentioned before, even a blind squirrel finds a nut every once in a while.

So here we are, AL Central champs, ghost of the 90's floating everywhere.

Someone put up a poll on the official Indians message board the other day asking who their favorite Indians team was. It's hard to argue with the '95 team, as they meant so much symbolically.

But I'm going to go with this team. I'm going to go with the core group that I watched wallow in mediocrity for the last few years, only to finally find the recipe for sucess. I'm going to go with Grady, Pronk, and Victor making their first post-season appearances. I'm going to go with Lofton's next shot at a ring and two Cy Young candidates. I'm going to go with a team that matches the teams of the 90's in home game homeruns and also has one of the best rotations in baseball. I'm going with a team I watch grow together over the course of the last few years.

So here we go.

Scripted

And now we try to clinch at home. It's funny how in the span of just a few days we've gone from wondering if we'll clinch, to hoping for the ideal situation in which to clinch. No longer do we hold our breath hoping the Tribe can pull this one out. Now we're making demands on how we want to win.

Ideally, of course, the Tigers will lose tonight and the Indians will win tonight and the Tribe will get a chance to clinch at home tomorrow night. That would be the earliest they can do it. Even without help from Kansas City, we can clinch at home with a sweep.

The AP article from Wednesday's game pointed out that the Indians could actually clinch during the first game of the doubleheader in Seattle on Tuesday. That's the last make-up game from the snowouts and the Tribe will actually be the home team in that game -- they'll wear home jerseys and bat second. Which means the Indians could actually clinch the division after winning a home game on the road.

There's a new stat for baseball.

Original and perhaps only remaining RCR reader Mike wondered why there seems to be a debate as to who the #3 starter will be in the post-season. I honestly don't know. Unless the coaching staff is in love with the idea of back to back ground ball pitchers, I don't see why Byrd wouldn't stay where he's at.

What I would find interesting is if there's any possibility that would deny Westbrook a start in a five game series. If the Tribe doesn't have home field advantage, it would be interesting to see if Wedge would go with C.C. on short rest to try and win a Game 4 instead of having to head back to Boston (the only team the Tribe could face and not have home field advantage over, although at this point that wouldn't be the case).

Speaking of Boston, Bob Ryan of the Boston Globe wrote an interesting article on the four playoff bound AL teams. This is what he had to say:

"Let's examine the AL contenders.

1. Cleveland. Grady Sizemore can hurt you. Casey Blake can hurt you. Jhonny Peralta can hurt you. Travis Hafner can hurt you. Victor Martinez can absolutely abuse you. They're not the Yankees, but they're all heating up at the same time. That's a lot of guys you don't want to see up, if you know what I mean.
What scares me is what C.C. Sabathia and Fausto Carmona can do to your batters. The 6-foot-7-inch, 290-pound Sabathia is at the peak of his game, and Carmona has games in which he is laughably unhittable. Paul Byrd and his 1937 windup could easily produce six or seven solid innings in a playoff setting. And suddenly the Indians have great setup people, led by former Red Sox farmhand infielder Rafael Betancourt (1.46 with 70 strikeouts and - gulp - 9 walks). How Joe Borowski has managed to close 42 games in 48 opportunities, given that he has a 5.04 ERA and has allowed 70 hits in 60 2/3 innings (Papelbon has allowed 29 hits in 55 innings), may be baseball's greatest supernatural mystery, but that is what he's done.
Recent history teaches us that two great starters, excellent setup people, and a closer who can close are all you need.

2. New York The lineup is sometimes ridiculous, even without Jason Giambi. Did you know that Jorge Posada has an OPS of .972? The reason they have not won since 2000 is that their starting pitchers have failed them in the playoffs. Period. End of story. Are Pettitte, Wang, Clemens, and Mussina good enough? If they are, there is no reason the Yankees can't win.

3. Orange County American League Baseball Representative They're the chic team of the moment. By the way, hate to tell you that Orlando Cabrera has driven in 83 runs. Now here's a team that can manufacture a run. And assuming his right triceps tendinitis doesn't hamper him, Vladimir Guerrero is the flat-out scariest all-around hitter in the AL.
But do John Lackey, Kelvim Escobar, and Jered Weaver really frighten anybody? Give me C.C. and Dr. Faustus.
Mike Scioscia's the best manager in the derby, however. That's a fact.

4. Your Sawx Simply put, I fear that their best baseball is behind them, that what you saw as they were getting out to that 36-16 record and that big spread over the You-Know-Whos was the best baseball they could produce. Sure, if they could have started the playoffs in June when they were getting quality start after quality start and Okey-Dokey was untouchable and Youkilis was on base every five seconds and a few other things, they would have won. Then.
But this is now. Is this a team that inspires confidence?

Yeah, they could get lucky. Didn't the 83-79 Cardinals win last year?

Here's a better bet: Go, Pats."

He seems to think very highly of our Tribe.

Tigers @ Indians, 9/19/07

Who saw THAT coming?

Honestly, I went into Monday night's game hoping for a win, because that would mean at worst we'd get out of the series with a 3.5 game lead. Only in my craziest pipe dreams did I hope for a sweep.

This, ladies and gentlemen, is what we call a statement.

Even better, we had our big inning by stringing together a series of hits, as opposed to just using the long ball for all of our runs. That's nice to see, as the power won't always be there.

Joe Borowski continues to lower his ERA by throwing 1-2-3 innings. It's a little insane how many guys (Borowski, Lewis, Hafner, Garko) seem to be choosing NOW to get hot.

C.C. definitely improved his Cy Young chances. His ERA is now 3.19, just below Beckett's 3.20. Unfortunately, C.C. most likely only has one more start left this season. Because of the doubleheader in Seattle, Sowers is getting called to make a start. C.C.'s last regular season game will be the first game of that doubleheader. The upside is that this means our rotation should be on target for the start of the post-season, with everyone getting a few extra days off.

Let's hope for some help from Kansas City this weekend so we won't have to sweep the A's to clinch at home.

I really can't believe we swept them.

Tigers @ Indians, 9/18/07

*Ahem*

From the July 31st entry of this very blog:

"On the upside, Jensen Lewis is getting more experience and he's learning to pitch in a variety of situations, including trouble he gets himself into. He could end up being key to our bullpen as the season goes on."

And from another on September 4th:

"Perhaps the unsung hero of the night was definitely Jensen Lewis. I've talked about Lewis in the past, mentioning that he has the talent, it's just his lack of experience that's a concern. As I've said before, when he's on he's a huge part of our bullpen, but when's he's off he can be off the charts bad. Experience will help him iron such things out and tonight was a great example of him getting that experience."

And from the entry the day before that one:

"Really, we just need ONE guy to step up in the bullpen and I'd feel pretty good about that, too. As harrowing as he can be, Borowoski has done his job and the two Raphaels are unbelievable. We just need one other guy to take the reins when we can't go to those guys."

Ladies and gentlemen, I believe we've found that fourth reliever.

If Jensen Lewis can pitch like he did tonight on a regular basis, we have a really good shot at winning it all.

While not necessary per se, winning tomorrow would be about the greatest moment of the year.

RETURN!

Okay, so I've been gone for a while, so long, in fact, that I doubt anyone is still reading this thing. As it's wont to do, the real world got in the way of my blogging.

And what a time to stop! It's always the guys we love to complain about that get hot and come through big for us. Yes, Jhonny, everyone wants Cabrera at short and you should have made that play, but those two home runs make it easy to look past those things -- for now. And while those home runs worked out for everyone, you still need to stop trying to hit them every time up.

Hey, I had Gomez starting at third by now! Again, that's not to say we wouldn't be winning these games, but clearly it wouldn't have been as dramatic.

Last night's game was a big one. Aside from the fact that it gives us a little bit of breathing room (the worst that can happen now is that the series ends with us up by 3.5 games with only ten remaining), but we basically STOLE the game from Detroit. The Tribe might as well as had ski masks on. Between the errors and the lack of big hit for most of the game, there was no reason for us to win it -- aside from the fact that we never, ever give up.

Let's not overlook the bullpen last night, either. I was positive Fultz would walk someone. I was beside myself when Borowski came in. But both of them did a great job (Fultz aided by a questionable decision by Leyland). And, of course, Betancourt was exactly was we expect him to be, lights out.

Sure, it's worrying that we seem to live and die by the homerun on certain nights, but with Cabrera in the two spot and Lofton in the line-up, I feel like we can manufacture runs far better than in the first half of the season. And, hey, Shoppach laid down a great sac bunt last night (although ultimately to no avail).

Byrd was actually pretty good last night, minus the unearned run. I worry about him against tough line-ups, though; picture him against the Yankees. Still, you can't say enough about his performance this season and it's probably a safe bet that they Tribe will pick up his option for next season.

Speaking of which, the battle for the #5 spot in spring training should be fantastic, between Lee, Sowers, Laffey, and Miller.

At this point, I'd almost prefer that the Tribe NOT pass the Angels for second best record. With the way the Red Sox have been pitching lately, I'd much rather face them than anyone else. They just seem to have more glaring holes. That, and the Angels have owned the Yankees this year, so let them take on NY in the first round.

Yet another big game tonight. A win tonight should all but clinch the division.

Indians @ Angels, 9/8/07

Indians win! Sure, it was only a two game losing streak, but that's two more than I like to see, particularly since the Tigers are winning.

And I was at the game tonight! We had seats in the nosebleed section, but it was a good view of the game. Besides, all we needed to see was C.C. who was DEALING. Was that a career record for double play balls? I'm sure it was a career high for balls hit directly at him (BOTH by the same batter).

We have twenty games left. Our magic number is 16. We have seven more games -- one against the Angels, three at Chicago, three at home against Kansas City -- before we face the Tigers at home for the last time. I'm hoping we stay at least five games up for that series so we have a chance to put it away then.

Tomorrow should be interesting. The Angels have the pitching advantage, but I'd really hate to see us lose this series. Hopefully we can get to Weaver early.