Cleveland Sports Forum

I think a lot of people, sportswriters included, forget that Jose Ramirez is a pretty young player himself. He's only a little more than a year older than Lindor. In 2013 he was the fourth youngest player on a major league roster.

Up until this year, I thought that Ramirez got lost in the shuffle. Ramirez was an undrafted free agent when he signed. Lindor was the #1 pick of the Indians and 8th over all selection in the draft and naturally gets all the hype.

As it turns out, Jose is a pretty good ballplayer in his own right.

Jose is a good player. But I really think he can most useful as a supersub. That's not a bad role and define a successful career.

Trade bait!!!

Baseball America chooses its Rookie of the Year


2014 Rookie Of The Year: Abreu Quiets Critics With Dominant Debut


When Jose Abreu came out of Cuba—and even before then—one highly respected scout after another came back with the same report on the slugger who had decimated Serie Nacional pitching.

His bat is too slow. He’s a restricted athlete with a bad body. He can’t lay off hard sliders away. Sure, he has huge raw power, but there are too many holes in his swing. He’d make a great softball player.

“He’s turning 27 years old and has a career full of 85 to 87 mile an hour fastballs,” one international scout said. “He’s not an athlete and he doesn’t have bat speed. You’re asking a 27-year-old non-athlete to go to the big leagues and make an adjustment. Against 97 (mph), this guy has no chance. All of us who know him are all saying the same thing.”

All this for one of the greatest hitters Cuba has ever produced, who regularly posted an on-base percentage north of .500 and slugged over .800 in Serie Nacional, including a ridiculous .453/.597/.986 MVP campaign with 33 homers in 293 plate appearances in the 2010-11 season. Abreu had scouts who believed in him, but despite a record contract for a first-year Cuban player of six years, $68 million, plenty more were skeptical.

“It’s a dead-body guy who can barely play first base and can’t run a lick,” another international scout said. “I didn’t see the bat. He’s a mistake hitter who weighs 250 pounds, is going to hit .240 to .250 and will feast on fourth and fifth starters. He doesn’t have natural bat speed—it’s more of a strength swing. He’s a strong guy and when he centers the ball it goes a long way, but you can tie him up against marginal pitching.”

One year later, Abreu has silenced his critics on his way to winning Baseball America’s Rookie of the Year Award. Abreu, 27, hit .317/.383/.581 with 36 home runs, leading the majors in slugging with a 5.5 Wins Above Replacement (WAR), per Baseball-Reference.com.

So, how did the White Sox get it right while so many other talented scouts whiffed so badly on Abreu?

Yoenis Cespedes was the darling of the international scouting community when he came out. His combination of athleticism, bat speed, power, arm strength, premium position (at the time) and track record both in Cuba and during international competition tantalized scouts. They were right—Cespedes came almost exactly as advertised.

ROOKIE OF THE YEAR
2013 Jose Fernandez, rhp, Marlins
2012 Mike Trout, of, Angels
2011 Jeremy Hellickson, rhp, Rays
2010 Jason Heyward, of, Braves
2009 Andrew McCutchen, of, Pirates
2008 Geovany Soto, c, Cubs
2007 Ryan Braun, 3b, Brewers
2006 Justin Verlander, rhp, Tigers
2005 Huston Street, rhp, Athletics
2004 Khalil Greene, ss, Padres
2003 Brandon Webb, rhp, Diamondbacks
2002 Eric Hinske, 3b, Blue Jays
2001 Albert Pujols, of/3b/1b, Cardinals
2000 Rafael Furcal, ss/2b, Braves
1999 Carlos Beltran, of, Royals
1998 Kerry Wood, rhp, Cub
1997 Nomar Garciaparra, ss, Red Sox
1996 Derek Jeter, ss, Yankees
1995 Hideo Nomo, rhp, Dodgers
1994 Raul Mondesi, of, Dodgers
1993 Mike Piazza, c, Dodgers
1992 Pat Listach, ss, Brewers
1991 Jeff Bagwell, 1b, Astros
1990 Sandy Alomar, c, Indians
1989 Gregg Olson, rhp, Orioles

Teams were too light on Yasiel Puig, but that was understandable. Puig had barely played internationally, was suspended his final season in Cuba, then signed quickly after defecting to Mexico with minimal opportunity for teams to evaluate him.

Abreu’s case is more puzzling. In the three years before Abreu left Cuba, between all the international competitions Abreu participated in, there were more than 200 at-bats outside of Cuba that scouts could have seen in person. There was legitimate uncertainty around what to make of Puig, but Abreu was a maintstay on the Cuban national team. There was no mystery with Abreu, nor was there any long-term projection involved.

For the White Sox, the majority of their scouting on Abreu came from Marco Paddy, the team’s special assistant to the general manager in charge of international operations. The White Sox didn’t have anyone at the 2013 World Baseball Classic, but Paddy had scouted Abreu at four or five international tournaments, including while he ran Toronto’s international scouting until the White Sox hired him after the 2011 season.

Once Abreu left Cuba, the only time the White Sox saw him was at a two-day open showcase at the end of September in the Dominican Republic. Just two White Sox officials were in attendance: Paddy and vice president Ken Williams. They never held a private workout for Abreu. They didn’t need to—they were sold. Back in the front office, the team’s in-house analytics attempted to translate his Cuban performance and project his numbers against major league pitching. The team’s internal forecasts weren’t quite as robust as some of the public projections, but they suggested star upside.

The White Sox had access to the same information as every other team. They may have even had less than other clubs, since they weren’t operating off any video of Serie Nacional games. Yet they came away with a vastly different projection on Abreu compared to most of their competitors, and they didn’t realize at the time how many in the industry thought they were out of their minds.

“With every guy you sign, you’re always going to have a bit of concern,” Paddy said. “Nobody can say when you sign a guy, you don’t have any concerns. In the case of Jose, the one thing we liked was his bat stayed through the zone a long time. You can sit there, look at different stuff, but this guy’s bat stays in the zone. If it stays in the zone, you have a chance to hit the ball because that’s where the ball is.”

The White Sox didn’t see any issues with Abreu’s bat speed. At Abreu’s showcase, they saw him face pitchers throwing in the low-90s, and watched the first fastball he saw land over the right-center field fence. Paddy was already a believer and Williams liked what he had seen on video of international tournaments. That showcase just helped solidify their enthusiasm.

“The plus-plus power was what got him the most notoriety, but we viewed him as a more complete hitter than that,” White Sox general manager Rick Hahn said. “It wasn’t just an all-or-nothing, big swing home run guy, it was someone who had the ability to adjust and be a professional hitter.”

For all the concerns about Abreu’s ability to get beat by good velocity, he turned out to be one of the best fastball hitters in the majors. Against pitches of 95 mph or better, Abreu hit .325, according to Baseballsavant.com. By pitch type linear weights at FanGraphs, among qualified hitters, Abreu had the best results against fastballs of anyone in 2014.

“It’s a pretty simple swing,” Paddy said. “There was no interruption, no leg lift or anything, just a small lower half load with his front knee and then the bat is in position to hit right away. There weren’t any hitches. He just stood there, watched the ball, did his lower half load and his hands came right to the ball. He lets the ball travel as far as he could. I think sometimes you can be deceived by that. “With his lower half load, there wasn’t any leg lift kick, he didn’t dive into the ball—his lower half was pretty stiff already. He just did a little hip load, turned his knee in and his hands came through.

“It was a pretty simple approach. Everything was simple about it. He allowed the ball to travel quite a bit. Sometimes you commit too soon, but he’d just stand there and let the ball travel and let his hands come through. In those two days (at his open showcase), guys were throwing 93-94 mph, and it didn’t faze him at all.”

The White Sox weren’t completely on an island in their evaluation. But for a free agent in the prime of his career with no draft pick compensation attached, Abreu was a steal.

“In today’s market, paying slightly over $11 million in the free agent market roughly translates to about the league average player in terms of market value,” Hahn said. “For him to exceed that, we had a number of indicators that that was going to be at least what we were dealing with, and a decent likelihood that he was going to be able to exceed it.”

And that’s exactly it—even teams highest on Abreu weren’t willing to pay him more than a steady, average big leaguer. Teams had already seen the success of Cespedes and Puig. Owners weren’t afraid to pay premium dollars for foreign professionals who have yet to establish major league track records, with Daisuke Matsuzaka and Yu Darvish cashing in from Japan. Abreu signed in the same offseason as Masahiro Tanaka, who signed for seven years, $155 million, not including the $20 million posting fee the Yankees paid the Rakuten Eagles. Fellow 2014 free agents Carlos Beltran and Mike Napoli, both in their 30s, got paid more per year than Abreu.

“He’s an extremely intelligent hitter who made adjustments from at-bat to at-bat, something that’s only going to help him going forward now that he knows the league, knows how pitchers are going to try to get him out,” Hahn said. “He burst on the scene in the big way initially, then he had a minor slump there where pitchers started pitching him a little different, moving away from fastballs in to try to get him to expand out of the zone on breaking pitches away. Jose in turn adjusted to that and again became quite dangerous.

“Given not only his approach to hitting but his game overall, his level of preparation involved, how seriously he takes it, now that he knows the league, the potential is there for him to exceed his extraordinarily impressive debut.”

With Cespedes, the tools were electric. It’s easy to fall in love with a dynamic, high-energy athlete who has lightning bat speed, huge raw power, a rocket arm and does so many things that are just fun to watch.

Abreu was more cerebral. The power show he puts on in batting practice is eye-catching, although many scouts didn’t think he would be able to get to his power against major league pitching.

But unlike Cespedes, there isn’t much flashiness with Abreu. He’s not going to grace the cover of any fitness magazines or be confused for a track-and-field athlete. He doesn’t whip the bat through the zone with the ferocity of Bryce Harper or Giancarlo Stanton, but his timing at the plate is always on point, and he’s smart enough to make adjustments against better pitching.

If hitting a baseball is one of the hardest things to do in sports, determining who can hit major league pitching is still one of the hardest things to do in scouting.

If hitting a baseball is one of the hardest things to do in sports, determining who can hit major league pitching is still one of the hardest things to do in scouting.

Good thing we have Joez to spot the good ones

I watched Jose Abreu hit in the Cuban League for three years + the world competitions as well as the World Baseball Classic. It was a no brainer to pick Abreu as the Rookie of the Year. I figured that one out when he defected. I was hoping the Indians would have put a bid in for him but we had Nick Swisher.

Besides Jose Abreu, I watched all the other players that defected for the same amount of time. It was about 4 years ago that I found a station in Cuba that televised games nightly so I spent a lot of time watching these players although I've been following the winter leagues for over 10 years now. We passed on everyone of those players. I'm still watching the games, but it's like starting all over again. All of the good players have defected. The cupboard is nearly bare when it come to the stud players. We missed some nice opportunities.

Diminishing power not just an Indians issue

Club seeking deep, productive lineup with home runs down across Majors

CLEVELAND --

There has been a noticeable lack of thump in the heart of the Indians' lineup over the past several seasons. There have been fewer balls sent sailing to the Home Run Porch down the left-field line or clanking off the bleacher seats at Progressive Field.

When Cleveland's offense went stagnant in the second half this year, the annual cries for an impact bat to beef up the middle of the order became louder. It sounds so simple: go get a big bat, watch the power numbers soar and climb the standings. The only problem is that obtaining power is a growing problem throughout baseball.

"It's not just the Indians. It's league-wide right now," manager Terry Francona said at the end of the regular season. "Teams are trying to figure out the adjustments that need to be made, because the power is down, but the strikeouts aren't. So, how you move forward is going to be really interesting."

There is no denying that the Indians' offense went too quiet down the stretch, hurting the team's chances to remain in the postseason hunt. There is also no getting around the fact that Cleveland did not make a serious run at slugger Nelson Cruz last winter and the club lost out on the international market in recent years in the bidding wars Jose Abreu and Yoenis Cespedes.

[We put in a bid for Cespedes but didn't match Cespedes' offer by Oakland and dropped out of the bidding. Cespedes was the only Cuban defector that we showed any interest in]

This offseason, Cruz, Victor Martinez and Cuban outfield prospect Yasmany Tomas project as three of the top power bats on the open market.

It is fair to point out that Cleveland had Carlos Santana (27 home runs), Yan Gomes (21) and Michael Brantley (20) -- each originally acquired via trade -- reach at least 20 long balls apiece in the 2014 season. That was tied for the second-most players on a team to have 20 or more homers in the Majors last year. The Indians were tied with the Orioles, Tigers and Nationals for the most players (three) with at least 20 homers and 70 RBIs.

What that shows is that the Indians' top three power threats were among the best trios in all of baseball this past year. Given that those three players are under control through at least 2016, and potentially longer in all three cases, Cleveland is more focused on improving the lineup as a whole. The way the Indians see things, one bat is unlikely to make a dramatic difference under baseball's current circumstances.

"Even in high-run scoring environments," Indians general manager Chris Antonetti said, "you're looking for a long, deep lineup that you get a lot of guys that are capable of [solid run production]. What we've tried to do is, we want to have as deep a lineup as possible that's capable of scoring as many runs.

"When the run-scoring environment drops, then how you run the bases, how you play defense, the importance of doing the little things right, probably gets more magnified."

Here is the reality of the Major League offensive landscape:

• Including Santana, there were only 18 players in baseball this season to have at least 27 home runs. Only 11 players in the Majors reached at least 30 long balls. The latter figure marks the fewest players to hit 30 or more homers in a non-strike season since 1992, when only 10 accomplished the feat.

• There were 27 players with at least 25 home runs and 57 with at least 20 home runs in the Major Leagues in 2014. Both figures also represent the fewest in a non-strike season since 1992, when there were 20 batters with 25 or more homers and 37 with 20 or more homers.

• Overall, Major League teams combined for 19,761 runs and a .386 slugging percentage. Once again, each of those figures mark the lowest total in baseball in a non-strike season since 1992, when 17,341 runs were scored and teams combined for a .377 slugging percentage.

Considering that environment, having a player such as Brantley is valuable for Cleveland. Beyond his 20 home runs, he churned out 45 doubles, hit for a high average (.327), featured speed (23-for-24 in stolen-base attempts) and ended the year with 200 hits. That kind of versatile offensive player is ideal for the Indians, who hope to feature a balanced and versatile lineup from top to bottom.

Take the 2013 season, for example. The Indians had just one hitter (Nick Swisher) reach at least 20 home runs, but the team led the Majors with 10 players having at least 10 home runs (one player shy of tying a Major League record). That balance of power helped push the Indians to fifth in the American League and sixth overall in the Majors in runs scored.
This past season, the Indians were roughly league average in runs scored (669), home runs (142), on-base percentage (.317), slugging percentage (.389) and OPS (.706). Much of that can be attributed to players such as Michael Bourn, Jason Kipnis, David Murphy, Ryan Raburn and Swisher enduring injury-marred, inconsistent seasons.

The Indians are counting on strong comeback campaigns from that group in 2015. Beyond trying to strike that offensive balance, the Indians also hope to continue to feature the kind of strong pitching that helped keep them afloat in the playoff race deep into September. Francona made it sound as though strengthening the pitching staff this winter is a higher priority than landing a big bat.

"I think that's the easy [answer]. It's, 'Hey, go get a power bat.' OK," Francona said. "What we're really trying to do is see how many runs our pitching staff we think is going to give up and how many runs we're going to score offensively, and then where does that fit moving forward? Do we think that makes us a team that can contend?

"I can tell you from personal experience, I'd rather win 3-1 than 8-7, because it's a hard way to win consistently."

Jordan Bastian is a reporter for MLB.com. Read his blog, Major League Bastian, and follow him on Twitter @MLBastian. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.

Francona made it sound as though strengthening the pitching staff this winter is a higher priority than landing a big bat.

Tito likes a good solid 10-man bullpen.

Ryan Raburn was in the midst of a season that far exceeded the expectations the Indians had for him when they signed him as a minor league free agent in January of 2013.

In 2013 spanning 277 plate appearances he posted a slash line of .272/.357/.543 and belted 16 homers and was an instrumental part of the teams ability to hit southpaws .

His performance led the Indians to sign him to a 2-year contract extension that will pay him $4.85MM over the 2015-2016 season and includes a club option for $3MM in 2016 ($100K buyout).

His Cactus League season off to a good start hitting 6 for 10 with two homers, two doubles, and four RBI before injuring his right wrist and bruised his knee as he slammed into the wall chasing a home run off the bat of Kris Bryant. He finished the Cactus League season hitting .353 (12 for 34) with three homers and 11 runs driven in.

Why bring this up? Honestly, it’s the only positive Raburn carried with him through the 2014 season which turned out to be an utter disaster beginning in April where he hit .166. His month by month averages were April (.166), May (.260), June (.182), July (.188), and August (.111). But it also shines light on an injury to his wrist that may have lingered through the season depleting his power and ability to drive the ball.

Not only was his hitting atrocious but his glove work in the outfield leading SBNations Kurt Mensching to coin the term:


Raburning (n) [ray-bur-ning] — The sensation of allowing the other team to score in the most embarrassing of ways – video links here

In September he got off to a good start (3 for 8 with a homer) before hurting his knee diving for a ball in right field which required season ending surgery for a torn meniscus.

The season ended up being a complete loss for Raburn who hit just .200 (39-for-195) with four homers and 22 RBI. He has made a career out of being reliable against left handed pitching but only hit .195 (24 for 123) against them in 2014.

After his struggles in 2014 there are many pundits that will write that the Indians erred in signing him to the contract extension. They’ll suggest that the team jumped the gun and bought high on a career season.

If his contract was representative of the Indians expecting him to continue the production showed in 2014 (see Jeff Keppinger Chicago White Sox) then those voices would have merit but his contract stayed in line with what the Indians expected moving forward.

The Indians signed him to be a weak side platoon who could provide a little power off the bench. There is no reason to believe that a 100% healthy Raburn can’t come back in 2015 and provide the Indians a season that makes them think about his 2016 option. It won’t take long in 2015 to see how much the wrist injury in spring training 2014 affected him at the plate.

I think this web site is working its way from the bottom up with reports on Tribe players. I'm posting them a little out of order.

Is Josh Tomlin a Trade Chip Following Solid 2014?

Following Tommy John surgery that sidelined Josh Tomlin for most of the 2013 season, it was unclear where he would fit in the Indians’ 2014 plans. That changed rapidly when Carlos Carrasco struggled out of the gate for the Tribe, forcing Tomlin into the rotation for the first time since 2012.

Tomlin returned a different pitcher than most Tribe fans remembered. His K/9 rate skyrocketed from 4.88 in 2012 to 8.13 in 2014. Tomlin’s 2014 K% was 21.1%. Before that, Tomlin’s highest K% as a starter was 14.3% in 2010, his first year with the big league club.

The Little Cowboy’s transformation became apparent on June 28 at Safeco Field in Seattle, the night Tomlin tossed the first Tribe one-hitter since Billy Traber did it against the Yankees on July 8, 2003. Tomlin was dominant, striking out 11 M’s en route to his first career complete game shutout. A leadoff single by Kyle Seager in the fifth inning was the only blemish on Tomlin’s evening. It was only the third time since 2002 that a pitcher recorded a one-hit shutout with at least 11 strikeouts and no walks. Tomlin’s game score of 96 from that night ranks fourth in the Majors out of all starts in 2014, further illustrating just how special his start was.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YAvZ5nu_AqM]

Overall, he started 16 games for the Tribe in 2014. As a starter, Tomlin finished with 4 wins, 8 losses, and 93.1 IP. He began to tire, as many starters do following TJ surgery, and he was relegated to the bullpen in favor of the resurgent Carlos Carrasco for the last few months of the season. He made 9 appearances out of the pen, contributing 10.2 innings down the stretch.

As a command pitcher with a fastball that hovers at right around 90 MPH, Tomlin has always been plagued by the long ball, surrendering 1.31 and 1.57 HR/9 respectively in 2011 and 2012. 2014 was no different, as his 1.54 HR/9 ranked fourth most in all of baseball among pitchers with at least 50 IP.




The question becomes where Tomlin fits in the Indians’ 2015 plans. His glimpse of dominance and huge uptick in strikeouts give him trade value. He is also under team control for at least two more years, and arbitration eligibility will lead to a raise come 2015.

With Carlos Carrasco coming off a fantastic finish, and Corey Kluber, Danny Salazar, and Trevor Bauer likely locks for the rotation, Mark Shapiro and Chris Antonetti have the freedom to move a starter. Though Tomlin alone is unlikely to garner much of a return, he could have value as a second or third piece in a larger deal for a bat or prospects. As the Indians look to bolster the squad for 2015, they will likely need to deal pitching depth, whether it be Tomlin, Zach McAllister (now out of options) or T.J. House, the young southpaw who showed the ability to pitch strongly at the big league level in 2014.

House provides additional club control and value as a lefty, while McAllister proved he could pitch effectively out of the bullpen while providing starting pitching depth. Tomlin may be the odd man out, and his 2014 transformation could give any team viable pitching depth, years of control, and upside.

After Jason Giambi played an important role in the 2013 playoff push, the Cleveland Indians thought it wise to bring back the then 42-year-old veteran. He signed a one year deal with the club on November 1, 2013, but he barely saw the field in 2014.

Giambi’s injury plagued, 20th big league season began its derailment during Spring Training. His playing time was limited due to a broken rib, and he began the 2014 season on the disabled list due to the ailment. His first appearance with the big league club came on April 21.

Over the course of his first two months, Giambi managed just nine April plate appearances and only 21 in May. When the calendar flipped to June, the Giambino was seeing fairly regular playing time at DH, but a knee injury landed him back on the DL. Originally placed on the 15-day DL before eventually being moved to the 60 day, Jason did not see the field again until September 1.

Despite being available for the entirety of September, Giambi played in just one complete game. While Tribe fans hung on every pinch hit at-bat, certainly due to his 2013 September heroics, the magic was not there during this year’s stretch run. He recorded just two hits in 13 September at-bats, one double and one single.

Giambi finished 2014 with his worst career stat line, hitting just .133/.257/.267. He had just eight hits and 11 walks (two intentional) in 70 plate appearances, slugging two home runs and knocking in five.

But the season was not simply an accumulation of career low-lights. On August 2nd, the Tribe celebrated Jim Thome, including unveiling a statute of the slugger and signing a one-day contract that allowed Thome to officially retire as an Indian. Giambi, who has worn Thome’s 25 since he signed with Cleveland, surprised Thome on the field and relinquished the number. This goodwill gesture between two of the game’s big-bat fraternity was certainly appreciated by Thome, as he discusses in this interview.




And, it is important to note that Giambi was not brought in to rack up offensive numbers. Giambi was in Cleveland to be a mentor, as he acknowledged in a September interview with MLB.com writer Jordan Bastian. With the Tribe using a number of young players, Giambi’s experience was certainly invaluable.

Giambi has not declared his intentions for 2015, but certainly he will have a job in baseball if he desires. However, whether that job will be swinging a bat or yielding a pen and filling in a lineup card is yet to be seen.

Is the “big bat” Indians fans long for here already?


When 5’10”, 180-pound Nyjer Morgan injured his knee chasing down an Adam Lind double in Toronto on May 14, the Cleveland Indians decided to call up an additional five inches and 70 pounds from Columbus to replace him. Jesus Aguilar made his big league debut the following evening, promptly going 0-3 with a strikeout and a walk as the designated hitter. He didn’t record his first major league hit until four days later, notching a fifth-inning single off Detroit Tigers starter Drew Smyly that also brought home his first run batted in.

Driving in runs is something Aguilar has become quite familiar with throughout his minor league career, and one of the biggest reasons the Indians gave him a look in 2014. He led the Eastern League in 2013 when he brought home an impressive 105 runs for the AA Akron Aeros. This past season he drove in 77 for the Clippers, putting him third in the International League. While not quite impressive as his RBI totals, Aguilar’s 35 home runs and 59 doubles over the past two seasons combined are nothing to turn your nose up at. The 24-year-old has raked in the minor leagues, period.

Unfortunately that success hasn’t yet followed him to Cleveland. He ended the season with just four hits in 33 at-bats, three RBI, four walks and 13 strikeouts. That was good (or bad) for a .121/.211/.121 slash line. His 34.2 K% isn’t even listed in Fangraphs’ explanation of the statistic it’s so bad. And you literally cannot put up an ISO worse than .000.

But it wasn’t all bad news for Aguilar in 2014. First of all, the stats I listed above have virtually zero predictive power given how small his major league sample size is. His 33 career at-bats are equal to 0.6% of Nick Swisher’s, 1.4% of Carlos Santana’s and 24.4% of Zach Walters’. There aren’t a whole lot of conclusions you can draw from that many opportunities. His line drive (19%), ground ball (47.6%) and fly ball (33.3%) are all right around average. That 34.2 K% will certainly come back down to earth, as that number has been trending in the right direction for basically his entire professional career.

Following the path of players like Carlos Carrasco, Jose Ramirez, Tyler Holt and C.C. Lee, Aguilar seems to be next up on manager Terry Francona’s list of young players he shows (maybe an irrational amount of) confidence in. It is pretty clear he’ll be given every opportunity to prove his power can translate to the major league level. He did get some work at third base in spurts last season but Aguilar seemingly projects to be a first base/DH-type moving forward. It remains to be seen what part of the club the Indians front office will attempt to upgrade this winter, but bringing in a big bat seems to always be at the top of fans’ wish lists. That bat may be right under our noses.

Price Overcomes Injuries To Finally Reach Majors

[But boy was he lousy. I cannot imagine him sticking on the 40 man roster]

The Cleveland Indians acquired Bryan Price from the Boston Red Sox on July 31, 2009 along with Justin Masterson and Nick Hagadone in exchange for Victor Martinez.

After battling injuries through much of his minor league career he had a very successful second half of the 2013 season with the Indians Triple-A affiliate earning a birth on the Tribe’s 40-man roster.

In spring training it seemed he was poised to challenge for a spot on the Indians 25-man roster but near the end of camp his right shoulder flared up. The shoulder soreness kept him in extended spring training through the month of May.

He returned to Indians Double-A affiliate Akron RubberDucks on June 1st appearing in eight games logging 10 innings allowing just two earned runs while striking out an impressive 16 batters. With the health of his shoulder no longer ni doubt he was promoted to the Triple-A Columbus Clippers where he made 20 appearances spanning 26.1 innings and posted an ERA of 2.73 (8ER/26.1IP) while striking out more than a batter an inning (28).

When the Indians expanded their rosters on September 1st Price was added to the squad. Later that night he appeared in his first major league game against the Detroit Tigers and after retiring the first two batters he faced he allowed an opposite field homer to Miguel Cabrera. The Cabrera home run seemed to unsettle him as he walked Victor Martinez and hit J.D. Martinez and a single to Nick Castellanos to load the bases for Alex Avila who delivered a run scoring single. He finally retired Eugenio Suarez to end the inning. Overall Price appeared in three games with the Tribe and had little success as he allowed a pair of runs in each outing.

The 2014 season marked the completion of a long journey from first round draft pick in 2008 (#45 overall) to a conversion from a starting pitcher to reliever and the battle to overcome injuries to finally reach the major leagues. A healthy offseason and spring 2015 and we might see Price challenge for a spot on the opening day roster. At the minimum he’ll receive several opportunities with the team during the season as Terry Francona frequently likes to swap relievers from Columbus to Cleveland.

Dickerson’s Two Homers Against Scherzer Highlight His Time With Club

[He's gone already.]

In early July the Cleveland Indians lost Micheal Bourn to a hamstring injury that would shelve the center fielder for three to four weeks.

Already having lost Nyjer Morgan for the year to a knee injury the Indians turned to the trade market for an outfielder.

On July 7th General Manager Chris Antonetti got on the phone and called his old friend Neal Huntington of the Pittsburgh Pirates and worked a deal for outfielder Chris Dickerson.

At the time of the trade Dickerson was playing for the Pirates Triple-A affiliate Indianapolis Indians where he was batting .309/.407/.479 with seven homer and 12 stolen bases.

He got off to a great start with the Tribe batting .375 (12 for 32) over his first 11 games including two home runs. The two home runs came in the same game against Max Scherzer of the Detroit Tigers leading the Indians to a much needed double header sweep of their division rival.

After his first 11 game hot streak he cooled off considerably and his playing time was cut down. Over his last 30 games he hit .152 (10 for 66) to finish the year with a slash line of .224/.309/.327 spanning 112 plate appearances. He was sent outright to Columbus on September 9th for the purpose of granting him his release and on September 16th he officially became a free agent.

Although the full body of work may have been lacking the two homer game against Max Scherzer and the Tigers will stand out as one to remember from the 2014 season