Cleveland Indians: Legitimate Contenders After Detroit Sweep

On August 27th, 2008, the Cleveland Indians beat the Detroit Tigers 9-7 to complete a three-game sweep of the Tigers at Comerica Park. Kelly Shoppach and Shin-Soo Choo each hit homers for the Tribe, and Fausto Carmona (now Roberto Hernandez) gave up four runs in six innings to get the win. And after a short 2,798-day break, the Cleveland Indians swept the Tigers at Comerica again. Trevor Bauer pitched 3 1/3 effective innings in emergency long relief (more on that later), and the Indians scored three runs in both the fourth and fifth innings to push them over the Tigers. The win pushed the Indians to 9-7 on the year and helped proved that they truly belong in the American League playoff picture.

During the offseason, all the talk surrounding the Indians was in relation to Micheal Brantley, or more the lack of Brantley, as he has started the season on the DL and is still there (though hopefully not for long), and because of this, there were a lot of questions surrounding where the Indians offense was going to come from sans Brantley. 16 games into the Indians 2016 season and the offense hasn’t been a huge problem for the Indians. Now don’t get me wrong, there are some times where the Indians missed an opportunity offensively or didn’t get a big hit when they needed one, but overall offensive hasn’t been a huge detriment for the Indians.

One of the main reasons for this is because everyone in the lineup from the top to the bottom has been producing. Take rookie Tyler Naquin for example, who has played in 13 games – and started in nine of them – for the Indians this year. Naquin has not batted above eighth in the lineup in any of the games he has appeared in this year, and he’s batting .303 with two extra-base hits, two RBI, and four runs. Normally if there’s an outfielder batting at the bottom of the lineup for the Indians, it tends to be a human black hole (Aaron Cunningham, Trevor Crowe, Shelley Duncan, etc,) but Naquin appears to be bucking this trend. 

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Another reason why the Indians are trending upward offensively is that some players are starting to find their stride early. Once an organizational afterthought, Jose Ramirez is balling right now. Ramirez moved to the outfield in the offseason, and right now it looks like a beneficial move for everyone but the Indians opposition. Ramirez is currently batting .265 with one home run and seven RBI, he has scored eight runs, hit four doubles, and stolen one base. He is also getting it done in the field, as David Wright found out the hard way.

Ramirez is not the only Indian getting it done at the plate either. Fransisco Lindor is showing no signs of regression, as he is batting .323 to go along with his four extra base hits and 12 runs scored and still doing this in the field.

But the Indians are not just relying on their young guys, as the veterans on the team are producing too. Juan Uribe has hit .318 in his last 7 games, Marlon Byrd is batting .282 with seven RBI, and Mike Napoli is currently tied for the team lead in home runs with three.

The Indians pitching staff has been mildly inconsistent to start the year, which has been quite the surprise, as the Indians have one of the best staffs in the majors, but they – like the rest of the team – have been trending upward recently.

The Indians rotation beings and ends with Corey Kluber, and Kluber has had a pretty interesting start to the year, as he’s currently 1-3 with 4.67 ERA through four starts. These pedestrian numbers are pretty uncharacteristic for Kluber, but they deserve a second look. In his start on April 12th against Tampa Bay, he threw 7 2/3 innings of one-run ball, but threw a mistake pitch to Logan Forsythe with two outs, and Forsythe made him pay, as he jumped on it for a two-run dinger. In his next start against the Mets gave up 6 runs in a loss, but 3 of the runs are at the feet of Rajai Davis, as he lost two fly balls in the suns that resulted in the Mets scoring three runs in the inning. The Indians offense also appeared to go missing during his starts, as he only got two runs in support over his first three starts. All this changed the last time Kluber pitched. Kluber threw a gem on Saturday, as he went eight innings, striking out 10 Tigers and walking none, The Indians offense also held up their end of the deal, as they gave him 10 runs in support, here’s to hoping both of those trends continue.  

The rotation after Kluber has had mixed results. Danny Salazar and Josh Tomlin have been stellar so far this season, as Salazar is 2-1 with a 1.47 ERA and Tomlin is 2-0 with a 1.54 ERA. Cody Anderson has had some struggles so far this year, as he currently is 0-2 with a 7.53 ERA. Anderson threw a good game in his first outing of the year but has given up five runs in each of two outings since.

Carlos Carrasco was arguably the ace of the Indians staff to start the year, well up until he got hurt. Carrasco was 2-0 with a 2.79 ERA through his first two starts and was looking just as dominant in his third start. All that changed in the third inning, as Carrasco went down in a heap of pain after covering first base. The Indians newest bullpen member Trevor Bauer came into the game and pitched effectively, and the Indians pulled out a win. All signs point towards stint on the disabled list for Carrasco, and if any team can stomach this kind of injury, it’s the Indians. The Indians still have a good rotation without Carrasco, and if needed, the Indians can slide the aforementioned Bauer into the rotation until Carrasco gets back.

The Indians bullpen has been decent, but there’s still some room for improvement. Bryan Shaw has given up an unhealthy amount of runs to start the season, and Ross Detwiler has looked average at best in his appearances. But there are also some huge positives in the bullpen. Cody Allen is 6 for 6 in save opportunities, and Zach McAllister (seven innings pitched), Joba Chamberlain (four innings), Dan Otero (four innings) and Jeff Manship (4 1/3 innings) haven’t given up a run out of the bullpen all year, and Manship very well may have gotten the biggest out of the year for the Indians thus far.

Next: Indians-Twins Series Preview

The Indians aren’t perfect. No baseball team is. But the Indians know who they are, and they play into their strengths. They know that if they keep the line moving their offense will succeed, and that their pitchers will make their runs stand up. Look for this sweep to push the Tribe towards that next level and solidify themselves as legit contenders.