Cleveland Indians: The Five Worst Moves by Mark Shapiro

Too many draft picks never developed under Mark Shapiro, including Trevor Crowe. Credit: David Richard-USA TODAY Sports

#1: Too Many Poor Drafts

This is probably the fault that has been most scrutinized with Shapiro.  For a small market team, they needed to draft better to help infuse the major league club with young, cheap talent. However, from 2002-2009 the Indians simply didn’t produce enough elite talent to sustain the success they experienced in the middle of Shapiro’s GM tenure.  Sure near the end things did go better when he took Lonnie Chisenhall in 2008 and got Jason Kipnis in the 2^nd round of 2009, but that didn’t make up for such misses as Jeremy Sowers, Michael Aubrey, Brad Snyder, Beau Mills, and Trevor Crowe.

The lack of drafting was more magnified by the inconsistent play of the big league club as well.  Under John Hart, the Indians may have actually been worse at drafting, but since the big league club was consistently winning most fans didn’t notice (or care).  Shapiro had to improve the drafting and he simply was not able to enough to help the big league club, which is what ultimately led many fans to turn on him. 

Next: Honorable Mention: Hiring Eric Wedge