Tribe Needs Some Help For Back Of Bullpen Trio

Terry Francona has been the manager of the Cleveland Indians since 2013, and the other night became just the third skipper in the history of the franchise to achieve 700 victories.

In the next several weeks, he will pass first Mike Hargrove (721) and then Lou Boudreau (728 and the last manager to pilot a World Series Champion for the Indians) to become the all-time winningest manager in franchise history.

At this point, we know how Francona likes to manage. He is famously patient with his players, particularly veterans with track records. Sometimes, this is frustrating for the fan base, but many times, his patience is rewarded.

We also know how he handles his bullpen. He has a caste system, trusting certain pitchers when he has a lead late in games, with most of the other arms being used when the Tribe is trailing. When Cleveland had their great run from 2016-18, if the team had a lead late, everyone (fans and opponents) knew they were going to see a combination of Bryan Shaw, Andrew Miller, and Cody Allen.

And because all of those guys were outstanding, the plan usually worked.

This year is no exception. Shaw is part of this triumvirate as well, this time joining Emmanuel Clase and James Karinchak to form an excellent back end of the ‘pen.

Shaw’s resurgence has been remarkable. He was released by Seattle last season after two bad years in Colorado, but has rebounded to pitch in 21 games, throwing 20 innings, allowing just six hits, and has a 1.35 ERA with 23 strikeouts and a save.

Clase, who missed last season on suspension, has been in 23 games, and has a 0.83 ERA and 8 saves. He’s given up some hits, but those are mostly groundballs that have found their way threw the infield. He was unhittable early in the year, but has been more human as of late.

And Karinchak has a 1.59 ERA and an unreal 42 whiffs in 22-2/3 innings and he has 6 saves in 24 appearances.

The biggest question as this season rolls on is can the heavy workload put on this trio allow them to hold their effectiveness throughout the season?

Coming into Saturday’s play Karinchak ranked tied for third in appearances with 24, trailing only Yasmeiro Petit of Oakland (26) and Jake Brentz of Kansas City (25). However, the A’s have played four more games than Cleveland. The Royals have played the same amount of games.

Moreso, Clase ranks tied for eighth in games pitched at 23. Of the top ten in the AL in appearances, Oakland, Kansas City, Houston, Los Angeles, and Detroit all have two members. There are 16 pitchers involved because of the tie for the eighth spot.

Behind Shaw in appearances for Cleveland, the next most is Cal Quantrill, who the Indians say they are stretching out in an effort to help out the starting rotation, which has suddenly sprung some leaks. Nick Wittgren has pitched in 16 games, followed by Phil Maton (15) and Trevor Stephan, who is kind of a “innings eater” in blowout losses with 14.

The hope is Francona can gain some confidence in some other relievers, perhaps Nick Sandlin or Kyle Nelson, or even Wittgren or Maton to ease the burden off the primary late inning trio.

We understand, with the Indians’ offense ranking near the bottom of the league in runs scored, when they have the lead, the skipper feels he has to win that game. Therefore, he uses his best guys. Unfortunately, if the team is winning, it results in a lot of use for the primary guys.

Unfortunately, the Indians have only won four games this season by five or more runs, and the last of those was May 8th. That’s a lot of close wins, and it also means no rest for Karinchak, Clase, and Shaw.

The Indians can’t afford for one of that trio to start fading due to overuse. That very well could be the key to the Tribe’s season.

Finding #4 and #5 In Rotation Is Tribe’s Newest Issue

When you trade three starting pitchers the caliber of Corey Kluber, Trevor Bauer, and Mike Clevinger since the middle of the 2019 season, it stands to reason there will be a void in your starting pitching.

That’s where the Cleveland Indians are today.

When the Tribe had that trio in their rotation, along with Shane Bieber, and prospects like Zach Plesac and Aaron Civale in the pipeline, there was a comfort among fans and we would guess the coaching staff. They had a chance to win each and every game.

They thought coming into the 2021 season they had the pieces in place for another good rotation. Triston McKenzie showed promise last season, albeit in a shortened season, and Logan Allen went to Goodyear and won a spot in the Opening Day rotation.

However, remember that McKenzie didn’t pitch at all in the 2019 season, so he is very inexperienced, and Allen was a good prospect, but that’s all. He’s still a rookie.

Allen started out fine, pitching five innings in each of his first two starts, but he couldn’t get out of the third inning in each of his next three starts and was sent to Columbus, where it hasn’t been pretty. He’s pitched 11-2/3 innings, allowing 19 runs in three starts.

McKenzie simply couldn’t throw strikes. He’s walked 30 hitters in 31-1/3 frames with Cleveland this year, and his lack of control comes suddenly. In his last start Friday night before he was send to Columbus, the 23-year-old righty sailed through the first three innings, allowing one run. In the fourth, he started walking everyone in sight.

Outside of his second start, a four inning stint against the White Sox in which he walked two, McKenzie walked three or more in every other start, and he went no more than five innings in any of those outings.

The struggles of the four and five spots in the rotation put a lot of pressure on Bieber, Plesac, and Civale to pitch well and pitch deep into games when they start to keep the Tribe in the race for a post-season spot. They won’t acknowledge that, they will simply say they go out and do their job every fifth day.

So, where does Terry Francona and the front office go from here? Is there another Plesac or Civale, who seemingly comes out of nowhere to fill the last two slots in the rotation?

Young, 24-year-old Sam Hentges has started twice and had extended outings in two others, with mixed results. His first start was a 4-2/3 outing vs. the Cubs, in which he held them off the scoreboard, but walked four, running his pitch count up so he couldn’t complete five innings.

He will get another opportunity against Detroit this week.

Will another rookie, Jean Carlos Mejia get a start this week? He made his major league debut Friday, pitching 2-1/3 innings, striking out five. But, he has pitched just 11 innings over the Class A level in his career, meaning no one knows what he will do when he has to go out there every fifth day.

At Columbus, there is Kirk McCarty, a soon to be 26-year-old southpaw who is 3-0, 2.66 ERA, 14 K’s, 5 walks in 23 innings, but he has also not pitched above Class A before this season.

Eli Morgan is a 25-year-old right-hander who has experience in AA ball, and is 0-1 with a 3.95 ERA and 13 strikeouts in 13 innings this season. He has walked eight though, but his minor league career doesn’t indicate wildness.

Another lefty, Scott Moss, has been bandied about over the last two seasons, but left his last start with a hand issue. So, he’s probably not a candidate.

If the Indians are going to stay in the race for a post-season spot, finding someone who can give them quality innings after Bieber, Plesac, and Civale is critical. We would doubt that any kind of deal is coming either, that’s not the organization’s style.

The number of off days is dwindling, so Francona and Carl Willis have to find some answers. The comfort level of knowing you have a chance to win every day is gone.

Time To Give Miller A Shot.

When you are hitting .212 as a team through a quarter of the season, you should be looking for offense wherever you can.

That’s why the debate on is there a place on the 26 man roster for Owen Miller is getting ridiculous. Miller has played shortstop more than any other position on the diamond during his minor league career, but if the organization is concerned about his defense, there are many other places where the Indians can use his bat.

First, we aren’t claiming Miller is the second coming of Babe Ruth. However, he is a career .317 hitter (830 OPS) during his professional career, so he has hit wherever he has played, and while we understand spring training numbers don’t mean much, but he hit there as well.

In 12 games at Columbus thus far, the right-handed hitter is batting an incredible .442 (23 for 52) with a homer and seven runs batted in. The only down stat is 13 strikeouts in 56 plate appearances, although he hasn’t fanned more than 86 times in any minor league season to date.

It would be more difficult to come up with a reason NOT to bring him up.

As to where he should play? Well, there are a few suggestions, but we’d pencil him in everyday at first base, where Jake Bauers and Yu Chang have combined to hit .171 with two home runs and 12 ribbies.

You could keep him at SS, where Andres Gimenez failed at the plate (534 OPS) and although Amed Rosario has had a couple of decent games at the plate, he is still hitting just .231 with a 629 OPS.

Since we like Rosario better than the Bauers/Chang platoon, that’s why we’d put Miller at that spot, and basically check back in after 20-25 games to see how he is doing.

He isn’t a power hitter really, but the Tribe ranks 8th in the American League in home runs now. What the Indians really need is a guy who gets hits and gets on base, they are second from the bottom in the AL in on base percentage and Miller has a minor league career .375 on base percentage.

When you think about it, if he came up and hit .250, that would be an improvement for the Tribe offense, and quite frankly his minor league pedigree says he will do better than that number.

We subscribe to the “can’t do any worse” theory, and Owen Miller, who came over in the Mike Clevinger deal last season, can’t be worse at first base than who Terry Francona writes in the lineup every day right now.

Is it an ideal situation to bring up a player who has played just 12 games at the AAA level? Of course not, you would like to see him get more at bats at that level. But it has been done before. Fernando Tatis Jr., although a much better prospect than Miller, never played at that level.

And for old school folks (like me), former Tribe manager Mike Hargrove came up to the Rangers after playing in A ball. If you can hit, you can hit. Since the Indians are starving for some consistency from anyone not named Jose Ramirez at the plate, it’s time to give Miller a shot.

This isn’t to say Owen Miller is the savior, we don’t want to put that kind of pressure on the young man. We are saying he’s likely better than at least one player in the lineup the Tribe is putting out there on a daily basis.

Tito Mixing And Matching Nightly With Lineup.

Mike Hargrove said it when he was managing the Cleveland Indians, there are two things that every man thinks he can better than everyone else, those are cooking a steak and managing a baseball team.

And despite winning two World Series and getting to a third, Terry Francona still hears his share of questions about how he handles the Cleveland Indians. Heck, half the fun of watching a baseball game is trying to manage along with your favorite team’s skipper.

We do it too, we aren’t going to deny it.

The Indians rank 9th in the American League in spite of being second last in the league in batting average. Yes, we know batting average isn’t in vogue right now, so they are also 14th in the AL in on base percentage.

They are doing it with a team that really only has five regulars: Jose Ramirez at 3B, Cesar Hernandez at 2B, Eddie Rosario in LF, Franmil Reyes at DH, and when healthy, Roberto Perez behind the plate.

Everyday, Francona has to decide who should play at shortstop, first base, centerfield and rightfield. Now, Josh Naylor has been in the lineup somewhere on an everyday basis, so he’s either at first or in right. But, Francona has to mix and match at three spots on a nightly basis.

He’s tried going with the hot hand. Jordan Luplow was hot earlier in the season, culminating in a walk off HR against Minnesota. So, he started getting regular playing time. He responded by going 1 for 22 over a seven game stretch.

Amed Rosario had four hits, including the game winner Wednesday afternoon against the Cubs. He started the first three games of the Seattle series at shortstop in place of a struggling Andres Gimenez, and went 1 for 12.

Harold Ramirez came up for the Kansas City series and gave the offense a spark, getting four hits in the first two games. He followed that with a 2 for 18 stretch, before getting two hits, including a home run in last night’s 7-3 loss to the Mariners.

At first base, everyone thought it was a matter of time before Jake Bauers would be replaced by Bobby Bradley as the left-handed hitting platoon. However, it’s the right-handed half that seems to have lost his job.

Yu Chang pinch hit last night, but hasn’t been in the lineup vs. southpaws over the past week. Going 7 for 50 with just two extra base hits seems to have cost him his job, and soon, perhaps his roster spot. At AAA, Bradley has started off just 6 for 37 with 15 strikeouts. He has belted three homers.

Bauers isn’t exactly tearing the cover off the ball either, and that has resulted in Naylor playing more at first.

Our point is that it’s a tremendous challenge for Francona and whoever helps him make out the lineup to put a competitive attack out there. Consistency is the best feature a professional athlete can have, and the Indians don’t have many consistent hitters.

And before you say just bring up players from AAA, it has to be a good fit. The last thing the organization wants is for a top prospect to come up and get sporadic playing time. It generally doesn’t help the development of the player.

That said, we believe some changes will be coming soon.

The pitching has for the most part held up their end of the bargain. We’ve said it before, how successful the Cleveland Indians will be depends on how many runs they can score.

Terry Francona has a challenge getting his team to do that with the current make up of the team.

Once Tribe Gets The Lead, The Bullpen Locks It Up

We feel fairly certain opposing managers in Major League Baseball won’t be thrilled with the news that the Cleveland Indians might have another bullpen weapon in rookie Nick Sandlin.

Now, we don’t want to get too carried away with three appearances totalling 4-1/3 innings, but the hard throwing sidearmer seems to have made quite an impression on Terry Francona, Carl Willis, and Reuben Niebla.

With last Thursday game in the balance, Francona brought in the rookie in a 3-0 game in the bottom of the sixth with two Kansas City Royals on base, and six time all star Salvador Perez at the plate. Perez hits cleanup for the Royals.

Sandlin induced a double play grounder to get two quick outs and then followed up by getting Jorge Soler on another ground ball. He pitched a three up, three down seventh, including two strikeouts, turning the game over to James Karinchak and Emmanuel Clase to close it out.

Generally, guys who throw from the side don’t get it up to home plate at 95 MPH, so it gives Francona an option to show opposing a different look late in games.

The Cleveland bullpen had already taken the look of a “if you aren’t ahead after six, it doesn’t look good for you” relief corps through the first 30 games because of the performances of Bryan Shaw, Karinchak, and Clase.

Shaw is a remarkable story. He already ranks 8th on the Indians’ all time list for appearances with 391, and should be at least 6th by the end of the season. He was a mainstay of Francona’s bullpen from 2013 through 2017, pitching in 378 games, and led the American League in appearances 2014, 2016, and 2017 before departing for Colorado and a big contract.

He suffered through two bad seasons with the Rockies, a place not known to be kind to pitchers, and then pitched in just six games with Seattle last season, allowing 12 runs in six innings.

When he signed with the Tribe before spring training, there were plenty of comments, mostly negative. We thought what the heck, maybe he could regain his regular form after pretty much a year of inactivity.

He’s rewarded the Indians’ trust by being the man Francona calls on to pitch the 7th. He has a 2.03 ERA in 13 games, striking out 14 in 13-1/3 frames. The only down statistic is his eight walks.

Karinchek is putting up unworldly numbers right now. He allowed a HR to Hunter Dozier last week perhaps just to prove he is human, as he has allowed just 3 hits in 15 innings for the season, striking out two batters per inning. And his control, an issue in the past, has been excellent to date with just three walks.

He has been so dominant, he ranks 4th in WAR for the Indians at this point of the season, behind Jose Ramirez, Shane Bieber, and Aaron Civale.

Clase, with his 100 MPH cutter, has been more dominant than his numbers indicate, and his numbers are good (1.26 ERA and 15 K’s in 14-1/3 IP). He’s allowed 15 hits in those innings, but only six of those have been classed as line drives. The rest are ground balls that have gone either through the infield or been fielded but the batter beat the throw to first.

He’s also walked just three batters on the season.

We haven’t even mentioned Cal Quantrill (2.12 ERA), Phil Maton (16 strikeouts in 11 innings), and Nick Wittgren, who after a couple of shaky appearances has allowed just a single run in his last five outings.

And Rule 5 draftee Trevor Stephan hasn’t been in a game since April 28th.

The starting pitching gets a lot of the headlines because they keep the Indians in almost every game. But once the Tribe gets the lead, it’s very tough to get it back because of the bullpen. And if Sandlin continues to do what he did in KC, it’s a nightmare for opposing hitters and managers.

No One Should Be Surprised By Tribe’s Lack Of Scoring.

The Cleveland Indians’ offense continues to struggle on a nightly basis. They have played 19 games this season, and scored three runs or less in 11 of them. Even if you have the best pitching in the sport, it’s difficult to win games when you can’t score.

On April 12th, the Tribe started an 18 game stretch (now 17 games with Wednesday’s game being snowed out) in which they were playing teams who figure to contend for the post-season.

In that stretch, they’ve seen some very good pitchers, guys like Lucas Giolito, Lance Lynn, and Garrit Cole. They were no-hit by Carlos Rodon, and didn’t score over nine innings against Giolito, a game in which they won by the way.

Cleveland has played 11 of those games, and they are 3-8 so far. They have scored more than four runs (the league average is 4.41) in just two of those contests, last Sunday’s win over Cincinnati and the following game at home against the White Sox.

Of the eight games where Terry Francona’s crew has mustered more than three tallies, half of them have come against Detroit, who by the way has the worst ERA in the league.

There are people who will claim no one should make rash judgments because the season is just 19 games old, and there is some merit in that, we usually wait until 27 games (1/6th of the season) has been played.

However, it’s not like the Indians were an offensive juggernaut a year ago. They were 13th in the AL in runs per game at 4.13, almost a half run less than league average, which was 4.58.

And they let go two of their top five players in OPS a season ago, trading Francisco Lindor and letting Carlos Santana go as a free agent. The only proven bat they brought in over the off-season was Eddie Rosario, so it isn’t like the front office looked at a bad offense and said let’s address the problem.

You can make moves like that if you have a farm system with players going to be ready for the big leagues right away. Most of the Tribe’s top prospects won’t be ready until 2022 at the earliest.

No one should be shocked they rank 13th in the league in runs scored thus far.

By the way, for all the gruff directed at Santana for walking a lot, how would you like an occasional base on balls out of the players at first base? The two guys who replaced him have combined to go 10 for 66, which is a .152 batting average, with no home runs, and four walks.

We understand the ownership decided to not just lower the payroll, but take a chainsaw to it, and guys who can hit tend to cost money. Still, the free agents many people mentioned, players like Joc Pederson and Kyle Schwarber, haven’t produced either.

Going back to Santana, he was known to love it in Cleveland. Doesn’t anyone else think the two parties could’ve worked something out?

A big hope was Josh Naylor, who came over from San Diego in the Mike Clevinger deal, but he has struggled out of the gate, hitting .241 with no homers, although he has five doubles, and striking out 15 times vs. three walks.

We still have hopes he can be a solid offensive player, but he’s put up some bad at bats in key situations this season to date.

Listening to an interview with Chris Antonetti before last night’s game, he sounded confident the bats will turn around, but we are sure that’s one of those circumstances where that’s all he can say.

We don’t see where the offense is going to get better with the current roster, and dare we say, with the current coaching staff. We aren’t a believer in change for change sake, but the dugout personnel has pretty much remained the same as when Terry Francona took over.

The only changes that were made (outside of Jason Bere as bullpen coach) came from Mickey Callaway and Kevin Cash getting managerial positions, and of course, because Brad Mills retired.

At some point, perhaps the players aren’t listening to the message anymore.

It’s still early, yes, but it’s also starting to get late. A week from today, the schedule will move to May, and that 27 game benchmark will have been crossed.

Will the Indians start scoring runs by then? We’d have to say it’s doubtful they will be a run scoring machine.

Lack Of Scoring Puts Tribe On Razor’s Edge

It is still early, very early in the 2021 Major League Baseball season. We still are just a middle past the middle of April, and the Cleveland Indians have only played 14 games, less than 10% of its schedule.

However, for many, including ourselves, who were concerned about the ability of Terry Francona’s squad to score runs, the trepidation is real.

Through the first 15 games, the Indians rank dead last in the American League in scoring. This current trip. which has included six games, have the Tribe tallying 14 runs, and two of those occurred in the ten inning win over Chicago last Tuesday, when the dumb MLB rules people gave Cleveland a runner on second to start the inning.

Wednesday night, they were no hit by Chicago’s Carlos Rodon in a game were their plate appearance got progressively worse as the night moved on.

Cleveland is last in the AL in on base percentage, 9th in slugging (mainly because they are 3rd in the league in home runs), last in batting average, and second last in OPS+.

Without a doubt, they are one of the worst offenses in the game to date.

In their 14 contests, they have scored two runs or less six times, three runs or less eight times, and four runs or less in all but three games. ‘Keep in mind, the average team in the Junior Circuit scores 4.5 runs in a game.

When you score that few runs, the other parts of your game have to be perfect. Your pitchers can’t have bad outings, and the Tribe had two of them (Zach Plesac and Logan Allen) this week. You can’t make defensive mistakes, which have cost Cleveland in both games in Cincinnati. You can’t make baserunning errors either, like Eddie Rosario’s in the 8th inning yesterday.

The entire team is living on the edge right now.

We felt going into the season, Francona had four, maybe five solid hitters in his lineup. When two of them are going through tough periods, like Cesar Hernandez and Jose Ramirez went through at the beginning of the trip, that means you have two or three hitters contributing.

That simply doesn’t cut it.

The front office had an entire season to find a centerfielder after Oscar Mercado lost the job, and they still haven’t found one. They seem to be trying to give the job to Amed Rosario, a converted shortstop who is more of platoon piece (he hits southpaws very well), and started the year using Ben Gamel there as well.

They seem hesitant to give Jordan Luplow, who also hammers lefties, a shot at a full time job out there, although the former Pirate didn’t have huge platoon splits in the minors.

The best thing you can say about the offense is they generally put the ball in play.

Former Tribe skipper Mike Hargrove used to say something to the effect of if you have a good leadoff hitter and a cleanup hitter, your lineup takes shape on its own. Right now, the Indians have no one who should hit first, except Hernandez, who has told Francona he doesn’t like hitting first.

He leads the team in walks with eight, and has a career .351 on base average.

They really don’t have a true #4 hitter either. Franmil Reyes is too streaky at this point in his career, and Eddie Rosario isn’t bad, but ideally should hit fifth or sixth.

That means Francona is left with putting together a puzzle every night, and that makes his job very difficult.

Where can the offense come from? That’s the million dollar question. Yes, there are alternatives in the minors, but we don’t a big impact will come from there.

Perhaps a change in approach by Francona? Maybe the team can be more aggressive on the basepaths, more steals, more hit and runs? They don’t strikeout, so the latter might be a plan.

The Indians have to start putting together a way to score more often, otherwise, the margin for error for this baseball team will continue to be very thin.

Tough Three Week Stretch For The Tribe.

No one can or should complain about a 5-3 start for the Cleveland Indians. As former major leaguer and broadcaster Mike Hegan used to say, if you win three out of every five, you end the season at 96 wins, and that gets you in the playoffs more often than not.

After losing last night, if the Tribe wins tonight, they will have accomplished that at least for the first ten games of the season.

But the next three weeks should give us an idea of how good the 2021 Cleveland Indians are.

Through May 2nd, the Tribe takes on a quartet of teams who are projected to be serious contenders to be playing baseball in October: The White Sox (8 more games), The Reds (3), the Yankees (4), and the Twins (3).

Chicago and Minnesota rank 3rd and 4th in the American League in runs scored per game (Cleveland is 7th) while the Reds led the NL in scoring. To be fair, they haven’t faced the Cleveland staff, which is tied for the league lead in ERA with the Twins.

While the Tigers’ offense ranks 14th in runs, perhaps because they have played six games vs. the Indians’ staff, let’s look at the Royals. KC has scored 37 runs in seven games, ranking sixth in the AL at 5.29 per game.

However, in the two games against the Indians’ pitching staff, they scored five runs in two games. So, when they aren’t facing Cleveland, they are averaging 6.4 runs per contest, which would be second in the Junior Circuit.

It will be interesting to see how the Pale Hose, Reds, and Twins fair against the Tribe staff, which hasn’t allowed more than five runs in a contest to date.

And while the Cleveland hitters knocked around the Detroit pitching staff, the series in the Windy City will see Indians’ hitters facing some accomplished hurlers like Lucas Giolito, Dallas Keuchel, and Lance Lynn, while they will also probably see the Reds’ Luis Castillo in the last game in the Queen City.

We have already noted the Twins’ pitching ranks tied for first with the Tribe in ERA, and the Yankees are currently third. Will the Tribe be able to score runs against real good pitchers, which honestly, the Indians have not faced yet.

And will the contact Cleveland hitters have been making, they have still struck out the least amount of times in the league, suit them well and can it continue against top flight pitching?

Look, we aren’t downgrading the Tribe’s success to date. We have always said when folks have complained about beating bad teams, would they rather they lose to them? Of course not, there is something to be said for beating teams you are supposed to have success against.

Unfortunately, the schedule makers have only allowed Cleveland 38 opportunities to play the Royals and Tigers, meaning there are 124 other contests on the slate.

There is an old baseball adage that says you split with the contenders and beat up on the poor teams on the schedule, so we aren’t looking for Terry Francona’s team to dominate over the next three weeks, although that would be nice.

They just need to hold their own against them. And as we said, we are anxious to see how the lineup cobbles together runs against the likes of pitchers like Giolito, who has pitched well vs. the Tribe in the past two seasons, and Lynn.

That might give us a truer picture of how the 2021 edition of the Indians will fare this season.

It’s Early, But Tribe Bats Haven’t Quelled Any Fears

First of all, let us start that it is way too early to make any conclusions about any major league baseball teams after five games.

However, if you thought coming into the 2021 season that the offense would be a problem for the Cleveland Indians, they have done nothing to make you feel differently.

Remember, the Indians ranked tied for 13th in the American League in runs scored last year and dealt one of their best hitters in the off-season. So, it’s not like there isn’t a reason for concern.

In the season’s first five games, the Tribe scored two runs or less in three of them, and let us remind you that even with Cleveland’s usually excellent pitching, winning when the team scores two runs is very, very difficult.

The average American League team scored 4.58 runs per game on average last season, and the Indians were best in the Junior Circuit in run prevention, allowing 3.48 runs per contest. So, scoring two runs usually means adding one to the “L” column.

Thank goodness for Jose Ramirez. The AL MVP runner up belted a pair of two run homers yesterday, accounting for the only runs in the Tribe’s second victory of the season.

There are some good things to take note of thus far, although you can look at them in different ways.

Cleveland is last in the AL in striking out, and even in today’s game where hitters fan a lot, that’s a good thing. The counter to that is they haven’t faced any of the game’s big strikeout pitchers. Detroit and Kansas City ranked in the lower half of the league in that category last season. In fact, the Tigers pitching staff was last.

And they’ve been drawing four walks per game, which has to be a staple of their offense. They probably won’t see a premier pitcher until they visit Chicago next week to take on the White Sox.

They have also hit some home runs. Ramirez’ two yesterday give the team seven on the season, and partially because of that, they rank 8th in slugging percentage.

However, some of the things we were concerned about have reinforced those feelings.

Terry Francona has for some reason decided the bat the centerfielder in the leadoff spot, and while Jordan Luplow has had tremendous success against lefties in his career, so it makes sense with him, hitting Ben Gamel first raises some eyebrows.

The veteran has a .331 on base percentage for his career (his best mark was .358 with Seattle in 2018), so it’s tough to find a reason for him to bat first. Luplow’s has a lifetime .379 OBP vs. southpaws as a contrast.

To be fair, we know Cesar Hernandez is a better hitter than he has shown so far (2 for 18 with four walks). But the offense can’t be solely dependent on Hernandez, Ramirez, Eddie Rosario and Franmil Reyes either.

Another problem for the attack has been the inability to get runners on base early in innings. Too often, the Tribe gets a couple of hits with two outs, making it tough to score. And they’ve also banged into five double plays, third in the league to date, so they aren’t putting a lot of pressure on opposing pitchers.

They’ve also scored only two runs before the sixth inning. So, starting pitchers haven’t been able to protect any leads thus far.

Again, it’s early, so it is way too early for concern. But the Indians could have eased the minds of many supporters with a good start at the plate.

If they can score, then they can surprise in the AL Central.

Asking Questions That Tribe Hasn’t Answered Yet

Spring training lasts six weeks because of the starting pitchers. They have to get enough time to get stretched out enough to throw around 100 pitches in a game once the regular season starts.

Because it lasts so long, there is plenty of time resolve most questions, but here are some we would like to have answers for, and maybe we will once the calendar changes from April to May.

What about centerfield? Our guess was the Tribe front office was hoping that Oscar Mercado would regain his 2019 form and seize the job, but the 26-year-old still has problems distinguishing a ball from a strike, so he will not be in Detroit today.

Bradley Zimmer has the same issue and was also sent down. So, Terry Francona’s options to start the season are veteran Ben Gamel, converted shortstop (and recently converted at that) Amed Rosario, and Jordan Luplow.

It’s not like Gamel hit his way on the roster either, he kind of walked his way on, drawing seven walks. He batted .171 (7 for 41). Luplow has been more of a corner outfielder since coming to Cleveland, although he is good enough defensively to play in the middle of the outfield.

The question to us, is why wasn’t Daniel Johnson given a look out there during exhibition play? He was 7 for 19 against fairly experienced pitching in Arizona.

You have to wonder how quick he will be back with the big club?

Outfield defense or lack of it? Compounding the lack of an experienced true major league centerfielder is that the two men who will play the majority of time in the corner positions are Eddie Rosario and Josh Naylor, neither of whom are known for their glove work.

The infield defense should be solid. Cesar Hernandez won a Gold Glove last year, and new shortstop Andres Gimenez won the job partly because of his glove. Jose Ramirez is very good at the hot corner.

However, perhaps the front office is counting on a lot of strikeouts because a team based on pitching like the Indians should back that strength with good defense.

Our guess is a lot of late game substitutions for defense in the outfield in games where Cleveland is ahead. That’s why the Zimmer decision was a bit curious. Although we never have been a fan because of his lack of hitting, he can go get it in the field.

Who’s Still Here in August? If the Indians get off to a slow start, expect the trade winds to start swirling, mostly involving Ramirez. The front office learned from trading Francisco Lindor was that they probably moved him too late, just one year before he was a free agent.

With Ramirez under club options through the 2023 season, it would seem the club could get maximum value dealing a superstar player with two full season left on a reasonable contract.

And if Ramirez is moved, it wouldn’t be a surprise to see Hernandez and/or Eddie Rosario also on the block.

If the Tribe is in contention, Ramirez is probably off the table, at least until the end of the season, but Hernandez could still be moved if one of the Tribe’s infield prospects shows they are ready to come up.

And if they are in contention, Eddie Rosario is probably having a big season.

The Cleveland management have put a lot of pressure on their young pitching staff for the 2021 season. Can they answer the challenge? If so, these questions won’t be discussed much, but if Terry Francona’s squad can’t muster up enough runs or the outfield defense is porous, you will hear a lot about all three.