The Cleveland Indians have now completed 1/6th of their season, and are sitting at 12-15 on the campaign. The good news is no one has gone off and ran away with the Central Division, as the Tribe is just three games behind the first place White Sox. The bad news is that our worst fears have come true. The offense is not up to championship standards, and Travis Hafner has not bounced back as of yet from a down 2006. GM Mark Shapiro likes to wait until about 40 games to evaluate his team. Don’t look now, but that’s a little over two weeks away.
This team has scored four runs or less in 18 of their 27 games. That’s 2/3rds of the contests if you are counting at home. That signals an attack that can best be described as mediocre. Right now, there are only a couple of players performing at an acceptable level, and that group includes the public whipping boy, David Dellucci, who is hitting above .280 with 3 HR (tied for second on the team) and 9 RBI. The others are Victor Martinez, who is hitting .364, but hasn’t homered and has just four extra base hits on the season, Grady Sizemore, hitting over .270, but he has only seven extra base knocks, and he had two last night, and Franklin Gutierrez, who’s recent surge has put him over the .250 mark.
Casey Blake, of all people, leads the Tribe in RBI with 18, and he had one-third of that total in one game. The slumping Hafner is actually second in ribbies with 16, a pace that would get him close to 100 for the season. The only Tribesman with more than three dingers is the hot and cold Jhonny Peralta, who has five, but has only knocked in 10 runs for the season. Peralta also leads the team in extra base hits with a paltry eight, several others have one less, including Hafner, Sizemore, Gutierrez, Garko, and the aforementioned Dellucci. Which means, I guess, that Pronk isn’t the sole reason for the hitting woes.
Clearly, Eric Wedge has to try something different. Perhaps moving Gutierrez up in the batting order is a start, since he has been hitting over the past week. I can’t for the life of me understand why Asdrubal Cabrera is hitting sixth or seventh. He has little pop, and seems ideally suited for the ninth spot, especially since the skipper was concerned about overexposure following his call up late last season. Ryan Garko is struggling, but he seems like a better fit in the five hole once he gets going again, than Peralta, who is prone to striking out.
I am not someone who thinks Ben Francisco is the next coming of Albert Belle, but I do think he deserves a shot at playing instead or Jason Michaels, who isn’t getting on base, nor providing any pop, two things the Indians organization covets. He’s the only candidate at Buffalo, since Josh Barfield is still having contact problems at Class AAA. Wedge has tried playing a little small ball since the hitting has struggled, trying bunts and sending runners more frequently than in the past.
One more concern is Fausto Carmona, who continues to have control issues. The righty has allowed 60 base runners in just 34-2/3 innings. It is a testament to his stuff that his ERA is 2.60 despite allowing that many runners. It is extremely unlikely this will continue unless he can start to throw strikes. A lack of control is a sign of fatigue. Remember, he had troubles with his command against Boston in the ALCS last fall. This is definitely something to keep an eye on as the season progresses.
Last night, Craig Breslow and Tom Mastny had to come in after not pitching for 13 days. I understand how the manager likes to use his bullpen, but to not have the confidence to use either of these guys in any games over a two weeks span means they shouldn’t be on the roster. The Indians didn’t win all their games in this span, so there was an opportunity to use them. Perhaps in the ninth inning on Sunday or after Jensen Lewis threw an inning and a third on Monday with the team losing 4-2. That shouldn’t happen again.
The season isn’t going the way the front office or the fans thought it would. But, no two seasons are the same. There is plenty of time to get things going in 2008. Just remember, the definition of insanity to doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.
KM
Cleveland Sports Perspective 
that’s just the indians are insane, especially eric "the genius" wedge who prefers to play slow white mediocre journeyman veterans instead of much more talented, albeit more cocky and opinionated black dudes. when plays both david de-douche-bag and k-michaels in the lineup, is it any wonder why they only score 2 runs or less???