Time for some serrious discussion

First,

I applaud Cleveland's management and player development staffs.   They have done more with less and produced winning baseball in Cleveland for an extended period of time.   In the dark ages of Cleveland baseball that I remember clearly, the management and player development staffs had the same opportunity to produce winning teams and didn't.   Anyone who says that this is not true really doesn't remember those times.

While I have criticized the management teams for moves and non-moves in the past, the truth is that I nor any of the bloggers out there really understand the constraints that are placed on Cleveland's management team.    

With that acknowledgement here are the realities as I see them:

•  It now is certain to me that ownership is screwing management.  That shouldn't come as a surprise as the fans have screwed ownership by not showing up in great enough numbers and, as we all know, dung flows downhill.  So fans, you get what you failed to pay for every time a salary dump occurs.
•  The key to me on the future of this franchise is NOT whether they trade Francisco Lindor but WHAT they get back for him when he is traded.  If we are scratching our head about the return it likely means that we took the best offer even if it was substandard to what Lindor is worth.  This will be a bad signal for the future of winning baseball in Cleveland.   Not that trading your stars is wrong on a small market team but trading them for too little value means you are screwing your franchise both short- and long-term.  

You see, if you trade your star players you are in rebuilding mode and in rebuilding mode you have to get back young talent equal to or better than the ML talent you are trading away.

Those are the simple truths.   We failed to trade Kluber and Bauer last winter because we couldn't get enough for them.   That standard is set.   By those rules we should get a lot for Lindor and, if we don't, it means the rules have changed and saving money has become the main goal of the Cleveland Indians.   Not rebuilding, not rebuilding and trying to win at the same time nor trying to win now.  

Just saving money.   

A couple of final thoughts:

•  If you are trying to rebuild you shouldn't be trading international slot money or competitive balance draft picks, right?   The Indians did both of those things last winter. 
•  If you are rebuilding every trade should involve trading away veterans to get quality prospects back, right?  You shouldn't be taking salary dumps in return for your better players.  
•  If you are trying to win now you should take some of the Kluber savings and sign a decent secondbaseman or thirdbaseman AND you shouldn't trade Lindor unless you get a top prospect back.
•  Regarding a Lindor trade, the minimum I accept for Lindor is Gavin Lux, Joc Pederson and a low minors quality pitching prospect.  I would even throw in one of our 9 outfielders into the mix to get that done.   You have to get a young middle infielder back for Lindor as we don't really have any in the minors who will help anywhere in the future.  We are still taking the gamble that Lux will not be a defensive liability or a Kipnis-like player.   In a trade for Lindor we can't get a rookie Kipnis back.   So we are taking the gamble that Lux reaches his expectation.   Other teams are only taking the risk that Lindor might get hurt.

So stay tuned Cleveland fans.   What happens between now and spring training will determine whether ownership is taking us back to the dark ages of Cleveland baseball.   If they do, we only have ourselves to blame because we, as fans, greased the skids by not showing up to games.

Levity moment

One report quipped that our new reliever’s name is pronounced “Class A”.   Priceless!

Kluber trade analysis

Kluber for Texas’ #30 prospect ands .242 hitting outfielder. in DeShieldswho is no better than what we have now!?!?!  This is a salary dump.  I can tell where the Lindor trade is going:  No Lux and we get May and they dump Peterson on us.

Winter meetings, the new rules and some non-baseball stuff

The winter meetings have started and here are some thoughts:

1. I hate the new roster rules.   While I am sure minor baseball players would love to make money and have a long career in the majors, a lot of these kids started off by just wanting to make it to the majors.    September is a great chance to get your feet wet in the majors and, for a good number of players, it may represent the only time they play in the majors.   Major league teams also occasionally give promotions to career minor leaguers who have been good organizational soldiers but have not gotten to spend much, if any, time in the big leagues.  The new rule changes all that.    The Indians signed catcher Beau Taylor to a minor league deal last week.   His first exposure to the majors was as a September callup after 8 years in the minors.   He was 28 years old.   He would likely not have gotten called up that year had the current rules been in effect.  This rule sucks.   It saves teams money, that is all.    It kills the little guy in this business who may never be talented enough to stick in the majors but at least deserves that cup of coffee.

2. Have I mentioned that the Indians should sign Lindor to a 10 year deal that he can opt out of after 4 years?  His salaries would be:

2020 - $18 million
2021 - $20 million
2022 - $22 million
2023 - $25 million (opt out if he wants to after this season)
2024 - $28 million
2025 - $29 million
2026 - $30 million
2027 - $30 million
2028 - $30 million
2029 - $30 million
2030 - $30 million (club option or $1 million buyout)
2031 - $30 million (club option or $1 million buyout)

That averages out to $26.4 million a year guaranteed.  We don't do a non-trade clause and the contract, including club options, follows him if we do trade him.

3. This will be the most interesting Rule 5 draft in years, including for the Indians.   You heard it here first.

4. Moving to football, the playoff committee got it right.   If Justin Fields was in perfect health then I think Ohio State deserved the #1 seed.   But he isn't and so there are, therefore, questions about the competitiveness of the Buckeyes against the best competition.    While we would all like to play the weakest competition until the finals in any sport we are involved in, if Ohio State deserves the national championship, going through Clemson and the LSU-Oklahoma winner would certainly prove that.

5. Ohio State Men's Basketball - I have seen them play almost every game this year and, frankly, I am amazed.  They are so much better than the sum of their parts and, frankly, look like they are getting better and better every week.   Yeah, the stars aligned against North Carolina and Penn State but they DEMOLISHED those two teams when they weren't supposed to.   Aside from getting cocky, bored, or just losing motivation, if their goal is and they are dedicated to making it to the final 4, for the first time in my life I can say that is a very likely outcome.

4. Ohio State Women's Basketball - They are not hitting on all cylinders yet but their victory over Louisville shows that the talent is there.   You just don't beat a highly ranked team like that if you don't have talent.

Post 40 man roster analysis

First, if anyone is reading this raise your hand.

OK.  Let's continue.

The obvious Indians prospects to be added to the 40 man roster were added.  I haven't found an analysis and don't have time to do one but let's postulate that the Indians were not the worst or not the best at protecting prospects from the Rule 5.  

The Indians left a lot of dead weight on their 40-man roster.   I used to get bent out of shape about this but many times those guys are just placeholders in case of a free agent signing or a trade where more guys come back then go out.   So, this is a great wait and see time.

Looking at the Nick Goody DFA, you likely have to disconnect the dead weight from what happened to Goody.   Letting Goody go meant that keeping him as a placeholder didn't make sense to the Indians and, rather, was something else.   We will see what his DFA meant as time goes on.

I have to be honest, the prospects who DIDN'T get protected are not that great of prospects.   The best of the bunch, Ka'ai Tom, is, at this point, a one year wonder.   The rest of the guys are either too early in their career or are not high draft picks or guys with big tools.   I can't be too mad at the Indians as they generally know what they are doing in these situations.

That DOES NOT mean the unprotected guys will still be with the Indians after the Rule 5 draft.   Anyone who says they really can predict who will be picked in the Rule 5 is likely blowing smoke up your butt.   No one really knows who will be drafted.   If someone asked me to guess, I guess the Indians will lose 1 player in the major league portion of the Rule 5 draft and there will be at least one surprise loss in the AAA phase.   That surprise, of course, would be that whoever we lost was not able to be protected on the 38-man Columbus reserve list.

I will end this post by talking about Mark Mathias.   Very interesting trade as one would guess the Indians suspected they would lose him in the Rule 5 and so got a rookie league catching prospect as a consolation prize instead of just the $100,000 if some team drafted Mathias.   The reason it is interesting is this sort of trade is not normal in my experience at this time of year. My only thought here is that the Brewers told the Indians they were going to draft Mathias but that it would be to the Indians advantage to trade him now as compared to maybe getting only cash if Mathias was drafted.   Given that I rated Mathias and Tom roughly the same in terms of susceptibility to being drafted, it will be interesting to see if Tom is drafted.

Time will tell and we should get a much better look about the time spring training starts.

It's 40 man roster AND AAA Reserve list day. What do we do?

OK, let's do this quickly.  

.Here is our goal today: create a roster that has 39 players on it.   That way we have one player spot open if we want to dip our toe into the Rule 5 ML draft coming up next month

Let's talk about the prospects we want to protect

Daniel Johnson - Definitely will protect

Triston McKenzie - Definitely protect.   This is ESPECIALLY because he was injured all last year.   Being injured would allow a team to stash him probably for the whole year as he 'recovered'.  

Scott Moss -  Definitely protect.   He has potential and is ML ready and cheap in case we need a starter this coming year.   So, he is good for the present AND the future.  

Oscar Gonzalez - Tough call - So, you have a 21 year old Latin outfielder who had a great year at Lynchburg.   Do you protect him?  The last time the Indians were in this situation, 2016, they did not protect that guy, who was Anthony Santander.   It took a while because Santander was injured and missed almost all of 2017 which played into Baltimore's hand as they stashed him on the DL almost all year and activated him in September when the rosters expanded.  They then carried him over the winter and kept him on the 25 man roster in 2018 until he acquired the appropriate ML time that allowed the Orioles to send him to the minors without exposing him to waivers or returning him to the Indians.  In 2019 Santander hit 20 HRs in 380 ABs for the Orioles while hitting .261.   It did take 3 years before Santander was even a functional MLer, not even a full-time starter yet.   If the Indians protect him and he has a hiccup in his development they might burn all their options on him before he makes it to the majors.  

Ka'ai Tom - Tough call - Here is a guy who was mediocre most of his professional career and broke out last year.   He is a little guy and, to me, does not stand out compared to all the other outfielders we have on the ML roster.   This is a player development issue for the Indians.   Does Tom project to be significantly better than anyone currently on our ML outfield roster and, if he does, will he get here quickly and can we live without an outfielder currently on the roster until Tom is ready?

Shoa-Ching Chiang - Don't protect - Unless a team thinks they can make him into a reliever I don't see him having the stuff or peripherals to be taken by another team.  There is no upside to him, just present, albeit limited value.

Felix Fermin - Don't protect - His upside is limited and he is too far from the majors.

Dalbert Siri - Tough call - Only protect if we have dead wood on our ML pitching roster and we think Siri has more potential than those guys.

Argenis Angulo - Don't protect.   I just don't see the present stuff in him that would get him selected.

Cam Hill -  Tough call - See Siri above for situation in which he would be protected.

Juan Hillman - Tough call - His performance has been mediocre but he is young and has upside.   I could easily see a team taking him and stashing him at the end of their bullpen until he acquires his 90 days of ML service that would allow the drafting team to keep him and send him to the minors. 

Luis Oviedo - Tough call.   Like Mejia last year he has intriguing enough stuff that some team might think they could use him as a reliever to get him his 90 day service time.  Still, he is a long way off as he had a mediocre season at Lake County 

OK, so we need to find room for 3 players (Johnson, McKenzie and Moss) and explore the available options to remove dead wood from the roster to add other players (Gonzalez, Tom, Siri and Hill)

So, here we go.   Out current 40 man roster stands at 38.   So we already have the spot for one prospect.   Let's look at the rest of the roster and see who we can dump:

Pitchers on the bubble: Maton, Hoyt, Mejia, Wood.  I think Hentges and Rodriguez are safe as are all the other 14 pitchers currently on the 40 man roster

Catchers - I think all three of Haase, Plawicki and Perez are safe as I think Haase has one option left.

Infielders on the bubble: Arroyo, Freeman, Valazquez and Chang.   I think you keep only 3 of these guys and maybe 2.   If it is 2 you keep Chang and Freeman.  If it is 3 you add Arroyo.

Outfielders on the bubble:  Greg Allen 

Here is what I think we should do:

Maton - get rid of him and add Moss to the roster

Hoyt - Get rid of him and add Hillman to the roster

Allen - get rid of him and add Johnson to the roster

Wood - get rid of him and add Gonzalez to the roster

Mejia - get rid of him and add Hill to the roster

Valazquez - Get rid of him and add Tom to the roster

I see Arroyo having more current and potential value compared to Siri.   

Now, when I say 'get rid of' I mean designate for assignment.  You might lose all those guys above if we DFA them but, frankly, I don't them being above replacement value.  Plus, we can stash them on the Columbus reserve list if they clear waivers.   In that case they would only be available for the Major League portion of the Rule 5 draft.   We also have room to stash Brady Aiken there as Fermin and Chiang.    It's not like we have a lot of guys who are eligible for the Rule 5 who we would NOT be able to protect on the Columbus roster.  

Here are the guys I think you protect at Columbus: Oviedo, Siri, Allen, Angulo, Hoyt, Mejia, Chiang, Fermin, Aiken, Jared Robinson, Tanner Tully, Michael Peoples, Moroff, Krauth, Mathias, Papi, Trenton Brooks, Connor Marabell, Gavin Collins, Mitch Longo, Francisco Perez, Kaminsky, Krieger, Lien Chen-Chu, Justin Garza, Henry Martinez.  Plus, if they clear waivers you can always add Hoyt, Maton Wood, and Valazquez back.

So that is 30 and represents most of the guys who I think might be Rule 5 targets.   That still gives the Indians room to add other guys who they think might be vulnerable to the minor league portion of the Rule 5 draft where, if you lose a guy, you can't get him back.

Non-baseball, Browns post

I am a baseball fan first and foremost but as a Clevelander I follow the Browns and Cavs, too.

Tonight I am ashamed to say that I am a fan of the Cleveland Browns.