Remembering When Starting Pitching Brought Confidence To Guardians’ Fans

As recently as 2018, fans of the Cleveland baseball team were spoiled by their starting pitching. The rotation consisted of Corey Kluber (who won 20 games that year), Carlos Carrasco, Mike Clevinger, Trevor Bauer, and a rookie fifth starter named Shane Bieber.

At the time, we thought going into every game, the Indians had a legitimate chance to win because they had the edge between the two starting pitchers.

Even into the pandemic season of 2020, Terry Francona’s starters were at the top of the sport. Bieber emerged as a Cy Young winner that season, and he was backed up by Carrasco, Clevinger (before he was traded), Aaron Civale, and rookie Triston McKenzie.

Baseball people started to refer to the “Cleveland Pitching Factory”, with the organization seemingly able to crank out starter after starter. Heck, it happened last season when McKenzie went down in spring training, Zach Plesac proved ineffective, and Cal Quantrill was hurt, the Guardians simply went to the farm and called up Tanner Bibee, Logan Allen, and Gavin Williams.

Apparently, this season the factory has been shut down for repairs or something, because the organization is scrambling to put an effective starting pitcher on the mound each and every night.

It was certainly curious when the organization released Quantrill after the season rather than pay him through arbitration, where he figured to make about $6 million, not a lot of money for a guy who can give you innings.

The right-hander has pitched to a 3.58 ERA in Colorado this season logging a staff high 73 innings. By the way, those innings would also lead the Guardians’ staff.

The only pitcher signed over the winter was Reds’ castoff Ben Lively, who has been a savior for this year’s staff.

Bieber was lost to elbow surgery after two starts, leaving a huge void in the rotation, which coming into the season consisted of him, the three rookies, and McKenzie, who missed most of last year with an elbow issue.

Of the trio of first year arms called up last year and thought to provide the backbone of the rotation going forward, only Bibee has been close to his ’23 form, with a 3.73 ERA in 70 innings with 76 strikeouts and 19 walks.

Williams has missed all year with an elbow issue, but hopefully can return soon. Allen has made his 13 starts but has a 5.57 ERA.

McKenzie has not pitched like the guy who put up a 2.96 ERA in 2022. He has allowed a league leading 14 dingers (tied with his teammate Logan Allen) and also leads the league in walks with 36 in 62.2 innings of work.

Right now, the rotation has more holes than an old guy’s socks. And there were no solutions at hand.

Xzavion Curry has made three spot starts, one very good, the other two being “meh”. The ERA of the pitching staff at Columbus is 5.46 and the best starter down there is journeyman Connor Gillispie, who has a 5.02 ERA, although he has 60 strikeouts in 57.1 innings. He’s 26 years old.

The bullpen has taken on a heavy burden for the big club to get off to this 42-22 start. How long can they sustain the success pitching all of these innings? Could they do it all year? Sure, but based on the past, eventually it is going to catch up with them unless the starters start carrying their weight.

As we said, Lively has been a savior and Bibee has been solid. Carlos Carrasco has been a nice story in his return to the franchise, but he can’t be trusted to get through a lineup a third time.

McKenzie needs to throw strikes and he and Allen need to keep the ball in the yard.

More likely is the front office is going to have to overpay to bring in an arm. With the Cleveland bullpen, they may be able to get a guy who can soak up innings and keep the team in the game.

The rest of the team is doing too well for the rotation to be a burden.

Tribe Should Have Heeded Tito’s Adage

Terry Francona has always said when you think you have enough pitching, you go out and get some more. It’s too bad his bosses didn’t heed his advise.

We know the Indians have traded away a lot of pitching over the last two and a half years, moving former Cy Young Award winner Corey Kluber, and then Trevor Bauer and Mike Clevinger in deadline deals in 2019 and 2020 respectively.

The organization has done a tremendous job developing young pitchers. The current (if healthy) top of the rotation features three pitchers drafted in 2016: Shane Bieber, Zach Plesac, and Aaron Civale. Going into spring training, the fourth and fifth spots appeared to belong to Cal Quantrill and Triston McKenzie.

We wrote at the time that outside of Bieber, none of those guys had more than 300 big league innings under their belt, and it would be wise to trade for or sign at least one experience arm.

Pitchers like Tijuan Walker (6-3, 2.38 ERA with the Mets), Jake Odorizzi (2-3, 4.08 ERA with Houston), and Tyler Anderson (3-8, 4.75 ERA with Pittsburgh) among others all were available shortly before spring training started. And none of them signed for huge amounts of money, always a consideration for the frugal Cleveland franchise.

Perhaps the organization got too caught up in the success of Bieber, Plesac, and Civale, all of whom seemed to have very little growing pains coming up to the bigs. Or more realistically, the ownership would not allow for the signing of a veteran hurler to add another proven arm.

Quantrill had command issues in spring training (he’s still going through them), so he went back to the bullpen, because of that and the fact that Logan Allen pitched extremely well in Arizona.

When the regular season started, Allen couldn’t keep the ball in the yard, and McKenzie, who opened as the 5th starter, couldn’t throw strikes.

They tried 24-year-old Sam Hentges, 24-year-old JC Mejia, and 25-year-old Eli Morgan, none of whom had any major league experience, and none were experiencing any great success in the minors.

When Bieber got the call in 2018, he was 6-1 with a 1.47 ERA in 13 starts at AAA and AA. Plesac came up in 2019 out of necessity due to injuries, but he was 4-2 with a 1.70 ERA in 10 starts in the high minors. Civale was 7-1, 2.43 in 13 starts in ’19 when he got the call.

By contrast, Hentges didn’t even pitch in the minors this year, nor last season due to the pandemic. His last minor league season was spent in Akron in ’19, where he went 2-11 with a 5.13 ERA.

Mejia had made two career starts above Class A in his life, both this year, before getting called up. He was 3-1 with an ERA just over four in Hi-A ball, in 2019, pitching just 33 innings.

Morgan made four starts this year at Columbus (4.67 ERA) and made 19 starts in AAA two years ago, with a 3.79 ERA.

We understand the organization didn’t think the latter trio was ready for the big league rotation now, but they left themselves no room for error.

And when Plesac went down on May23rd, the Tribe could’ve signed a free agent not currently in anyone’s organization and they would be ready now to help the team over this hurdle.

Rick Porcello, Cole Hamels, and Anibal Sanchez are just three pitchers still unattached, and another Homer Bailey, just signed with Oakland. Could any of those guys have helped? There is no way of knowing, but at the very least, they could have bought time for the youngsters.

They could’ve made a trade as well, although we would like to think Chris Antonetti and Mike Chernoff tried. It is well documented the organization has a ton of middle infielders regarded as good prospects. Move one of them for a starter who can soak up innings without taking the team out of a game early.

Perhaps the Indians can whether the current storm and stay in the race for the playoffs, and if they do and come up just short, they could point to these games pitched by men who weren’t ready to handle the job.

The point is the front office (including ownership) should have listened to their skipper. Heading into spring training, the pitching staff was very inexperienced. They pretended it wasn’t an issue.

An All Too Familiar Refrain From Indians

Even when you know bad news is coming, it still can make you sad when you hear it.

That’s how we felt when Cleveland Indians’ president Chris Antonetti spoke on Tuesday and talked about the “daunting” financial reality of the team.

He also spoke about the “reality” of the financial loss the Indians suffered during the shortened 60 game schedule, losing money from ticket revenue, concessions, and parking about other things.

So many things go through our heads on this.

First, we understand this was a difficult season for every major league baseball team. We are sure they didn’t make as much money as they usually make.

On the other hand, they didn’t have to pay any player his full salary either and the costs of travel were also greatly reduced because there were fewer trips as well as shorter ones.

The Cleveland Indians are definitely not the only team who can make these claims.

Secondly, since the off-season just started and the team has just introduced some new season ticket options, this seems like an odd way to solicit potential ticket buyers.

Your team president pretty much told everyone the payroll will be trimmed again, and one of the team’s best players will likely be traded. We are sure this news isn’t making anyone reach for their checkbooks.

We understand that the ownership is being honest, in fact, brutally so, and are trying to be transparent about the financial state of the franchise. However, there is a difference between being truthful and beating someone over the head with the truth.

It’s likely the supporters of the team know what the owners want to spend on players with the trades over the past few years of Corey Kluber, Trevor Bauer, and Mike Clevinger, as well as the loss of Michael Brantley to free agency.

In theory, many people thought those moves were made to free up money to spend on either younger impact players. That didn’t turn out to be the case.

We know and understand the Cleveland Indians cannot spend on players the same amount of money that the New York Yankees, Boston Red Sox, and Los Angeles Dodgers spend. But why can’t they spend what the Cincinnati Reds, Minnesota Twins, and Milwaukee Brewers can?

And although we don’t live in those cities, so we don’t know the message the ownership provides to the fans, we would doubt it isn’t the constant “woe is us” message Indians’ fans receive from the ownership here.

We would agree with declining the club option for Carlos Santana and although we would pick up Brad Hand’s option with the hope of trading him, he wouldn’t be terribly angry if they simply let the southpaw go when the World Series ends.

Unfortunately, it seems like the same modus operandi will be in place. The Indians will trim these salaries and not spend them on players to help the remaining players.

Remember, this isn’t a rebuilding situation for the Tribe. They made the playoffs from 2016-18, missed in 2019 even though they won 93 games, and made the post-season this season.

They have a cadre of young, controlled starting pitchers, led by 25-year-old Shane Bieber, the likely AL Cy Young Award winner. Their best two position players are 27 and 26, and both would rank in the top 25 players in the sport.

Why wouldn’t you want to make a push and try to bolster the roster around these players? Maybe the Indians will be better in 2021, but it puts a lot of pressure on everyone, including apparently many young, inexperienced players to perform at a very high level.

This is probably just the first in what should be many such talks from the Indians’ organization telling their customers not to get high expectations.

It’s a dreadful situation if you are a fan of the Tribe.

On The Clevinger/Plesac Situation

When it was announced on August 9th that Cleveland Indians’ pitcher Zach Plesac had violated the protocol for COVID-19, it was greeted as a mistake made by a kid, an unfortunate error, but the hope was neither Plesac or any of his teammates would be infected.

The next day it was revealed that Mike Clevinger was with Plesac, and compounded the error by not letting anyone know, and flying back to Cleveland on the team plane.

Suddenly, the Tribe’s vaunted starting rotation was missing two pieces in a shortened season.

Now, a week later, the question of how this will play out is still up in the air.

ESPN’s Jeff Passan reported yesterday that veteran reliever Oliver Perez said he would opt out if the duo was returned to the active roster, and reportedly, the players as a whole are still very upset (and rightly so) that they were lied to by their teammates.

At the end of the day, the Indians’ organization has to do what is best for themselves both from a clubhouse standpoint and perhaps more importantly a competitive one.

There is no question the 2020 edition of the Tribe is better with Mike Clevinger and Zach Plesac in the starting rotation. If they weren’t, then Adam Plutko would have been in the rotation to open the season, and one or both would have been in the satellite camp.

You have to also understand the players know this too.

That’s why talk of releasing the pair or trading them for essentially 20 cents on the dollar doesn’t make sense. The party who loses in this scenario is the Cleveland Indians.

People have referenced the Trevor Bauer transaction last season after the pitcher threw the ball over the centerfield fence in Kansas City in an act of frustration, but the Tribe got quite a haul for the right-hander, although we still think the deal was made more with 2020 in mind.

Our guess is if the return wasn’t there, Bauer would have finished the season in Cleveland. And we say that understanding Bauer didn’t put his teammates’ health in jeopardy.

At 13-9 during this abbreviated baseball schedule, the Tribe certainly has a solid chance to make the post-season, and perhaps win the division. The strength of the ballclub is the starting pitching. That would certainly be diminished without the men who started the second and fifth games of the season.

Without a doubt, the schedule was on the front office’s side in the disciplining of Clevinger and Plesac with three off days in an eight day span. Plutko has started twice in place of the former, and was okay in one start, and not so good in the other.

The team could’ve made the move to send Plesac to the minors anyway with all of the off days to bring up an extra position player or reliever.

We don’t want to marginalize the potential danger the pair put their teammates in, particularly when they saw the situations in Miami and St. Louis. Their reputations took a hit, as well they should have, but people need to understand this is not high school or college, so lesson learning cannot be the entire thing here.

This is professional sports and the players get paid to perform to the best of their abilities and the team is trying to win. Mike Clevinger and Zach Plesac help the Indians in that pursuit.

And their teammates should understand they need them to win as well. So, cooler heads need to prevail.

First, both players need to throw themselves on the mercy of the rest of the roster. Be sincere, and in Plesac’s case, stop putting yourself out there on social media.

The team needs to accept this apology and start the healing process. Yes, the trust was broken, and only time will tell if it can be repaired.

There have been “bad guys” who have played Major League Baseball in the past, some who are well known (Ty Cobb), and others who have flown under the radar. We know the Indians’ clubhouse is especially tight knit, but no one says you have to like the people you work with, although it is nice.

It may sound callous to some, but the Cleveland Indians are a better team, and have a better chance to win with Clevinger and Plesac. Let’s hope everyone involved can understand this as well.

Tribe Is A Different Team, Are They Better?

The Cleveland Indians were involved in a blockbuster trade Tuesday night, trading starter Trevor Bauer to Cincinnati in the three team deal that netted the Tribe slugging outfielders Yasiel Puig, Franmil Reyes, left handed prospect Logan Allen, and two lower level prospects.

Certainly, president Chris Antonetti and GM Mike Chernoff addressed the club’s offensive issues, the Indians rank 10th in the AL in runs scored. It was needed to keep the team in the playoff race.

The question is did they damage the club’s biggest strength, the starting rotation.

During the winter, we advocated for trading a starting pitcher because of the rotation depth, but at that time, Corey Kluber and Carlos Carrasco were healthy, and you had five above average starters.

While we understand Bauer wasn’t having the same success he had a year ago, he still is one of the league’s better pitchers, and there was a certain comfort of knowing when he went to the mound, and the same can be said about Mike Clevinger and Shane Bieber, Cleveland has a pretty good chance of winning.

Now, instead of three nights out of five with that feeling, you are down to two.

This isn’t to denigrate Zach Plesac, who has made just 12 big league starts, and has pitched pretty well, but he doesn’t have the experience or the track record to garner that confidence.

As for the other two spots, right now they are being filled by Adam Plutko, who is a really a hit or miss proposition at this point, and Danny Salazar, who hasn’t pitched in a big league game since 2017.

And as for the return of Corey Kluber from his broken arm, remember, he wasn’t pitching well when he got hurt, and he will have missed three and a half months by the time he returns.

If anyone knows how he will perform when he gets back, please send us the winning numbers for the next Mega Millions drawing.

Yes, the Indians will score more runs, but the fear is instead of losing 2-0 against good teams, they will now lose 7-5.

Could the Tribe have updated the offense without giving up Bauer, possibly by getting a couple of rentals, which by the way, Puig is? We will never now.

Allen is a top 100 prospect in the game, but he has struggled in the majors with San Diego and at AAA this season, so it is doubtful he will help the big league club in 2019.

We are all for trading from a strength, but we didn’t feel the Indians had an excess of starting pitchers, not with the injury to Kluber and Carlos Carrasco’s illness.

Perhaps we’d feel differently if the Indians’ upgraded the bullpen, but they didn’t, so we don’t think Terry Francona can lean on his relievers to make up for the absence of Bauer.

Remember, Bauer’s ability to throw around 120 pitches per start helped protect the bullpen, and there is no one who will take over in the rotation who is capable of that.

Did this trade make the Indians a better team than they were on Monday? We can’t be certain.

The Tribe is better offensively, but their rotation isn’t as deep, and their bullpen isn’t any better, and that’s a big factor.

For the Indians to overtake Minnesota or win a wild card berth, the key will be how well the starting pitching is. If Plesac can continue his strong rookie season, if Salazar can show a glimpse of the pitcher he was in 2013-mid 2016, if Kluber can return to his Cy Young form.

As we well now, that word, “if” might be the biggest word there is.

An Eventful Sunday For Tribe

Sunday was an eventful day for the Cleveland Indians, although not all of it was positive.

First, their modest four game winning streak was ended by Kansas City, so the team returns for a nine game home stand after a 5-2 trip.

They come back for a series against the American League’s best team, the Houston Astros, trailing the Minnesota Twins by two games in the Central Division, and leading the wild card standings by three games over Oakland and 3-1/2 over Tampa.

Oh, and one of their starting pitchers threw a conniption fit on pitcher’s mound.

Was it the big deal it became on social media? No, but it wasn’t a good look for Trevor Bauer, who threw a baseball against the screen between the Royals’ dugout and home plate, and fired another one over the centerfield wall.

The right-hander showed remorse almost immediately, apologizing to Terry Francona as he reached the mound, and doing the same in the dugout and after the game issued a statement saying he had no excuse for his actions.

Still, is this any different than a pitcher punching a wall or knocking over the Gatorade cooler after a bad performance? We believe Bauer is being truthful that the frustration was directed at himself and the sport, not at any of his teammates.

We would think everyone in the clubhouse knows Bauer and gets that he cares about performing his best above everything, and he feels he let his team down.

Our guess is this: If you like the competitor in Bauer, you don’t have a huge problem with what he did, and if you dislike him for his off the field beliefs, you think he is the locker room cancer.

And it is doubtful this changed his trade value, other teams know about this personality trait, nor does it change our mind about dealing Bauer. We still wouldn’t unless you can get a legitimate starter in return or in another deal.

Besides the loss and the Bauer stuff, the Indians also made a minor deal, sending Class A OF Ruben Cardenas to Tampa Bay for relief pitcher Hunter Wood and infielder Christian Arroyo.

Wood, who will turn 26 in a couple of weeks, is a righty, and has a lifetime 3.20 ERA in a little over 70 innings pitched with the Rays, and strikeout close to a batter per inning. He will be sent to Columbus for now.

Arroyo is a former top 100 prospect as recently as 2016, while in the Giants organization, but has been plagued by injuries the past three years, playing 59, 68, and 49 games the past three seasons.

He has a 984 OPS in AAA this year, and never struck out more than 73 times in a minor league season.

We look at this move similarly to the move which brought Oscar Mercado here at the trade deadline this time last year.

If he can stay healthy, and he’s on the 60 day injured list right now, he could be in the mix for a big league job next season, particularly because it is doubtful Jason Kipnis will be back.

He just turned 24 years old, and is a right-handed hitter.

It’s not the big move people wanted (they still have time), but it’s the kind of under the radar move the Tribe front office has made in the past.

So, for the last day before the schedule starts to get tougher, it sure was eventful for the Cleveland Indians.

The Only Way A Bauer Deal Makes Sense

The rumors keep swirling around Major League Baseball about the Indians trading Trevor Bauer, and quite frankly we don’t understand it.

Yes, we understand that Bauer is going to get a significant increase in pay for 2020 through the arbitration process, and is going to be a free agent following that season.

We hear the arguments about dealing Bauer and improving the team now, and if you can do that, we are all ears. We have said it many times before, we would trade anyone for the right price.

And maybe someone will pay that price for Trevor Bauer, we just don’t think anyone will.

That’s because the right price for Bauer would include getting a major league starting pitcher in return. That’s what the Indians need unless they decide to do the mind boggling task of giving up on a season in which they are on pace to win more than 90 games.

No one has been more critical of the Indians’ offense than us, and the series against the Twins showed the need to fill holes in the lineup, even with Jose Ramirez starting to resemble the guy who finished in the top three of the MVP voting the past two seasons.

However, trading Bauer for someone who can impact the lineup right now and not getting a MLB caliber starter as part of the package is just robbing Peter to pay Paul.

If you deal Bauer, you have a shortage of starting pitching in our opinion.

One of the reasons the Indians are in possession of a playoff spot right now is their pitching, which ranks second in the American League in ERA, and the strength of that staff recently is the ability to trot Bauer, Mike Clevinger, and Shane Bieber out there every three of five games.

Moving Bauer creates a void in that strength. Without him, your rotation is Clevinger, Bieber, Adam Plutko, rookie Zach Plesac, and who? Another rookie in Aaron Civale?

Can you win enough games to make the playoffs with this rotation?

And spare us the “we’ll get Corey Kluber and maybe Carlos Carrasco back soon” talk.

If you can tell us how Kluber will pitch when he comes back, then please supply us with the next numbers for the MegaMillions drawing. Kluber was up and down before he was injured, and he is basically starting his season over.

Could Kluber be the pitcher he has been for the last five years? Sure. Is it worth gambling a playoff spot on that chance? Of course not.

We understand the offense is still below par, so go out and get a rental bat, even though we know the front office doesn’t like to do that. Let’s say you can get a Nicholas Castellanos for a prospect not currently in the Cleveland top ten?

That way you boost the offense without touching the rotation.

Or you can get a young starter with some big league experience in exchange for Bauer. We don’t think a team will do that with Bauer eligible for a big payday in ’20 and free agency in ’21.

Maybe you make two deals, one for a starter, say Marcus Stroman, and then move Bauer somewhere else.

That would be more prudent so you can continue to compete this season.

The Minnesota Twins are a good team, but they no longer have a 10 game lead in the division, it’s now three. You can’t weaken the strength of this team, which is starting pitching.

If you make the team better, then make the deal. But if you are going to weaken part of the team to fix something else, that doesn’t make sense.

Sell Mode For The Tribe? Ridiculous!

It is funny to us that we hear many people, both fans and media, talk about whether or not the management of the Cleveland Indians wants to chase a playoff spot if it happens to be a wild card.

Why try to make moves to get you in a one game playoff? Well, if you win that game you advance to the Division Series, which is a best of five series.

Secondly, if you make the wild card game, you have a chance to win the World Series. Heck, in 2014, the Royals beat the A’s in the one game winner take all event, and actually were trailing late in that game, and they went to the seventh game of the World Series before losing to the San Francisco Giants.

If you don’t make the playoffs, even a wild card game berth, you have no chance to win.

To a sporting person, it is crazy not to take a shot at getting in, even if it is for just one game.

This isn’t the NBA, were probably at most five of the 16 teams to make the playoffs have a legitimate chance to win the title, so if you finish 6th or 7th in the conference standings say, three years in a row, you would likely be better off to miss the post-season festivities.

But the nature of baseball is if you can play in October, you have a chance to win.

Did anyone really think the Indians would beat the Red Sox in the 2016 Division Series once Carlos Carrasco went down? Remember, the Tribe started Josh Tomlin in Game 3 at Fenway Park.

Then, they beat Toronto in five games using Ryan Merritt to start one game, Tomlin started another, and a third game was a essentially a bullpen game because of Trevor Bauer’s bloody finger.

If you get into a series, anything can happen.

We understand the Indians lost to New York in ’17 after being up two games to none, but folks forget the third game was a 1-0 loss. That’s how close the Tribe came to a sweep.

As for last year’s sweep at the hands of the Astros, here were the scores of the games going into the 7th inning–

Game 1: Houston 4, Cleveland 2
Game 2: Houston 2, Cleveland 1
Game 3: Cleveland 2, Houston 1

Not playing coulda, shoulda, woulda, but it wasn’t like the Astros dominated right from the word go.

The point is the Indians had a chance to win each game late. They didn’t, but with a better bullpen and a tad more hitting, people might have a different viewpoint.

Besides, we have a hard time giving up on a season, particularly when you are 11 games over .500, which the Indians are right now.

We lived through the drought from 1959-1994, when hitting the .500 mark was considered a good season. When you have a good team, and you have a chance to make the post-season, you have to take a shot.

Now, we wouldn’t mortgage the future for a one game playoff, but the Indians do have some depth in the farm system and we wouldn’t be opposed to moving a middle of the road prospect for someone who can improve the roster now.

Baseball is a different sport. Using the same strategy and thought process used in football and basketball is ridiculous.

Getting to the post-season gives you a reasonable chance to win. The Indians should take advantage of that chance in 2019.

Tribe Needs To Cash In Bauer Right Away

The Cleveland Indians are 11-1/2 games behind the Central Division leading Minnesota Twins heading into a three game series against them starting tonight at Progressive Field.

Nobody saw that coming, mostly because no one thought the Twins would have the best record in baseball in the first week of June.

Even though the trail in the division by that huge margin, the Indians are just two games out of the second wild card spot and a chance to be the AL Champs.

The problem is, they can’t accomplish this with the roster they currently have. They need to make a bold move, and do it as soon as possible.

Unfortunately, this front office has never been a group to keep moves to come from behind. In 2016, when the Indians were in first place by around five games after the All Star Game, that’s when they traded for Andrew Miller, and attempted to deal for Jonathan Lucroy.

If the front office and ownership would be willing to salvage the season and get back to the post-season for the fourth straight year, they have one logical move to make, and it would be tremendously bold: Trade Trevor Bauer for some hitting.

This pains us to say it because we have always been a fan of the right-hander, since he arrived in Cleveland after the 2012 season.

In his first year in the organization, he was a spot starter, coming up for doubleheaders and some other spot starts. He progressed to a back of the rotation starter to one of the AL’s best starters in his tenure here.

A contending team should be willing to pay a high price for Bauer, a guy who takes the ball every fifth day, and is eager to pitch on short rest.

He is also under club control through the end of next season, meaning whoever would deal for him has him for a year and a half. And moving him sooner than later may just save the 2019 season for Cleveland, but also allow him to make maybe 12 additional starts for his new team.

If you can get two major league ready hitters for Bauer, which obviously limits who he could be dealt to, we say do it right now. There is no need to wait.

Right now, with Jose Ramirez in his lengthy slump, the legitimate threats in the Indians’ batting order end with Carlos Santana in the #3 hole. Getting two more bats would lengthen the lineup and should result in better results.

And if Ramirez returns to form, and he has shown subtle signs he is starting to, then that’s all the better. Suddenly, we start to resemble a big league offense.

Even without Bauer, your starting rotation is acceptable, assuming Mike Clevinger returns soon. Terry Francona can still trot out Carlos Carrasco, Shane Bieber, Clevinger, Jefry Rodriguez, and Zach Plesac out there on the nightly basis, although we know the latter two are very much unproven.

You have to score runs to make the post-season in baseball, and the AL Central is proof of that. The Twins lead the league in runs scored. The other four teams in the division are in the lower half of the league. That explains the 11-1/2 game lead.

Forget about the talk of the window closing and even that the season is over. If you can pull off a deal soon, you will have a better offense and a solid pitching staff.

And you will be set up for contention again in 2020. The time to act is now.

For All The Talk About Hitting, Tribe Chances Depend On Starters

The Indians unlikely come from behind win over Boston Tuesday signaled the 1/3rd mark of the Major League Baseball season, and the Tribe sits right at .500.

They went 15-12 during the first 27 games of the season, so they reversed that mark over the next 27 contests.

Depending on your perspective, the Indians were either a huge disappointment to this point, or they are extremely fortunate to be at the break even mark considering the state of their offense.

We are well aware of the offensive issues at this point. Cleveland ranks in the bottom three in the American League in most offensive categories, but the most concerning thing might just be the starting pitching staff.

The starters were supposed to be the part of the team that Terry Francona would lean on. The quintet of Corey Kluber, Carlos Carrasco, Trevor Bauer, Mike Clevinger, and Shane Bieber were thought to be the best in the game.

Injuries have ravaged the rotation.

Clevinger was the first to go down, making just two starts before going down with an upper back muscle pull.

The bell cow of the staff, Kluber, always good for 200 innings over the last five years, fractured his arm getting hit by a line drive.

That forced Francona to use Jefry Rodriguez for seven starts (the same as Kluber), and Cody Anderson, and Adam Plutko have each received two starts. Zach Plesac, who wasn’t even considered in the big league club’s plans in spring training, made his major league debut on Tuesday.

It hasn’t been just the injuries though. Bauer was dynamite in April, but suffered through a poor May. Carrasco has been prone to the home run ball, allowing 14 on the season.

He has a very good 72 strikeouts to just 10 walks, but he’s allowing more hits than innings pitched, something he hasn’t done since he returned to the starting rotation in 2014. Normally one of the most reliable starting pitchers in the game, he has been anything but that in 2019.

Kluber wasn’t very good before he was injured either. The normally precise righty walked in runs twice this season, something he never did in his career. And he’s allowed more hits than innings pitched as well.

To this point, the guy who was the fifth starter coming into the year, has been the most effective. Bieber has the best ERA at 3.67, has allowed less hits than innings pitched (58 in 68-2/3) and has fanned 85 batters, walking just 17.

He didn’t have great stuff Wednesday night in the 14-9 win over the Red Sox, but still persevered long enough to get the win.

If the Indians are to get back in the race for the division title, and despite what you hear, there is still plenty of time to do just that, they need the April edition of Bauer, and the Carrasco they have seen in over the last four seasons.

Despite the recent offensive explosion in the past few days, we don’t think the Indians, as constituted, will be an offensive juggernaut. They need outstanding starting pitching.

The hitting being what it is, the determining factor on the Indians getting into the divisional title race will be the starting pitching. It simply has to get back to its expected level.