Examining the 40 man roster and the possible additions to it.

OK, it's time to look at current 40 man roster and who the Indians might add and who they might even subtract.

Locks: Bauer, Beiber, Carrasco, Cimber, Clevinger, Hand, Kluber, Olson, Otero, Plutko, Salazar, Gomes, Roberto Perez, Haase, Alonso, Chang, Yandy Diaz, Encarnacion, Kipnis, Lindor, Jose Ramirez, Greg Allen, Jordan Luplow, Leonys Martin, Oscar Mercado, Bradley Zimmer.

Guys on the fence: Cody Anderson, Jon Edwards, Nick Goody, James Hoyt, Chih-Wei Hu, Neil Ramirez, Ben Taylor, Max Moroff, Eric Stamets, Tyler Naquin

So, currently the Indians 4-man roster stands at 36 with two overall adds in the last two trades.

Never, and I repeat, NEVER have I seen this much dead wood on an Indians' team that is supposed to compete for a playoff spot.

Seven of the 18 pitchers and probably 3 of the position players currently on the roster would really be roster filler on any other contening team, the type of guys you DFA as you add prospects to the roster or make a trade for a major leaguer. There are only 3 non-pitchers who fall into the DFA-able category and two of those (Moroff and Naquin) you could argue about but you might be able to argue that Luplow and Mercado belong on the Guys on the Fence list.

Still, we have so many 4A type players on the 40 man roster at this time of year it is unbelievable.  Literally it is possible that none of the guys I list on the fence could be with the Indians as the 2019 season starts and, likely, none of those guys will have an impact on the outcome of 2019.

If the Indians go into the major league season with this roster plus prospects we add to protect them from the Rule 5 draft, this team is in trouble both in the bullpen and in the outfield and in our infield depth.

So, now that I have trashed the Indians current major league roster, let's look at who they need to add to the 40-man roster to protect them from the Rule 5 draft:

Definite: Bobby Bradley, Triston McKenzie (if he is Rule 5-eligible, which I don't think he is)
Maybe: Connor Marabell, Shao-Ching Chang, Henry Martinez, Sean Brady,
 
Literally, in my experience, the absolute weakest group of prospects who need to be added to the 40 man roster in my recollection.  Literally, if McKenzie isn't eligible, it could just be Bradly or Bradley and Marabell.  How weak and pathetic does that make the top of the Indians farm system look if we only add 1-2 prospects and don't worry about any of the rest being lost in the Rule 5 draft.

So it is likely that the 40-man roster could stand at 38 after adding Bradley and Marabell.

Don't get me wrong.   Civale and McKenzie could also help the ML roster next year as might Nick Sandlin.   This would be in addition to Bradley and Marabell.   So it's not like we have nobody to provide ML depth, just probably not enough from our prospect ranks.

Pretty bleak, right?   Well, lots to love about our 40-man roster as we should have enough horses to win the AL Central again.   But no contending team has 1/4 of their 40 man roster be dead weight.  It just doesn't happen.  So it makes you wonder why we made the Luplow/Moroff and Wu trades.   It really just makes our 40 man look that much more pathetic.

What in the blazes are the Indians doing here?