It’s getting old, real old.
If you are around 50 years old, you likely do not remember 1964 when the Cleveland Browns brought this city its last professional championship. So, you have gone your entire life without seeing a Cleveland team celebrating.
No parades down Euclid Avenue, no title banners hoisted to the rafters.
Sure, there have been some good times in all those years. The Cavaliers brought excitement during the 1975-76 season with “The Miracle at Richfield”.
The Browns were the city’s best hope in the eighties, going to three AFC title games, but not to the Super Bowl.
It was the Indians’ turn in the nineties, going to two World Series, but not cashing in on either of them.
And the Cavs were the team in the first decade of this century, getting to the NBA Finals in 2007, and having the NBA’s best record in 2008-09 and 2009-10, before losing early in the playoffs.
The Indians seem to make all of their decisions on a low risk – high reward mentality. The only players they go after are people coming off injuries, hoping to catch lightning in a bottle, so they can trade them for prospects.
Why not take interest in the recently traded Zack Greinke, who is just 27 years old, and is signing through the 2012 campaign. The Royals traded him for four prospects, including two of the Milwaukee Brewers top prospects. However, the players received by the Royals have proven nothing in the major leagues.
Greinke, on the other hand, is a very good major league pitcher. The Brewers are getting at least two years of a proven commodity, a legitimate #1 starter with a Cy Young Award on his resume.
The Indians’ front office will give you the usual mumbo-jumbo about building the farm system and player development being the way to go for a small market team. However, Greinke didn’t get dealt to New York, Boston, or Los Angeles, he went to Milwaukee.
There is no question that prospects have to be the lifeblood of a team that cannot afford premium free agents. However, Greinke is a proven ace, all of the minor leaguers the Tribe talk about might be good one day, but then again, they might not.
There were thoughts that perhaps the Indians would go after one of their former players this winter, possibly Manny Ramirez, since the team needed a right-handed bat.
Well, they have signed one former Tribesman in OF Austin Kearns, who returns to the team after spending the last two months of the year with the Yankees. Kearns had a great April and May with Cleveland, but in June and July, he hit just .253 with 5 HR and 20 RBI. He did have a 746 OPS last season, but that was due to a .351 on base percentage.
His slugging percentage was under .400, not exactly what you want from a corner outfielder. In fact, Shelley Duncan, who may be designated for assignment as a result of this signing, hits southpaws better than Kearns.
The team is also interested in 37-year-old Bartolo Colon, another former Indian. He fits the “low risk, high reward” player; the front office is famous for. Colon, if signed, will take starts away from the Josh Tomlins, Jeanmar Gomez’s, and Alex White’s of the world, unless he is getting battered in spring training.
Cleveland has struggled early in the season lately because they are giving playing time to mediocre veterans, and then play better when young guys are brought up.
It doesn’t appear they are learning from their mistakes.
Instead, why don’t they go after a young player who is a proven player and has cost certainty for at least two years? That’s the kind of move that would get fans excited about the ballclub.
It’s a kind of move that an organization that is interested in winning makes.
MW
Cleveland Sports Perspective 