Dolan’s Comments Seems Like Rebuilding Year For Guardians

The Cleveland Guardians celebrated their annual winter festival over the weekend, a time to look forward to the upcoming baseball season. It’s a great time for the fans, who get to see their favorite players again after three and a half months.

The team’s resident superstar Jose Ramirez was there. Fan favorite Josh Naylor and brother Bo made an appearance, and the Guards’ new skipper, Steven Vogt, interacted with ticket payers and media people alike.

It was a great time to talk baseball during the cold northeast Ohio winter, and of course, the weather cooperated by providing a snowstorm.

And then, someone put a microphone in front of team owner Paul Dolan. Dolan did say the team is always looking for ways to improve, but seemed to imply the improvement would come “internally and organically” with the young guys coming up from the farm system.

And thus, a wet blanket was put over the event.

Look, we get a team like the Guardians (at least in their own head) have to have a farm system that is producing in order to field a contending team. However, even if you are going to depend on rookies and/or second year players, if you fancy yourself as a contender, you add veterans who can contribute in case the inexperienced players aren’t quite ready.

We know the Guardians need outfield help. Since the end of the 2023 campaign, they resigned Ramon Laureano, who they acquired on waivers in August, and traded with the Yankees for Estevan Florial, who was a top 100 prospect. In 2019.

We reviewed the organization’s top ten prospect list from Baseball America and we see three outfielders–

Chase DeLauter is the top prospect, but he has only played a handful of games above the High A level, and could be ready late this season. Key word there is could.

George Valera has been on prospect lists since 2020, but has had injury issues the past two seasons and has never played more than 100 games in a minor league season. If he can stay healthy in 2024, perhaps he’s another player who can be in Cleveland by the end of this season.

The third OF is 19-year-old Jaison Chourio, who played mostly in the Arizona Rookie Leauge last year. He’s aways away.

So, it’s not like the Guardians have one of the game’s best prospects ready to step in the lineup on Opening Day. In fact, there has been talk that the readiest minor league player, Kyle Manzardo, might start the year in AAA.

Plenty of players who made these top prospect lists never pan out, and others who don’t make them wind up being real good major league players. Ramirez never appeared on the Top 100 prospect list and he has been one of the best players in the game over the last six years.

Yes, there is still time to sign a veteran outfielder to help the team’s hitting before spring training starts, and actually, there are still good candidates remaining on the market.

But to us, going entirely with your farm system to fill this void, and not having highly tiered prospects ready to go, reeks of a rebuilding team. The Guardians are not a team that is several years away from success, they won the Central in 2022.

Perhaps any warmth fans received at the event over the weekend was the hot air coming out of the team’s owner.

The public relations department of the Guardians don’t get paid enough to spin whatever comes out of the owners’ mouth.

Guardians Seem To Have Changed Philosophy On Hitting

About 10 years ago, the Cleveland Guardians developed a philosophy about hitting. The theory was it was easier to teach a good contact hitter to hit for power than it was to instruct a power hitter to make more contact.

The prime examples were Jose Ramirez, who hit a grand total of 13 home runs in the minor leagues (216 in the majors) and Francisco Lindor, who’s high in the minor leagues was 11 dingers, and by his second full year in the bigs, belted 33.

Kyle Manzardo, who came in the Aaron Civale deal, also fits this profile. He struck out in 18% of his plate appearances last season and hit 17 homers.

As everyone is aware by now, the Guardians were last in the major leagues in home runs in 2023, so what moves they have made have involved getting power, but they are getting players with high strikeout rates and low walk rates.

Why do we focus on this? Because generally, those players can be pitched to, meaning pitchers aren’t dumb and if they realize they can retire a hitter without throwing him a strike, then they probably won’t.

Not to pick on Amed Rosario, but how many times did we watch him strikeout without the pitcher throwing a ball in the strike zone? We realize the game has changed (not all changes are for the good) and hitters sell out to hit more home runs, but sometimes you can score without getting a hit. Can’t do that with a strikeout.

It’s not impossible for a hitter to succeed with that profile, but it isn’t the norm.

For example, Oscar Gonzalez struck out almost six times as much as he walked in the minor leagues. His first year in the bigs, he hit .296 with 11 homers, but he did fan 75 times with just 15 walks.

His next year? He hit .214 with two round-trippers and struck nine times more than he walked (46:5). It will be interesting to see how the Yankees will handle him.

This off-season, the Guardians elevated Johnathan Rodriguez to the 40 man roster. He has hit 55 home runs the past two minor league seasons, including 29 last season at the AA and AAA levels. He did strike out in 29% of his plate appearance last season in the minors. That’s the bad news.

The good news is his walk rate was the highest of his minor league career. Perhaps that’s a good sign.

The same is true with Estevan Florial, acquired from the Yankees the day after Christmas. Florial hit 28 dingers at AAA last season with a career high 66 walks. He did strikeout in 30% of his plate appearances in the minors a year ago.

The Guardians do a lot of touting of Gabriel Arias, because he has a very strong exit velocity when he hits the ball. However, that’s the problem. He whiffed in 32.8% of his at bats for the Cleveland a year ago.

In addition to being last in the majors in home runs last season, the Guardians also struck out the least. However, it is possible hit for power and not whiff excessively.

Of the top ten in the lowest number of strikeouts last year, five teams made the playoffs, including the Braves, who led the majors in home runs with 307, and Houston, who were fifth in the bigs in runs scored.

We have our doubts that the new power with high strikeout rates will work for the Guardians. We think they should focus on getting more men on base, a higher on-base percentage.

Of the teams with the 10 worst OBP in the sport in 2023, none made the playoffs. Maybe there is a correlation there.

Guardians’ Off-Season Has Been Riveting

Today is January 7, 2024. This means in 37 days; baseball fans hear the expression they have waited for since the World Series ended on November 1st: ”Pitchers and catchers report to spring training”.

If you are a fan of the Cleveland Guardians, it has been watching the constant upgrades to the roster, as the front office addressed the weaknesses, particularly the hitting, which finished 12th in the American League in runs scored.

The heavy sarcasm is intended.

Yes, we know the Guardians have a new manager, but they have done little else with spring training commencing in little over a month.

And this isn’t last season, coming off a Central Division title, the Guardians were a below .500 team in 2023.

First, they selected 1B/OF Alfonso Rivas from Pittsburgh off waivers, and then put him on waivers themselves several weeks later. They also added C Christian Bethancourt from Tampa Bay via the same method, and then traded him to Miami for cash (we will spare the sarcasm here, oh guess we didn’t) a little over a month later.

The biggest move they made was designating Cal Quantrill for assignment, and then trading him to Colorado for a minor league catcher. Apparently, when Terry Francona retired, so did the mantra that you can’t have too much pitching.

The one move that would rank highest on the excitement level (still would be around a 4 on a scale of 1-10) would be acquiring reliever Scott Barlow from San Diego for Enyel De La Santos. Barlow is a former closer and could be a cure for overusing Emmanuel Clase, assuming he isn’t traded before the season starts, as there have been rumors.

The Guardians didn’t stop there though. In kind of a secret move, Oscar Gonzalez, a post-season hero just a year and a half ago, was put on waivers and claimed by the Yankees.

Since they lost Quantrill, team president Chris Antonetti and GM Mike Chernoff swung into action and signed Ben Lively, not to be confused with actress Blake Lively, as a free agent from Cincinnati.

Lively, 32, could be another veteran anchor to the Cleveland rotation. That is if you dismiss his career 5.05 ERA in 208 big league innings. He had a 5.38 ERA for the Reds last year, but of course, their home park is very hitter friendly.

Unfortunately, his ERA at home was 4.70 and his road figure was 5.90.

Austin Hedges, a fan favorite (why?) was brought back as a free agent. Hedges is a tremendous defensive catcher, but he his OPS over the last three seasons have been 461, 489, and 527. And the first figure was the most recent.

The day after Christmas, the Guardians dealt oft-injured pitcher Cody Morris to the Yankees for left-handed hitter OF Estevan Florial, a former top 100 prospect.

Florial hit .230 (635 OPS) in 61 at bats for New York last season. He did belt 28 homers and put up a 945 OPS at AAA last year. He does strike out a lot, but his walk rate has got better over the past two seasons. No sarcasm here, but perhaps he can help.

On the other hand, he hits left-handed, not really an area of need, although the power would help.

Our point is it must be very tough to be a salesman in the ticket office for this team. They’ve virtually given their fans nothing to be excited about, although we are sure they would say it is because of the uncertainty surrounding their local television deal.

Perhaps in the next 30 days, they will be involved in doing something to significantly help their new skipper, Steven Vogt, have a more competitive squad.

We are sure the prospect gurus out there will tell us how several rookies will impact the 2024 edition of the Cleveland Guardians and all will be well.

Truth be told, we like some of their talent coming up, and hope those folks are correct. Our experience tells us most of those good young players won’t make an impact in 2024.

Hot Stove Season? More like Hot Doze Season if you are a fan of the Guardians.

Guardians’ Starting Depth? Not That Much.

The Cleveland Guardians pride themselves on being a pitching factory. Even the national media talks about it. When we read that, we always think what happened to the blueprints for the hitting factory.

A recent ranking of starting rotations in the sport had Cleveland ranked 24th though, far below where they normally sit. And frankly, that ranking makes sense to us.

Right now, the rotation consists of two pitchers who missed significant time with arm problems in Shane Bieber and Triston McKenzie, and three guys who have less than a season of experience.

Bieber has missed substantial parts in two of the last three seasons with injuries, completing only the 2022 season, when he went 13-8 with a 2.88 ERA and 198 strikeouts in 200 innings.

Last season, his velocity was down, but he still was reasonably effective in 128 innings, pitching to a 3.80 ERA (league average was 4.33) and allowing less hits than innings pitched.

McKenzie pitched in just four games, totaling only 16 innings with an elbow issue. That issue has led many pitchers to “Tommy John surgery”, and frankly, that’s still a concern for us heading into the season. And if something happens during spring training, we won’t see the 26-year-old until the 2025 season.

The three rookies were very impressive in 2023, but still, it was their first year and since there is no track record for any of this trio, we have no idea what to expect.

Tanner Bibee was the star, finishing second in the American League rookie of the year voting, pitching to a 2.98 ERA in 25 starts totaling 142 innings. He allowed just 122 hits while striking out 141 and walking 45.

Lefty Logan Allen made 24 starts and went 7-8 with a 3.81 ERA in 125.1 innings, giving up 127 hits, whiffing 119 and issuing 48 walks. And former first round pick Gavin Williams made 16 starts and had a 3.29 ERA with 81 strikeouts in 82 innings with 37 walks.

Impressive as they are, the 2024 season will tell if they can be like the three rookies in the 1984 Kansas City Royals’ rotation, Bret Saberhagen, Mark Gubicza, and Danny Jackson, who helped lead the Royals to their first world championship in 1985.

On the other hand, the last starting pitcher who was the rookie of the year was Detroit’s Michael Fullmer, whose ERA was more than a half run worse the following year, and his strikeout rate was down.

The history of the game shows a bunch of pitchers who were very good in their first season, and once the hitters got a book on them, didn’t have the same success going forward. We think both Bibee and Williams in particular have good enough stuff to overcome this, but until we see it, there has to be a bit of doubt.

There isn’t much depth behind this group. Cleveland signed 32-year-old Ben Lively from Cincinnati, who has a career 5.05 ERA, and still has holdovers Hunter Gaddis (49.1 career innings, 6.57 ERA) and Xzavion Curry (4.07 ERA in long relief, spot starting duty last season)

It was mentioned in a piece by Mike Axisa last week that perhaps Trevor Stephan might profile better as a starting pitcher, as he was in the minor leagues before 2019.

And of course, the next man who should be ready from the pitching factory is left-hander Will Dion, who had a 2.39 ERA at high Class A and AA last year, fanning 129 in 116.1 innings, allowing just 91 hits.

There is very little experience in the group we mentioned, especially if a rumored deal involving Bieber is completed. We are sure a pitching prospect will come back, but of course, that just adds another unproven arm.

That’s a lot of questions for a team that likes to consider itself a contender for a post-season spot. Does the organization still think that way?

Trading Good Players, Claiming Not To Have Money Is Nothing New In Cleveland Baseball

We have often said how long we have been a fan of the Cleveland Guardians, we go back to the mid 1960s and the days of Sam McDowell, Max Alvis, Rocky Colavito, and Leon Wagner.

And much like today, those teams were built around pitching while scoring runs was definitely a struggle.

It also dawned on us that for most of the 58 years we have been a fan of Cleveland baseball teams, they haven’t been free with a dollar bill.

Early on in my fandom, it was a terrible park to watch baseball and mediocre teams that drove attendance down. The Indians didn’t draw one million fans from 1959, when they finished 2nd in the American League to 1974, when they were in contention into August.

Their best record in that span was in ’65 when they went 87-75.

Of course, the National Pastime as a sport wasn’t in the great position it is today. There was one national telecast of baseball each week, and as for local TV, maybe as many as 40 games were broadcast on a local station in a season.

The financial situation led to trading many good, young players such as Graig Nettles, Chris Chambliss, Buddy Bell, Dennis Eckersley, Len Barker and others, usually for prospects. Does this sound familiar to anyone?

This went on until the Jacobs Brothers, Richard and David, bought the team from the estate of Steve O’Neill in 1986. The new owners immediately saw the terrible lease situation the team was in with The Stadium Corporation, run by Browns’ owner Art Modell, and set out to get their own ballpark.

When then Jacobs Field opened in 1994, fans flocked toward the new building in record numbers. Of course, it helped when the Indians were good for the first time since the late 50’s, and the sellout streak and more network television cash allowed Cleveland to be a factor in free agency, signing players like Eddie Murray, Dennis Martinez, Orel Hershiser, Roberto Alomar, and Jack McDowell.

Most of them helped the team reach two World Series and qualify for the post-season in six out of seven seasons.

Cleveland baseball attendance figures reached the three million mark from 1995 to 2001 and hit 2.6 million in 2002 when the team dipped below the .500 plateau.

Ironically (or not perhaps), the Jacobs family sold the team to the Dolan family at the end of the 1999 season.

Outside of that stretch when Jacobs Field opened until the sale of the team to the current owners, the folks in charge of running the operation have told us they cannot compete financially.

However, Progressive Field is being renovated, updated if you will, but it is still a great place to watch a baseball game, certainly better than Municipal Stadium. And there isn’t a landlord siphoning concession revenue and the like from the Guardians like there was in the 70’s and 80’s.

And we understand the local television deals for the bigger markets have exploded giving teams in large metropolitan areas more cash to spend, but that shouldn’t affect how much the Guardians can spend.

Various remodeling projects at the ballpark don’t allow the Guardians to draw three million fans anymore. The most they can do if they sellout every game would be a little over 2.8 million.

The conditions are very different from when we grew up with the baseball team in Cleveland, but still, all we seem to discuss is keeping the payroll low. The franchise still has to trade its best players when the time comes for free agency. Only Jose Ramirez stayed, but he left money on the table to do so.

Like it or not, that’s the reputation the Guardians have nationally. It’s why every very good player that plays here is involved in rumors by the national media.

The more things change, the more it has stayed the same, we guess.

Guardians Still Need Offense

The Cleveland Guardians had an issue scoring runs last season. They ranked 12th in the American League in runs scored in 2023 and were last in the league in home runs.

The Toronto Blue Jays scored the least runs of the teams that made the post-season, and they scored 84 more times than Cleveland did. Although pitching is the name of the game in Major League Baseball, you have to score runs to win in the regular season.

The off-season player movement cycle has moved slower than normal this year in the sport because everyone is waiting for Shohei Ohtani to sign, which he did about a week ago.

To date, the Guardians’ front office has done nothing to improve the hitting and frankly, seems to be depending on the young starting pitching getting better through experience.

The Guards were 10th in on base percentage and 14th in slugging percentage. So they need help, and a lot of it in both areas.

We have said this before, but we feel you need seven solid bats in a lineup to have an contending team’s offense. Right now, we would say Cleveland has five: Jose Ramirez, Josh Naylor, Steven Kwan, Andres Gimenez, and Bo Naylor, although remember, the younger Naylor has less than a full season’s experience.

Right now, the lineup would look something like this:

Kwan LF
Gimenez 2B
Ramirez 3B
J. Naylor DH
Laureano RF
B. Naylor C
Manzardo 1B
Arias SS
Straw CF

Of course, that what the Guardians will likely do, not what we would do. We understand folks are high on Kyle Manzardo, who came from Tampa Bay in the Aaron Civale deal, but the reality is he doesn’t have a single big league at bat.

As for Arias, we don’t think any hitter with a 32% strikeout rate will ever wind up being a solid bat, no matter how hard he hits the ball when he does make contact. And we have seen Straw the past two seasons, with his OPS under 600 in each of those years.

Laureano will likely platoon with Will Brennan in right field, and both are similar, neither has a lot of pop, and neither walk a lot. Those two attributes make up to be a mediocre offensive player.

Given the financial restraints (although they are not as severe as the ownership says they are) of the Guardians, what free agents would make sense for Cleveland?

We would be intrigued by Brandon Belt, but he plays the same position as Josh Naylor, and we believe the Guardians have to give Manzardo a shot unless he is terrible in spring training.

A one-year deal for a veteran like J.D. Martinez (33 HR and 893 OPS with the Dodgers) would make sense, if he is willing to take one year. Martinez could DH and play some LF (with Kwan sliding over to CF) and provide some right-handed power the Guardians sorely need.

Mitch Garver, formerly of the Twins and Rangers is also intriguing, although he is more of a catcher/DH which would make it tougher for Manzardo to get at-bats. Garver hit 19 dingers in 344 plate appearances for Texas last year.

Even though he’s a left-handed hitter, what about taking a chance on Austin Meadows, who has battled injuries the last two seasons, playing just 42 games for Detroit. In his last full season in 2021, he did hit 27 homers and knock in 106 for Tampa Bay. He’s likely looking for an incentive laden “prove it” deal.

There have been reports that Tyler Freeman has started working out in the outfield in Goodyear, and no doubt we would love to see the front office give him a full shot at an everyday spot based on his minor league numbers. Our guess is they are looking at him in LF with again Kwan moving to the middle of the outfield.

In any case, Cleveland’s offensive needs are exactly what they were when the regular season ended. And spring training will start six weeks after the holiday season ends.

The Guardians’ fans are waiting.

Guardians With Their Annual “We Can’t Spend” Talk

There are rites of spring concerning baseball and in Cleveland, there are the rites of winter, the time right around the sports’ winter meetings when the owners of the Guardians come out and give us the reasons they cannot spend money.

It used to be attendance. Ownership would tell fans they would like to spend more money on players, but the number of paying customers prohibited that. But last season, attendance jumped from 1.3 million in 2022 to 1.8 million. So, they had to invent a new reason.

Let’s keep in mind if Cleveland sold out every game, they could draw at most 2.8 million fans.

And the current financial issues with Bally Sports was chosen. Cleveland doesn’t know if it will be their local television money, an estimated $60 million, but if the contract is dissolved, Major League Baseball will step in and give the Guardians a percentage (reportedly between 70-80%) on what they would have been paid.

The Guardians’ ownership wants you to believe those are their only sources of income when they also receive money from baseball’s national broadcast package, and they are also a recipient of a share of the luxury tax payments from those teams that spend above the salary threshold.

So safe to say, the franchise has a lot of money coming in. At this time, we would also point out that the Guardians will save money on their new manager, Steven Vogt, who replaces the highest paid skipper in the big leagues in Terry Francona. And we would also bet with only three holdovers on the coaching staff, they will save money there.

Look, the organization may feel they are better off not paying a free agent(s) big money because they think they can get production from their prospects. That would be a strategy, and although it is probably a poor one, because most prospects do not become stars, at least the fan base would know they probably aren’t looking at contending in 2024.

Our problem is the way the organization handles this, it’s all they talk about. And as a longtime fan of the team, we are tired of hearing about it. No matter how they finish a season, when it comes to hot stove season, they make sure they tell the people who cover the team about their bleak financial situation.

No one is going to force the Dolan family to sell the team. They had David Blitzer buy into the franchise but frankly we haven’t seen any difference in the way the Guardians operate.

However, we will not buy (no pun intended) that the franchise isn’t a money maker for the Dolans. No one running a business loses money year after year without making changes or selling it.

What fans care about is the ownership giving the front office and manager the resources to win, and hopefully, it results in a world title. If the current owners don’t want to do that, it’s fine, but please, stop telling us what a challenge it is for you. No one is buying it.

And stop announcing that you are not going to increase payroll for any myriad of reasons. It’s like telling your partner you are going to cheat on them before you do it. Why? To prepare them for it?

Just stop talking about your finances. It’s done just to hear yourself justify why you aren’t trying to win. Yes, you will be happy if you do win, it’s just that unnecessary means will not be done to insure it.

We are sure next year will hold a different excuse.

Attendance Was Up For Guardians, Now How About Payroll?

The Bally Sports situation is troubling for many baseball teams, we understand that. Losing the rights fee for organizations is definitely a loss of revenue.

However, let’s not forget that these ballclubs will be paid by some entity to televise their games in 2024. It may not be as much as Bally’s was paying, but there will be income coming in.

We also need to remember that nobody uses this time of news better than mid to small market Major League Baseball owners. We already have heard a few teams telling their fans they have to cut payroll due to this situation.

Recently, Guardians’ president Chris Antonetti said the organization let right-handed starting pitcher Cal Quantrill go because what he figured to get in arbitration didn’t fit in with the teams’ payroll structure.

To us, if you can’t spend $6 million on a serviceable starting pitcher, it raises an eyebrow. After all, Cleveland already had the second lowest payroll in the big leagues last season, ahead of only Oakland. (according to Baseballreference.com)

It’s also a good time to remind you that the Guardians had the fourth biggest gain in attendance in ’23, behind Philadelphia, Cincinnati, and Baltimore. We know some folks will argue they were low-cost tickets that caused the spike, but we would argue the main thing is getting people in the park, remember, no team is selling concessions at cost.

This organization have always implied they couldn’t spend money on players because of dwindling attendance figures. So, attendance went up last year, and now it is the possibility of losing the television deal that won’t allow the Guardians to spend money on players.

We have always said we understand the Guardians can’t have a $200 million payroll, they certainly don’t generate the same type of revenue that teams like the Yankees, Red Sox, Dodgers, and Phillies can.

However, last season they outdrew Kansas City, who had a payroll $18 million higher than the Guards. Miami spent $114 million on players, and Cleveland outdrew them by 650,000 people.

The Brewers and Twins are similar market sizes, and both teams’ salaries for players were almost $140 million. By the way, Minnesota is saying they will have to cut payroll because of the local broadcast situation.

Now, one of the reasons Cleveland’s salaries are low is because they are the youngest team in the majors, so many of their players are on minimum contracts because they haven’t reached arbitration yet.

Don’t they have room to add some veterans who can help the team?

So, local television deal or not, the Guardians need to increase the amount they are spending on players for the 2024 season.

Let’s face it, coming off a 92 win season and a division title in 2023, last season was a disappointment. They have a new manager in Steven Vogt and should want to get him all the help he needs.

And you can’t forget the elephant in the room: 1948. The fans came out last season, now the front office should hold up their end of the bargain.

Nothing major, but how about not being in the bottom five in the league in payroll. We don’t think that’s too much to ask.

On The Guards’ New Skipper

The Cleveland Guardians picked the successor to Terry Francona earlier this week when they tabbed Steven Vogt to be the new skipper of the Guards.

Is it a good move? We have no idea. Vogt just retired as a player after the 2022 season and spent last year as Seattle’s bullpen coach. He just turned 39 years old earlier this week. He made two all-star teams as a player.

That’s what we know about Vogt. We aren’t going to make any claims as to how he will do as a manager because he’s never done it before. And that doesn’t mean he will not be good at the job; it simply means he has no track record.

The front office did their due diligence reportedly speaking to Francona and other experienced skippers about what they feel was the best attributes to having success as a manager. They felt Vogt had those qualities and it is a good thing that he can still recall what it was like to be a player.

It reminds you what things you can ask a player to do.

Apparently, Sandy Alomar Jr. will remain on the coaching staff and his experience should be invaluable to Vogt as he navigates his way through a 162 game regular season. And Carl Willis, the Guardians’ long time and very successful pitching coach will also remain on the staff.

Vogt couldn’t hope for two better guys to be able to bounce ideas off, and hopefully, he listens to them as well in terms of communication from a manager’s standpoint, rather than that as a veteran leader.

He should develop a relationship with Jose Ramirez as soon as possible. Ramirez is the Guardians’ de facto captain and bonding with him and getting his support will go a long way into having the rest of the roster buying in.

Francona liked having veteran leadership in the locker room. In his first year in Cleveland, he had Jason Giambi in that role. Because Ramirez has been here awhile, an older player isn’t needed for that purpose, but Vogt and Ramirez need to be a team.

We would like to see the new pilot and the organization be a little more flexible about starting the season with rookies in everyday spots. Francona seemed to be a little more concerned with cold weather affecting the performance of rookies, but we would like to see them as opposed to mediocre veterans with track records.

It is a bold choice for sure and for that we commend the front office.

Speaking of the front office, they already improved the catching situation by claiming Christian Bethancourt on waivers from Tampa Bay. He belted 11 homers last season (635 OPS) and has a rocket for an arm, he pitched for a bit in the minors early in his career.

He doesn’t have a great strikeout/walk ratio, but is certainly better than Cam Gallagher, who put together one of the worst offensive seasons we have seen in a long time.

We don’t understand the other waiver pick up, 1B/OF Alfonso Rivas, who slashed .303/.422/725 with Pittsburgh and San Diego last season. He’s not an on base guy and doesn’t have a lot of pop either. He is having a good winter league season and had good numbers in AAA last season.

Just seems like a AAAA player right now. However, he may not be on the 40-man roster by the time spring training begins.

And that spring training will be guided by a new manager for the first time since 2013. Maybe Vogt can be the first World Series winning manager for Cleveland since 1948.

Reviewing Cleveland’s Prospects From Five Years Ago

We believe that the basis for having a good organization in major league baseball is to have a very good player development program. Especially if you are a smaller market team.

Although we think every major league team could spend tons of money on players (after all, they are all millionaires or billionaires), many teams have a philosophy of not spending, a lot of them because the bang isn’t worth the buck.

For every Corey Seager or Marcus Semien from the newly crowned world champion Texas Rangers that works out, you have a Javier Baez or Jason Heyward.

However, in building a farm system, fans need to understand that the payoff rate for prospects is also not good.

We like to do this every winter, but let’s take a look at the Guardians’ farm system from 2018, five years ago. A system that ranked in the middle of the pack among major league teams, at #15.

Who has worked out, who hasn’t. Here is the list from Baseball America:

1). Francisco Mejia
2). Triston McKenzie
3). Bobby Bradley
4). Nolan Jones
5). Shane Bieber
6). Yu Chang
7). Willi Castro
8). Greg Allen
9). George Valera
10). Will Benson

In our books, there is one all-star type player from this list, and that’s Bieber, who won a Cy Young Award in the COVID shortened season of 2020. He’s 60-32 lifetime, made two all star appearances and thrown 200 innings twice. He has had injury issues in two of the last three seasons.

Although we think McKenzie is very good if he can stay healthy, and he was good in the second half of 2021 and in ’22 (11-11, 2.96 ERA), right now, there is concern over his elbow. But, if he can pitch, he’s a very good starting pitcher.

Mejia was the most highly regarded prospect, but we don’t think the organization felt he could be a full time catcher and traded him to San Diego for Brad Hand. In over 1000 big league at bats, he has a 678 OPS (.239/.284/.394). He never reached what was projected for him.

The book is still out on Jones and Benson, both of whom had very good seasons after being traded by Cleveland after the ’22 season. Jones had a 931 OPS for Colorado, but we worry about a strikeout rate that is over 30% in his time in the big leagues.

Benson had an 863 OPS with Cincinnati, but he fanned in 31.3% of his at bats. High strikeout rates don’t bode well for long term success in the majors.

Bradley, Chang, and Allen never found extended success in the majors, and although the latter two played in the bigs last season, neither are on 40 man rosters heading into the winter.

Castro was traded to Detroit, but had his best year with the Twins this season as kind of a super-utility player, playing six positions, and had a 750 OPS with 33 stolen bases.

What was funny to us was that we’ve been talking about Valera for so long. He had an 816 OPS between AA/AAA in 2022, but fell to 718 at Columbus last season, fighting a lot of injuries. He has pop and patience, but the batting average in his minor league career is just .242, but he gets on base 36.3% of the time.

So, out of the top ten, the successes are Bieber, McKenzie, Jones, Benson, and Castro, although the latter three should be re-evaluated at this time next year.

Valera is still a prospect, probably still top ten in the Cleveland system. The other four simply didn’t pan out.

Keep that in mind when you look at the list that will come out this winter.