Cleveland Indians Fantasy GM: Reconstructing the possible 2021 roster

Rebuilding the Cleveland Indians 2021 roster and playing GM

The 2021 season is in the books for the Cleveland Indians, and the team will be watching October baseball from their couches with the rest of us. Despite a bottom-three payroll and young players all over the roster, the team overperformed in the first half, and arguably could have made a push for a Wild Card with healthier starting pitching. With a record of 80-82, and a second place finish in the American League Central, let’s have some fun and play “beat Mike Chernoff”.

Something we do as fans, especially fans of a small-market team like Cleveland, is complain about ownership’s lack of spending to field a competitor. In Cleveland’s first season without Francisco Lindor, who signed a gaudy 10-year $341M extension with the New York Mets, the team significantly cut back on payroll, opening 2021 with roughly $46.8M total on opening day, good for 28th in baseball. It wasn’t necessarily a rebuild as the Indians had promising pitching across the board (including a 24-year-old Cy Young winner) and Jose Ramirez, who feels like he’s been around forever, but just turned 29 this season.

So why not, if just for fun, attempt to construct a potential roster that may have existed for the 2021 Cleveland Indians somewhere in the multiverse? For the sake of ease, and not making this 10,000 words, we’re going to set some basic criteria, ignore a couple of complex specifics (arbitration namely) and try to reason one trade deadline move as a possibility of entering 2021. So, here in no particular order, are the criteria for this exercise:

1. For a player to be eligible for this exercise, they must have logged at least one game for the Cleveland Indians from 2016 until the end of 2021.
2. Prospects and players who have yet to debut are excluded, but it is assumed the majority of the farm system is in-tact to have made this roster possible.
3. The average opening day salary for Cleveland in this date range is roughly $86,456,700 with the expansion of the roster to 26 players in 2021. In the unlikely event we exceed that average we will apply a +$4M cushion (half the value of Eddie Rosario’s one year $8M contract entering 2021) to account for the extra player.
4. We will assume that free agents who signed deals with other teams during this window (Michael Brantley for example) would have signed the same contract with Cleveland.
5. We are to assume this roster would not have experienced the same injury luck the actual 2021 Indians experienced. We will use 2021 stats as a reference point, but imagination will be required (i.e. what if Shane Bieber made 32 starts instead of just 16?).

With those rules in place, let’s get into it, and delve into each position group, what each player’s stats were in 2021, age and eventual free agent status.

Starting Pitching

Starting pitching was among the hardest group in this window to pick, featuring a combined four Cy Young awards (Trevor Bauer was ruled out for this exercise due to legal reasons, but his Cy Young award stands) and a large chunk of the rotation that dragged Cleveland to the 2016 World Series. Sentimentality for Corey Kluber was probably the hardest to get over, but a one year $11M deal for a 35 year-old pitcher coming back from injury was too steep.

Cleveland, despite the injuries and the rough few months by The Replacements that actually happened in 2021, plus the benefit of hindsight, the rotation came together pretty much as it was constructed the final month or so of the season.

The oldest guy in the rotation was 26 on Opening Day? Combined the whole rotation only cost roughly $3M? These are things we knew about Cleveland’s pitching. They’re young, under team control for several more seasons and will only get better, further extending the playoff window as well as the team’s chance to win when the offense goes cold.

However, did we know that Cal Quantrill would blossom into a true number two in the back half of the season? No, this is one of the benefits of hindsight for this piece, but it was obvious even in March that Quantrill should have had the fifth rotation spot over Logan Allen.

Zach Plesac and Triston McKenzie made the most starts for the Tribe in 2021, and Plesac arguably had a down year in just about every way, but despite that the rotation could be among the elite of the American League, capable of posting potentially five 10-game winners. Not only that, but all five guys excel in limiting free passes, and if healthy, could have two or three 200+ strikeout candidates. McKenzie and Plesac would need another season to get into full form, but with the entire rotation under team control through at least 2025, there’d be plenty of time.

Infield and Catchers

Now comes the real meat of the roster, but probably among the easiest to choose given the budget constraints. A player like Francisco Lindor is immediately ruled out due to his exorbitant contract with the Mets, and even Yan Gomes is a tough situation with multiple Indians catchers potentially earning over $1M in 2021.

That being said, it doesn’t mean that money wasn’t spent when constructing the infield. It’s a blend of young talent and aging veterans who still provide value while waiting for the crop of infield talent in the high minors to make their debuts.

Josh Donaldson played 16 games for the Cleveland Indians in 2018, coming over from Toronto late in the season and coming back from an injury. In 2019 he received MVP votes for the Braves. Both Donaldson and Carlos Santana are the most difficult decisions for this selection, especially Santana who would be due $10.5M in 2022, but for now I value his ability to draw walks, get on base and to play defense more than Bobby Bradley. Francisco Mejia has also developed nicely between his time with Tampa Bay and San Diego, and much like his counterpart Gio Urshela on this roster, it seems that all he needed was some more consistent playing time.

As for Jose Ramirez, two things would happen here; 1) I’d move him to second base to accommodate Donaldson in the lineup, and 2) I’d pay him whatever he wants after his club option for 2022. And that may be possible with total payroll at the end of this exercise. Amed Rosario, Ernie Clement, Josh Naylor and Andres Gimenez make up an excellent crop of young bench and utility players, covering the entirety of the infield as well as Naylor capable of playing right field. There’s still the good problem to have of too much talent stacking up in the minors, so the roster is insulated from injuries with Gabriel Arias, Nolan Jones and Brayan Rocchio still in waiting.

Outfield and Total Payroll

We have long belabored the lack of impact from Cleveland’s outfield, even during the 2016 World Series run with Michael Brantley sidelined that year due to injury. In recent years it felt there would be budding stars roaming the warning track in Cleveland with Oscar Mercado, Tyler Naquin and Bradley Zimmer climbing the ranks during this window, but ultimately with six roster spots and not a lot to choose from, I valued average and defense, not always in the same package.

Bringing back Michael Brantley, despite his age and contract, was a no-brainer. His first contact with the Astros was immensely affordable for Cleveland at the time, and among other puzzling moves and success stories elsewhere was letting Tyler Naquin go entering 2021.

Naquin went on to hit .270 with 19 home runs and 70 RBIs for the Reds in 2021, something almost every fan in Cleveland knew he was capable of between the injuries and his elevated strikeout rate, but for just $1.5M he is worth every penny.

Myles Straw is the difficult player here, coming to the Indians at the actual 2021 trade deadline, but I would argue that if Houston gave up a 30 double/30 steal candidate at the deadline for Phil Maton and a Low-A catching prospect then this trade could have been made at the winter meetings before spring training.

So, there we have it, a 26-man roster with the farm system (namely the top 30) untouched. We set out to build a roster with sustainability, youth and more importantly a payroll under $86,456,700 with a $4M buffer up to $90M to account for the extra player.

It may not be perfect, and certainly has questions at the corner infield spots, but when it’s all said and done true to the Indians roster building of recent seasons only nine players on the roster exceed $1M in salary, and only two contracts are expiring after the season, but both have club options for 2022 (Jose Ramirez and Roberto Perez). We find ourselves with a 2021 opening day payroll of $79,782,800, beating the number we set by $6,673,900, and possibly by as much as $10M if the buffer was needed.

Given 2021 didn’t play out perfectly in reality, but in a world where we assume this roster stays mostly healthy, I’d expect this offense to be greatly improved and to make a push for 95 or so wins, which would have won the AL Central this year. The benefit of hindsight is incredible for an exercise like this, but it’s purely for fun following a disappointing season. Feel free to come to my Twitter and stake your cases, I’m ready to be roasted.