The Cleveland Indians finished third in the American League in runs scored in 2018, and you can make a pretty good argument that dropping to seventh in this category this past season is the reason they were sitting at home.
The Tribe was third in on base percentage in ’18 and fourth in slugging percentage, the key components to offensive baseball these days. In 2019 though, the Indians dropped to 6th in slugging, and down to 8th in on base percentage.
The latter figure is something Cleveland needs to work on for the 2020 campaign, and a reason we wished the organization would have gone in a new direction with the hitting coach.
The list of Indians’ hitters with an OBP over .350 is very short: Carlos Santana, Yasiel Puig, Jordan Luplow, and Mike Freeman. Only Santana was in the lineup all year on an everyday basis.
By contrast, the Astros, whose offense is relentless, have these players over the .350 benchmark: Jose Altuve, Carlos Correa, Alex Bregman, Michael Brantley, Yordan Alvarez, George Springer, and two other players who are reserves.
Boston was second in on base average (behind Houston), and had these players over .350: Brock Holt, Xander Bogaerts, Rafael Devers, Mookie Betts, and J.D. Martinez.
If you think we are being picky with the .350 figure, please be advised that the Tribe didn’t have anyone else over .340 either. The next best OBP was Francisco Lindor at .335.
To be fair, had Jose Ramirez hit higher than .255 this season, he would have hit the .350 level, because his strikeout to walk ratio (74:52) was solid.
To us, this indicates the lack of strike zone awareness throughout the roster, and this leads to hitters getting themselves out by swinging at bad pitches.
Sometimes this improves through experience, which is why we aren’t concerned right now with Oscar Mercado walking just 28 times in 482 plate appearances. If this number stays there next season, it could indicate a problem.
We have already touched on Lindor, whose walk rate was the lowest since his rookie year, and he got himself out plenty in clutch situations last season, swinging at a lot of pitches out of the strike zone, sometimes when he was ahead in the count.
If we were Chris Antonetti and Mike Chernoff, we would be focused on getting some guys who can get on base to help the offense next season.
It might start by giving Luplow, who had a .372 OBP in his minor league career, a shot at an everyday spot in the lineup.
And Lindor is too good of a hitter not to learn from this season and make pitchers come to him instead of helping them out.
Besides, if you can get a solid hitter who can get on base, you can get the shortstop out of the leadoff spot, and hit him in the #2 hole or lower.
Together with Santana, who has always been an on base machine, and Ramirez returning to somewhere close to his norm (he has three straight seasons over .350 from 2016-18), it would give the Indians four players who can get on base.
We would also have someone work with Franmil Reyes on his strike zone judgment. If he could layoff bad pitches more, he would be an anchor in the middle of the lineup.
Against good teams and particularly good pitchers, you have to make them work, you can’t help them out by swinging at borderline strikes.
Remember the success the Indians had vs. Justin Verlander with the Tigers? They made him throw a lot of pitches early in games, and even if they didn’t have success against him, they got him out of the game.
On base percentage is the key stat for the Indians to improve on this off-season. Not saying it’s a cure all, but it will help the offense be more “relentless”, for sure.
MW
Cleveland Sports Perspective 