Cleveland Indians: Use of six-man rotation helps when injuries occur

The recent use of a six-man rotation helps the Cleveland Indians retain some consistency now that Josh Tomlin has been sent to the disabled list.

While Monday was all about the trade deadline, a bit of news may have been missed by Cleveland Indians fans.

Josh Tomlin was sent to the 10-day disabled list after injuring his hamstring in his start on Sunday.

Injuries to a member of the starting rotation are always frustrating, but this particular one won’t require someone to be called up to make a spot start or two thanks to the recent use of a six-man rotation.

The use of six starters wasn’t done to prepare for a potential injury, but that is one of the benefits of using an extra man. And for a team who has seen injuries hit much of the rotation over the past two seasons, it is always smart to be prepared.

The fact the Indians have six capable starters is likely why a major deal wasn’t made to trade for Yu Darvish or Sonny Gray, or perhaps the price was too high regardless. Gray at least has some years of team control left in his contract, but the front office would have been foolish to send top prospects for a player who may not even crack the postseason rotation depending on Danny Salazar‘s performance over the next two months.

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Tomlin’s injury delays the decision of who to move to the bullpen or to Triple-A once the team goes back to a five-man rotation, but that player appears to be Mike Clevinger after another rough outing Monday night. However, he has time to change that.

Initially going with six pitchers prevented a major disruption to one of the starters’ workloads if a decision was made to send a player to the bullpen. Doing it for a month also allowed major successes and failures to level out and give a clearer picture of how each pitcher is actually performing.

To be fair to Clevinger, two starts in a row after six great weeks is not enough to immediately assume he is the odd man out once Tomlin returns.

However, Tomlin and Trevor Bauer have postseason experience and Terry Francona may not want to throw one to the bullpen in the midst of a pennant race, when one may be needed to start in October.

Making any changes will require all six players to be healthy, and fans know that is not always the case. The issue of the five who will stay will come up once Tomlin is healthy again, yet going two weeks with a five-man rotation may cause Francona to stick with six once Tomlin is back. It helps save arms for the postseason and keeps an injury-prone group fresh.

Next: Recapping the trade deadline

Francona is an unpredictable manager, so it will be interesting to see his plans over the next two months.