Cleveland Sports Forum

Andrew Miller mentions:

1. Defense
2. Baserunning
3. Tito

A great remake of what this team has been about. In the past, defense and baserunning were afterthoughts. And nice mix of vets and kids.

WAHOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!

Wow, that was nerve wracking and anxiety producing and FUN!

And absolutely total agree that:

[A great remake of what this team has been about. In the past, defense and baserunning were afterthoughts. And nice mix of vets and kids.

It remains very difficult to go through the roster, position by position and player by player, and see a championship contender, but as a brilliantly managed unit they are ultimate overachievers. Who knows how much farther they go but this has been a stellar season. And remarkable to say, but so far, we can't say that there is anyway we could be a better position than we are now IF ONLY Carrasco and Brantley and Salazar were healthy and available. Home field advantage for the ALCS.

here is a prediction site which, of course, posts Indians as underdogs vs. Jays.

http://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/201 ... edictions/

Jays are 54% choice to win the series. Indians are 20% chance to win the World Series, with Cubs of course the first choice of the odds makers at 32%

Just got my tix for Friday night!
They went on sale at 10 AM, and are probably sold out by now.

At first I kept getting error messages, like "tickets are not available in the price range you selected" or "Can't complete the transaction due to high volume - try again"

BUT I was persistent, and finally was able to buy at 10:30

GO TRIBE!

Had Brantley been healthy, Jose Ramirez might not have gotten as much playing time.

civ ollilavad wrote:here is a prediction site which, of course, posts Indians as underdogs vs. Jays.

http://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/201 ... edictions/

Jays are 54% choice to win the series. Indians are 20% chance to win the World Series, with Cubs of course the first choice of the odds makers at 32%

Not really a prediction site. It is analytic site in which they use predefined metrics to derive a chance of victory.

Blue Jays-Indians: A position-by-position ALCS look

First postseason matchup between Cleveland and Toronto appears even

By Mike Petriello / MLB.com | @mike_petriello | 11:35 AM ET + 82 COMMENTS

An American League Championship Series featuring Cleveland and Toronto is a fascinating matchup for so many reasons, and not just because Blue Jays executives Mark Shapiro (president/CEO) and Ross Atkins (general manager) worked for the Indians for nearly 40 combined seasons before joining the Blue Jays last year.

Neither team has represented the AL in the World Series since the 1990s, so that's at least one drought that will come to an end when the series begins on Friday night (8 p.m. ET on TBS in the U.S.; Sportsnet and RDS in Canada), and it doesn't take a ton of imagination to envision a scenario where Andrew Miller is in to face Jose Bautista with the game on the line -- even if "on the line" ends up being in the sixth inning.

What we do know is that as we go through strengths and weaknesses, we'll note which players just had a big AL Division Series, but we won't let that overshadow the advantages. After all, a player who performed for months or the entire season has a much better track record than one who did so only for three games in a short series. Let's go position by position for strengths and weaknesses between Cleveland and Toronto.

Catcher

Let's prove that right away, because while it is true that Roberto Perez came up with some big moments in the ALDS against Boston, it's also true that he hit .183/.285/.294 (58 Weighted Runs Created Plus, where 100 is league average) this season, and the semi-healthy Yan Gomes didn't bat against the Red Sox at all. While Russell Martin had just one hit against Texas, it was a big Game 3 home run, and Martin's very good second half (122 wRC+) and long track record help overcome his poor first half (77 wRC+).

Big advantage: Toronto

First base

Both sides have big sluggers here, but Edwin Encarnacion (.263/.357/.529, 134 wRC+, 42 homers) outhit Mike Napoli (.239/.335/.465, 113 wRC+, 34 homers) during the regular season, and he has more home runs (three) in the postseason than Napoli has hits (two). That this is a big advantage for Toronto is not a knock on Napoli at all, since he's experienced and very good. It's just recognition for Encarnacion, long one of baseball's most underappreciated sluggers.

Advantage: Toronto

Second base

Devon Travis had a productive season (.300/.332/.454, 109 wRC+), but he also sat out the final two games of the ALDS with a sore knee, forcing the Blue Jays to go with the plus glove and limited hitting skills of Darwin Barney (career .249/.297/.343, 73 wRC+). Even if Travis were healthy, he can't compete with the excellent Jason Kipnis (.275/.343/.469, 117 wRC+), who just put up his fourth elite season in the past five and set a career high with 23 home runs.

Big advantage: Cleveland

Shortstop

If we did care only about postseason numbers -- and we don't -- this would be a tie, because Troy Tulowitzki and Francisco Lindor both had a homer, another extra-base hit and refused to walk. But while Tulowitzki (.254/.318/.443, 102 wRC+) is still capable of big moments, he's pretty much a league-average hitter these days, while Lindor (.301/.358/.435, 112 wRC+) slugged as well as Tulowitzki did -- just with better on-base skills, better baserunning and better defense. He's one of baseball's elite young stars.

Advantage: Cleveland

Third base

Are we still worried about Josh Donaldson's health? A poor September amid reports of a sore hip fueled worry that the 2015 AL MVP Award winner wasn't operating at full strength, and he may not be, but five doubles among nine hits -- and a series-winning dash from third to home you may have heard about -- after a very good .284/.404/.549 (155 wRC+) season should help put some of those concerns to rest. We shouldn't overlook Jose Ramirez (.312/.363/.462, 122 wRC+), but he's not Donaldson.

Advantage: Toronto

Left field

Though Ezequiel Carrera and Coco Crisp were the main starters in left, we also saw Michael Saunders, Melvin Upton Jr. and Brandon Guyer at various points over the past few days. That gives both managers the flexibility to pick and choose strengths and weaknesses, like how Guyer crushes lefties (career .288/.390/.469, 144 wRC+). The Tribe will have to replace Crisp's weak throwing arm, measured by Statcast™ at just 78.6 mph on "competitive" throws, in the late innings. Given the wide variety of skills here, neither side has a strong advantage.

Advantage: Push

Center field

Tyler Naquin (.296/.372/.514, 135 wRC+) had himself a smashing rookie season, but he also managed just four plate appearances in the ALDS, because he's a lefty who never faces lefty pitchers. With southpaws J.A. Happ, Brett Cecil and (maybe) Francisco Liriano available, we'll see a fair bit of Rajai Davis here, as he's got a good career line against lefties (.288/.343/.437, 112 wRC+), and he also stole 43 bases this year. Meanwhile, Kevin Pillar's strength is his outstanding defense (second only to Kevin Kiermaier among center fielders in DRS), but he didn't hit well this year (.267/.303/.375, 80 wRC+) and had just three hits in 17 ALDS plate appearances.

Small advantage: Cleveland

Right field

There's been some fair talk that at 35 and after having dealt with injuries this year, Bautista (.234/.366/.452, 122 wRC+) isn't quite the superstar he once was, and perhaps that's fair. But he's still a considerably above-average hitter, with more on-base skills and pop in his bat than Lonnie Chisenhall (.286/.328/.439, 103 wRC+). Carrera is available here as a defensive replacement, too.

Advantage: Blue Jays

Designated hitter

This can be a bit of a rotating spot for the Blue Jays, though Saunders started three of the four postseason games so far. Though he had an All-Star first half, his second half (.178/.282/.357, 69 wRC+) left a lot to be desired. Meanwhile, Carlos Santana (.259/.366/.498, 132 wRC+, 34 homers) put up the best year of what's becoming a very impressive career, giving the Indians the clear edge.

Advantage: Cleveland

Bench

Depending on the lineups, Cleveland could have Guyer and Davis available, which is useful, though Michael Martinez doesn't add much and it's unknown what Gomes will be able to contribute. It's almost the exact same story on the Toronto side, since there's good outfield depth, an injury concern in Travis and not much bat from Barney or Ryan Goins.

Advantage: Push

Starting pitcher

We all knew that the injuries to Carlos Carrasco and Danny Salazar presented a huge issue for the Indians headed into the ALDS, but it was also uncertain what Corey Kluber would be able to give after suffering a quad injury in his final start of the season. He looked fantastic in his lone start (seven shutout innings in Game 2) and should once again be viewed as an ace. He's the best starter in this series and will be on full rest for Game 1. That said, Toronto's depth -- with Happ, Marco Estrada, Marcus Stroman and Aaron Sanchez -- outweighs what the Tribe can offer with Trevor Bauer, Josh Tomlin, and uncertainty after that. Cleveland's rotation deserves a ton of credit for holding down a great Boston offense, but this edge still goes to the Blue Jays.

Small advantage: Blue Jays

Closer

Roberto Osuna had a poor finish to the season, and then had to leave the AL Wild Card Game with shoulder soreness, so to then see what he did in the ALDS -- 3 2/3 scoreless with one hit allowed -- was stunning. It's easy to forget that he's still just 21, yet over two years in the bigs, he's got a 157/30 K/BB in 143 2/3 innings, making him an elite closer. Cody Allen, meanwhile, has become a very underrated closer himself, especially now that Miller is around to take the spotlight. These are two extremely good pitchers, without a clear edge on either side.

Small advantage: Push

Relief pitchers

Let's give a ton of credit to the much-maligned Blue Jays bullpen, which came into the postseason looking like it was in disarray, and then managed to allow just two earned runs in 14 innings. Toronto relievers didn't weigh down the roster; in fact, they helped set up those big extra-innings wins. Still, this is the Indians' bread and butter, especially with Miller available to enter at any time for multiple innings, along with the underrated Bryan Shaw and Dan Otero. This unit helped Cleveland beat Boston, and they'll need to do the same against Toronto.

Big advantage: Cleveland

Tribe can press big baserunning advantage in ALCS

Cleveland's 134 stolen bases most since 1999 team had 147

By Mike Petriello / MLB.com | @mike_petriello | 4:55 PM ET + 1 COMMENT

In a matchup as tight as the Cleveland vs. Toronto pairing seems to be, little things can make all the difference. That figures to be the case when the American League Championship Series begins on Friday (8 p.m. ET on TBS and, in Canada, Sportsnet and RDS) at Progressive Field.

So while there's understandably plenty of focus on the Blue Jays' edge in the rotation or the Indians' edge in the bullpen or how big of an advantage Kevin Pillar's elite defense provides in the outfield, let's look at the basepaths -- because there's potentially a big strength for Cleveland to exploit against Toronto. The Indians can run wild, and the Blue Jays may not be able to prevent it.

Let's share what we mean ...

Cleveland is outstanding at steals, and Toronto isn't good at stopping them

The Indians quietly stole the most bases in the AL (134), which was their highest total since the 1999 team of Omar Vizquel, Kenny Lofton and Roberto Alomar stole 147. If you prefer looking at success rate rather than raw totals, then manager Terry Francona's team and its 81.2 percent success rate finished second in the Majors only to Arizona, and not by a whole lot (the D-backs were at 81.6 percent). Rajai Davis' 43 steals were the fourth most in the Majors and the most the team had seen since Vizquel's 42 in that '99 season.

So Cleveland likes to run wild on the bases, and that's perhaps a problem for Toronto. The Blue Jays tied for the fewest times catching baserunners stealing (20), and their 19 percent caught-stealing rate (when the Major League average was 28 percent) was the third lowest. Russell Martin threw out just 11 of 72 runners, a 15 percent success rate. You can't blame knuckleballer R.A. Dickey, either; he allowed only two steals all year long.

"Numbers lie," Martin said when asked if he was concerned about Toronto's lack of success throwing out runners this year. "That's why if they want to take their chance, what I'm best at in life is catching and throwing. I don't want to sound overconfident, but it's a big part of my game. So to me, it's a non-issue ...

"Controlling the basepaths is something I've done my whole career, and it's exciting for me. I like when people run. It gives me a challenge, and I love challenges. I hope they run a lot."

Cleveland is outstanding at running the bases in general

There's more to life, and baseball, than just stolen bases. There's taking the extra base on a sacrifice fly. There's going first to third on a single. There's making it home safely from second on a single. There's a lot of important baserunning variables.

Now, there's a few ways to quantify that. There's the simple ways, like noting that Cleveland's Extra Bases Taken percentage was the second best in the Majors (45 percent, when the average was 40 percent) or that no team scored from second on a single more often (129, when the average was 101).

There's also the advanced ways, like FanGraphs' BaseRunning Runs, which accounts for most everything a runner can do on the bases. Cleveland ranks high there as well, coming in third with +17 runs added. Individually, Davis (second) and Jose Ramirez (fifth) were both in the top five, with only the elite Billy Hamilton topping Davis.

"It's not necessarily that they're the fastest," Blue Jays right fielder Jose Bautista said. "They might be good at taking chances and being aggressive, which opens the door for us, if we execute, to throw a lot of them out. Kind of like the situation the Angels run themselves into sometimes.

"I don't think we should change anything. We have pretty good arms in the outfield ... We have to be positioned well, our pitchers have to execute so our positioning can come into play. Hopefully they hit the ball hard enough to where we have a chance to throw them out. And if they want to take those chances, we welcome that and challenge them to do so, because we feel good about our defense."

The Indians are outstanding at turning 90 feet into something shorter

So why are the Indians so successful on the bases? Without question, Cleveland has fast, heads-up runners, but it also does something interesting to help itself -- taking good, strong primary leads, which we can measure with Statcast™.

For example, let's just look at steal attempts to second and see how far off the baserunners were when the pitcher made his first move to the plate. The Major League average for those plays is 11.3 feet, and we have 63 players who have tried at least 10 attempts to look at.

The Indians have three players in the top 15, including Francisco Lindor (fifth, 12.4 feet), Jason Kipnis (10th, 12.2) and Davis (15th, 12). Ramirez also appears at 22nd, with an average lead of 11.8 feet. It helps to be fast, but it also helps to change the rules of the game. You don't have to run 90 feet between bases. You run 90 feet minus however much you can bite off with a lead. Cleveland's runners do just that.

"As long as I don't take too long making the pitch, I don't think too many guys are going to try to steal," Blue Jays Game 1 starter Marco Estrada said. "We've got one of the best catchers behind the plate. So if they want to try to steal, go ahead. Russ, you know, he's got a cannon. He's quick releasing it, he makes accurate throws. So it makes my job that much easier."

Toronto's outfield arms are not a strength

While it's on Martin and Toronto's pitchers to prevent Cleveland from stealing bases, it's on the Blue Jays' outfielders to hold Davis, Ramirez and friends from taking extra bases or running home without fear.

While the Jays do have an elite ground-covering center fielder in Pillar, what they don't have is an outfield well-suited to taking out opposing runners. By an old-school number like assists, Toronto's 25 ranked 23rd, when the average was 29. By a newer metric like FanGraphs' "Arm" rating, which tracks not only assists but also how well an outfielder prevents a runner from even trying to advance, the Blue Jays are, again, 23rd.

And by Statcast™'s arm strengths, we can see that few of the Blue Jays have plus arms in terms of velocity. For example, we saw 16 outfield throws during the regular season that were clocked at 100 mph or more (two by Cleveland's Tyler Naquin), plus two more so far in the postseason. Toronto had only two above 95 mph all season long.

Looking at "competitive throws," the Blue Jays' outfield arms rank 18th, with an average of 88.7 mph. For comparison, Minnesota was the best at 93.4 mph, and Oakland the weakest at 83.6 mph. Given that the Major League average was 89, Toronto ranks about in the middle of the pack. While Melvin Upton Jr. (91.8 mph) leads the pack and Michael Saunders (90.7 mph) and Pillar (90.0 mph) are OK, Ezequiel Carrera (86.9 mph) and -- shockingly, given his reputation, but perhaps not given last year's serious shoulder injury -- Bautista (84.4 mph) can be run on.

This aspect of the game probably won't decide the series on its own. But in a tight pairing where anything can happen, maybe it will. We certainly saw how Josh Donaldson's aggressive baserunning and the inability of the Rangers to prevent it mattered in getting Toronto here in the first place, didn't we?

"You have to play good, smart, clean baseball in the postseason," Pillar said. "I think we've done that so far in the four games that we've played. We've done the little things right. But last year is a huge reminder of how quickly things can turn. One moment you're cruising, you make a mistake, you're looking up the scoreboard and you're losing the game."

Weighing the advantages vs. disadvantages article.

I think the Starting Pitching angle is flawed. Kluber is the best pitcher in the series. But their biggest advantage our our disadvantage is depth.

What isn't mentioned is the Manager, We have the advantage there.

And with the position players I think the focus is too much on offense and not defense. Catcher specifically.

But hey they get paid to write articles, not me.

I thought that about catcher too!

Ha, well to me any article on analysis is useless at this point. Completely useless.

I could analyze the Detroit Tigers and come to the conclusion they have an advantage over the Tribe.

I certainly could analyze the Red Sox and come to the conclusion that they have the advantage.

How did those work out?

Forget it, if I had to lay money down I would have lost tons of it when the Indians swept the Red Sox. Just wish I had laid money down on the Tribe AFTER Carrasco and Salazar went down. Can only imagine what Vegas did to the odds after that.

As far as analysis, to me the Blue Jays have much better talent. Then again, the talent on the Indians just works. Why? Dunno.

So, for me, I will AGAIN be hoping this round that they can somehow find a way to combat that all star lineup and excellent rotation.

PS - I will say the Blue Jays have a better rotation than Boston though. Could be the difference.

Baron wrote: What isn't mentioned is the Manager, We have the advantage there.

No brainer. Tito is top 3.

Now we're all big Roberto Perez fans! But he deserves it: defense behind the plate is very important and martin's success vs. basestealers will be a major issue in the series.