Projecting the Cleveland Indians for 2013 and Beyond

Last week, 20 Cleveland Indians writers from six different websites and media outlets took part in a survey to reflect on the 2012 season and look ahead to the offseason and beyond. We’ve already released our player awards for the 2012 Indians, our thoughts on the organization’s direction and philosophy, and our predictions for which players will be gone by Opening Day 2013. Today, our series continues with our projections for how the Tribe will fare over the next several seasons.

First up, we asked each respondent to make a prediction for how many games the Indians will win in 2013:

Our average projection is 76.3 wins (.471 winning percentage), with a median projection of 75 wins (.463), a mode of 80 wins (.494), and a standard deviation of 5.8 wins (.036 in winning percentage). Our most pessimistic voter was Did The Tribe Win Last Night?‘s Mike Brandyberry (65 wins), while Indians Prospect Insider‘s Jim Piascik painted the rosiest picture (88 wins, the same as the Tigers won this year).

A few things to note: All but one of us expect the Indians to improve on their 2012 68-94 record, but just three have them pegged to finish over .500. Generally it seems like the results are clustered into three main groups: about average (around 80 wins), mediocre (mid-70’s), and pretty bad (low 70’s).

Next, we asked our writers when they expect the Indians to next finish over .500:

The good news is that over half of us project the Tribe to be back in the black within two years, suggesting that we’re not in for too drastic of a rebuilding process after this year’s collapse. The bad news is a plurality of respondents think we won’t sniff a winning record until 2015, with DTTWLN?’s Vince Guerrieri expecting as many as three more losing seasons before things turn around.

Now for the one that really matters: When will Cleveland be back in the playoffs?

Interesting spread we’ve got here, but the results are pretty close to symmetrical. In general, we expect to see October baseball at Progressive Field in 2015, plus or minus a year. There’s a chance it could happen as soon as 2013, but there’s also chance it could be as long as 2017. Here’s hoping the optimists are right.

Huge thanks to the writers who participated in this survey: Mike James from the Defend Cleveland Show; Mike Brandyberry, Vince Guerrieri, David Roberts, Kevin Schneider, and Ronnie Tellalian from Did The Tribe Win Last Night?; Charlie Adams, Kevin Dean, and Jim Piascik from Indians Prospect Insider; Nino Colla from The Tribe Daily; Ed Carroll, Brian Heise, Steve Kinsella, Lewie Pollis, and Evan Vogel from Wahoo’s on First; Craig Lyndall and TD from WaitingForNextYear; and Geordy Boveroux, Andy Cooper, and David McGarry.