Cleveland Indians: 5 players who could regress in 2017

After career years from many members of the Cleveland Indians, production decline is inevitable. But which players are most likely to regress?

In baseball, regression is normal and long-term consistency is rare. Those who possess the ability to perform at a high level year in and year out tend to find themselves in the Hall of Fame. For the other 99.9 percent of players, a drop-off in production is expected.

Last season, the Cleveland Indians greatly exceeded expectations. From the starting lineup to the bullpen, the Tribe took the league by storm. Ownership and management around the league didn’t see it coming, and quite frankly, neither did the city of Cleveland.

Fast forward to 2017, where expectations for the Indians are potentially higher than when the Tribe was dominating during the mid-1990’s. However, Indians fans should be wary, not that the 2016 season was a fluke, but because performance like that isn’t routine.

While on their journey to capturing an AL pennant, the Tribe had numerous individuals outperform their personal expectations. From rookie Tyler Naquin, to former Indian Mike Napoli, Cleveland seemed to get enormous production everywhere they turned.

With the 2017 season just days away, it’s time for a closer look at what to expect from these “overachievers”. Don’t expect the wheels to completely fall off, but reproducing the individual levels of production is going to be difficult.