Cleveland Indians Series Preview: Tribe Set To Open 2021 In Detroit

The 2021 Cleveland Indians face off against the Detroit Tigers to open the season. New faces and two teams with similar young cores look to get off to a strong start.

Baseball is back! We’re previewing the opening series of the 2021 season which will feature the Cleveland Indians opening up at Comerica Park against the Detroit Tigers.

Both teams come in with goals to surprise outside pundits and lean on their younger pitching staffs to lead them in the new season.

For the Indians, we’ll get to see what their lineup will look like now that Francisco Lindor is no longer part of the top three. In addition, questions about the starting options at centerfield will begin to be answered. There will be a committee approach to the outfield, but on the Lindor front, the replacement is Andres Gimenez who was the prized piece coming back to Cleveland from the trade with the Mets.

The Indians and Tigers both have younger arms in their rotations to boost them this year. For the Indians, there are questions in the bullpen. This series will be the first glance at a closer by committee, something we haven’t seen under Francona yet. A manager who’s pretty methodical with his bullpen arms and predictable, now becomes a bit unpredictable until the bullpen can settle into their roles.

On the filp side the Tigers have former Astros manager AJ Hinch at the helm. Hinch will be managing for the first time since Game 7 of the 2019 World Series when he was manager of the Houston Astros.  Detroit won’t wow you offensively, but they do have some high-end prospects filling out the back-end of their rotation.

Offensively they appear to have a ways to go. They still have a familiar face in Miguel Cabrera who will be playing first base more this year at the age of 38. Cabrera has played the Indians well in his career, and he won’t be fresher in 2021 than he is on opening weekend.

Lets take a look at the 3-games in closer detail with the projected starters.

First Pitch: April 3rd at 1:10pm EDT

Projected Starters: CLE Zach Plesac (2020 stats: 4-2; 2.20 ERA; 0.80 WHIP; 57 Ks)

DET Julio Teheran (2020 stats: 0-4; 10.05 ERA; 1.76 WHIP; 20 Ks)

Getting the ball for game two will be Zach Plesac who had a phenomenal sophomore season on the mound. He’ll look to continue his upward trajectory in 2021 and facing an opponent he’s dominated should help him out.

In Plesac’s final start during the 2020 season he faced the Tigers and went 7+ scoreless innings with 11 strikeouts. The Tigers offense hasn’t churned as much as the Indians, so there will be a lot of familiar opponents in game two for Plesac to get off to a strong start.

For the Tigers they are looking at providing a career reset for former Braves ace Julio Teheran. Teheran had the wheels fall off last season in 2020 while with the Angels, but when things are right, he has top-end of rotation movement and stuff with his pitches.

This spring his numbers have been mixed, having a 5+ ERA during his starts, but 18:4 strikeout-to-walk ratio, so his accuracy is on point to potentially have a strong start to the season. He is battling some minor injuries and indications are he’ll only be available for five or six innings when he starts on Saturday.

While it’s safe to anticipate a strong performance in game one for the Cleveland Indians offense, game two will feature an opposing pitcher most of the Indians haven’t seen much of. The exception is Franmil Reyes who is a career .333 average against Teheran with two home runs and a 1.444 OPS when facing him.

The other story to follow with this matchup is after facing the lefty in game one, how will the lineup and defensive platoons shift to when a righty takes the mound? We know there are possible platoons for the Indians in center, first, maybe shortstop and possibly one of the corner outfield spots, too.

The Indians rightly anticipate having a strong rotation to provide strength this year, but defensively is where things may get interesting if there are errors or poor routes on fly balls. We’ll have to wait and see, but Comerica Park itself will be a challenge if there are inexperienced outfielders trying to cover the large gaps.

First Pitch: April 4th at 1:10pm EDT

Projected Starters: CLE Aaron Civale (2020 stats: 4-6; 4.74 ERA; 69 Ks)

DET Tarik Skubal (2020 stats: 1-4; 5.63 ERA; 37 Ks)

The most balanced starting pitching matchup may take place on Sunday when Aaron Civale squares off against Tarik Skubal. Skubal is entering his second season having made his highly touted debut in 2020. The Tigers season is hinging on the likes of Skubal to gain control and tapping into some of his elite stuff to give the Tigers hope at being competitive in 2021.

Skubal has lightning stuff, his fastball can get close to 100 mph. The issue with Skubal, at least in his brief rookie starts last year, is that he allowed 9 home runs in just 32+ innings pitched. The Indians offense doesn’t project to be a major power lineup, but there are pockets of hitters that can certainly do damage if Skubal leaves that heater in the right spots.

For the Tigers, they will need to attack Aaron Civale who started off 2020 on a very high note, but then cooled off as the season went on. Civale will look to be more like his first five starts of 2020 where he had a 2.97 ERA, than the pitcher that labored down the stretch.

This off-season Civale has added a new pitch (Split Change) to assist his effectiveness on the second and third times around lineups. The Tigers have had success offensively against Civale, granted in limited appearances, specifically Candalerio who has gone 2-for-3 (.667 average) facing Civale.

Civale will not strikeout a lot of hitters and allow his defense to get the outs. This is another test for the Indians new defense to see how strong it is at supporting a pitcher who will rely upon them for outs.

On paper this series is tilting heavily for the Indians to win the series and get off to a strong start in the new season. However, games aren’t played on paper and the bullpens will be used early to ease each starter’s innings early on, so the new-look bullpens for both teams could be the ultimate deciding factor in who comes away with a series win.

It’s the start of a new season, so lets Play Ball!