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Indians Tidbits (2006 season)..

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Piney,

I gave you some green, but I have to say it here to. That was a great post.

The Indians will be fine for the first part of the season. First place in the Cental? Probably not, but good enough to be in the playoff picture. It's probably best to see what they have to work with before they worry about plugging holes. Franklin Gutierrez could have a Sizemore like training camp/early season and move into the starting lineup at either corner OF spot. Marte and Shoppach could prove to be ready this year and fill the holes at First (V-Mart) and Third. If Marte is looking good and Boone is playing well Boone could probably move over to first some. The Tribe has plenty of trade bait in the farm system to make a move during the summer if they need it.
 
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piney's post was spot on........going back to the attendance issue and filling seats for a winning team.....im stating a lot of the bitterness comes from a dislike for the owner and a non-willingness to make him rich by supporting a team just good enough to stay in contention year to year by trading away pieces you don't want to pay for more future talent.....again this was an off-season to get better not take a step backwards for prospects.....we didnt re-sign millwood which based on our startegy was the obvious play, but you cannot say we are a better team with paul byrd or jason johnson in that spot, and jason michales in left field over coco.....our corners now have michales in left, blake in right, boone at third, and broussard at first.....of those 4 i believe boone will prob have the best offensive year.....whos to say marte becomes a stud? he struggled big time with his opportunity in atlanta. whos to say kelly will be better than bard? he hits for power at the AAA level but he also hit .251 last year.....mota's era has been high the last 2 seasons with arm injuries......id love to see the tribe come together and have a great season next year, but along with lots of others, i feel by mid-season we're going to be hearing this season was built to contend for 2007
 
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im stating a lot of the bitterness comes from a dislike for the owner and a non-willingness to make him rich by supporting a team just good enough to stay in contention year to year by trading away pieces you don't want to pay for more future talent.....again this was an off-season to get better not take a step backwards for prospects
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you have to have some long-term foresight instead of blindly paying players. look at the FA market this year. Look at the future FA market with respect to the 3b spot. There is nothing of value. Any respectable 3b will be heavily overpriced and out of most team's range. Crisp was never going to play CF over Sizemore, nor is he an ideal leadoff or 2nd batter. Some people just dislike Dolan to the point that they don't understand the logic behind where this team is going.
 
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billmac91 said:
im stating a lot of the bitterness comes from a dislike for the owner and a non-willingness to make him rich by supporting a team just good enough to stay in contention year to year by trading away pieces you don't want to pay for more future talent
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The Dolans are already rich and any money that they make off of the Indians isn't going to change that much. As Piney said they are probably still in the negative for the whole time they have owned the Indians. If the Indians are sitting in a good position to make a run to the playoffs and they don't let MS make any logical moves before the trading deadline I'll be upset, but for now I'm willing to let them play. I like Coco, but I never thought he was the guy I want in left field for the future.
 
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where is this team going? will we lock grady up long term? if we lock grady up do we trade away pronk, victor or peralta for more future prospects? Will we continue to sign middle aged starting pitchers for 1-2 years were they can try and revive their career in cleveland only to re-sign with other clubs? I think those are all very legitimate questions, and how that plays out will really determine whether Dolan is serious or not. I thought trading CoCo was step in the wrong direction, others think it was a great move. I don't understand why its more important to have a 3rd base prospect in the system versus a 26 year old .300 hitter with the potential to be a yearly 20/20 guy. This season will be very telling, that is for sure. Shapiro is either going to look like the GM of the decade or look somewhat silly. Time will tell.
 
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I'm sure they'll lock up Sizemore to a long term deal when they feel like they need to. He's still young enough that they don't feel that need right now. Usually they do it when a player is a couple years from being a FA. Once those deals run out it might be hard to resign the players again so they might trade them for prospects when the first long term deal runs out. That's the way baseball works for teams that play moneyball. Unless the MLB gets a hard salary cap like the NFL, teams like the Indians, Twins, A's, etc won't be able to spend with the big boys. They need to lock up their young players for reasonable contracts for as long as they can and trade them for prospects when the contract is about to end. Hopefully Indians fans will support the team over the next 3-4 year enough that the Dolans will put enough money into the team to keep a few of the core guys for a second long term deal.
 
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You can read back to see my view of the trade but will outline again. An above average to good 3B are rare and in great need anywhere. A LF who can bat .300, hit 25 HRs and steal 10-15 bases are a dime a dozen. I will also state that Coco was not a guy that was ever going to be considered a "core" player. We wrapped up Martinez & Hafner last offseason. Sabathia was signed recently too, and there are talks of signing Cliff Lee long term soon. That is where Shapiro is spending his free agent monies.

So would you rather sign Coco long term and then when Sizemore is ready for his long term deal we can't do it because we have Coco signed up? Because that is the future choice and Shapiro knows it so he got GREAT value for Coco.

Will this hurt the team right away? Yep, but for how long? We can find out as quickly as June/July how good Marte is if Boone struggles again. Michaels might be an adequate replacement for Coco. Heck, a Jason Bay might become available from Pittsburgh and we trade for him in July at the trade deadline. Or better yet Brad Snyder or Guitierrez tears the cover off the ball in Spring Training and starts in LF and Blake and Michaels end up platooning.

In summary the trade of Coco gives Shapiro flexibility to improve this team even more as the season goes on if anything happens.
 
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BTW - for the record, I think Cleveland still finished 2nd in this division. KC added a lot of pieces, but they're still bad, even on paper. Minnesota added a few names, but they still don't scare me. Detroit should be better, but Kenny Rogers and Todd Jones could just as easily suck as not. Now, clearly, some people picked Chicago to finish fourth last year, and at the time, I believed them. So who knows? But here's my pre-preliminary forecast for the Central.

Chicago 96-66
Cleveland 90-72
Minnesota 82-80
Detroit 79-83
Kansas City 69-93
 
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im gonna say we finish 3rd behind chicago and minnesota.....minnesota has had a nice off-season and i think thome has a nice rebound season to go along with the core already in place there (chicago)
 
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vrbryant said:
BTW - for the record, I think Cleveland still finished 2nd in this division. KC added a lot of pieces, but they're still bad, even on paper. Minnesota added a few names, but they still don't scare me. Detroit should be better, but Kenny Rogers and Todd Jones could just as easily suck as not. Now, clearly, some people picked Chicago to finish fourth last year, and at the time, I believed them. So who knows? But here's my pre-preliminary forecast for the Central.

Chicago 96-66
Cleveland 90-72
Minnesota 82-80
Detroit 79-83
Kansas City 69-93
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That's probably about right unless the W Sox get hit hard by old age or bad pitching. We just have to hope that the Yankees or Red Sox win less than 90 games. The Indians need to play better against the Sox this year.
 
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billmac91 said:
im gonna say we finish 3rd behind chicago and minnesota.....minnesota has had a nice off-season and i think thome has a nice rebound season to go along with the core already in place their
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And OSU is going to have a hard time getting a .500 record this season after losing 9 starters off of the defense. I think you're letting your hatred of the Dolans cloud your judgment a little. You will be much happier with the glass is half full approach where the Indians will make the playoffs and OSU is the preseason #1.
 
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Piney said:
Heck, a Jason Bay might become available from Pittsburgh and we trade for him in July at the trade deadline. .
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You were doing good until you threw this in. This is only Bay's 3rd season and Pittsburgh, no matter how stupid, will never trade Bay this season, never!

If you're going to think about trades, you need to be a realist.


Boone will not struggle this year.
 
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