Cleveland Indians
Overview
The Indians came into the year as the critics' choice as the breakout team but the only breaking out they ever did was when they nearly broke down to dead last in the American League. In the end, the money woes of the St. Louis Browns out-awfulled them by a single game. This really ought to have been expected: Excepting 1932, this team finished dead last or 7th every single year going back to 1923.
It's hard to find any one category to take solace in if you're a fan of this team. The team started poorly, approached mediocrity in midseason, and were downright awful to end the year. Their hitting sucked. Their pitching blew. They did go 21-16 in one run games but it's tough to say whether that was due to some actual ability to emerge victorious in close games or just plain dumb luck.
Kuniyuki Kono has a long-standing reputation for concentrating on pitching at the detriment to everything else. His previous managerial experience with Boston ended up being mostly positive, although it's telling that they didn't ask him back for 1928. He'll get his first chance to helm a team from the beginning this year after leading Cleveland to a 43-69 record to close out '32.
Pitching
Conventional wisdom is that you have to be a pretty good pitcher to lose 20 games.
Willard Doe is a pretty good pitcher. He's not great, and he's certainly not the kind of man you attach a phrase like "flashes of brilliance" to, but for now he eats up innings so that guys who aren't ready yet don't have to. While the Indians hope that
Tim Maisonet will turn into that guy who can give as well as get against the other first starters in the league, we're not as optimistic. He doesn't throw nearly hard enough - on a good day, his fastball tops out at about 85 miles per hour - and his control has to be absolutely pinpoint to make up for that. That's a lot to ask from any pitcher, let alone one as young as this man.
There are some younger prospects on this team. Most of them seem to be of the variety who have a great shot at being in their 30s in 10 years, but they still make the prospect lists so what the hey.
Brian Cowell did a much better job, we think, than his won-lost record of 5-8 indicates. He also needs to find more movement on his pitches but he at least gets into the high 80s on a regular basis.
Chad Smalls is tougher to figure out and in the end the Indians decided to cut him loose - actually, they found a buyer in the Chicago White Sox for his massive potential. So far, despite some tantalizing stuff, he has put together a 9.05 ERA in 109 1/3 career innings.
Larry Bramble is another mid-80s guy whose control won't quite allow him to remain in the bigs as a starter.
At the time of this writing, the Indians brought in Boston Red Sox veteran Roger Sayers to anchor this young rotation. Perhaps he can teach the rest of the staff some new tricks.
Code:
Player Age W L Pct G GS SV IP H ER HR BB SO ERA
Willard Doe 28 11 20 0.355 35 35 0 259 303 131 13 92 83 4.55
Tim Maisonet 24 11 14 0.440 32 30 0 227.1 249 85 7 68 38 3.37
Larry Bramble 23 6 11 0.353 39 22 0 188.1 181 80 6 97 63 3.82
Paul Rogers 35 9 10 0.474 20 20 0 142.1 174 61 7 67 51 3.86
*Brian Cowell 22 5 8 0.385 26 16 1 129 121 51 5 75 26 3.56
*Chad Smalls 21 2 9 0.182 23 11 1 83.2 116 77 4 64 22 8.28
Ron Anglin 28 1 2 0.333 45 0 2 78.2 74 25 4 24 39 2.86
Alan Ford 26 3 3 0.500 9 9 0 66.2 65 31 3 32 13 4.19
*Jesús Espín 36 2 5 0.286 11 9 0 61.1 73 34 4 31 21 4.99
*Bob Poche 25 8 8 0.500 41 0 5 61 58 20 4 23 20 2.95
Steve Petrie 37 0 1 0.000 11 0 1 20.2 23 13 3 9 4 5.66
Dale Thomas 21 1 1 0.500 11 0 0 17.1 18 9 2 13 10 4.67
*David Días 35 0 2 0.000 2 2 0 10 14 9 3 5 2 8.10
Darrel Segars 21 0 1 0.000 6 0 0 8 20 16 2 3 2 18.00
Erik-Johan Nybacka 27 0 0 0.000 5 0 0 7.2 15 5 1 5 2 5.87
*Matt Corwin 34 0 0 0.000 4 0 0 5 3 0 0 2 0 0.00
Wu You 23 0 0 0.000 8 0 0 9 20 12 0 13 3 12.00
Team Totals 27.4 59 95 0.383 328 154 10 1375 1527 659 68 623 399 4.31
Catchers
[b]Dave Echols[/]' rescue from the scrap heap of the minor leagues is the stuff of legend. Last year was the first time he was given a job day in and day out and while he didn't quite hit at the level he'd shown in '32, he was more than man enough for the 3-hole in the Indians' lineup. His lack of RBIs are due more to the fact that people in front of him just weren't getting on base enough.
Andres Merced hit .297 in limited time the year before and for a brief time actually pushed Echols out into left field, but in the end he proved that his proper place was as a backup.
Code:
Pos Player Age G GS AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI SB CS BB SO AVG OBP SLG
C Dave Echols 24 137 133 545 67 155 28 4 5 57 0 0 43 60 0.284 0.337 0.378
C Andrés Merced 26 82 49 223 22 57 11 1 0 21 0 0 9 21 0.256 0.286 0.314
C Ray Alexander 25 59 29 109 10 30 3 0 0 8 0 0 9 9 0.275 0.328 0.303
Infield
Bill Eldridge proved that 1932's off-year was just that. He rebounded to lead the team in homeruns and RBIs and finish a close second in batting average to Dave Echols' .284. The Indians go into 1934 knowing that, however many holes in this lineup there are, there is not one at first base.
The Indians are very high on
Mario Vasquez but in 94 September at-bats he showed very little except that he's not ready for prime-time yet. That leaves the position to
Art Tribble, who broke his elbow last year and may or may not be all the way back by spring training, or
Vernon Friedrich, 1932's starter who lost almost 100 points off his batting average last year.
Chris Clark has a lot of potential with the bat. He hit .335 in Montreal in 1932 as a 22 year old. He sure did not show it last year, and no team, not even the Indians, can stick with a guy for long when he posts a .268 on-base percentage.
Jeff Gunn, who just did get his cup of coffee last year, is one guy who will be pushing Clark in spring training.
Shortstop figures to be a position in flux, particularly now that
Carl Kagan has been sent out of town. Friedrich might be the front-runner here, but also look out for
Desmond Chandler, who failed in a 78 at-bat trial with the White Sox in 1932 but who blistered the minors last season. He's probably not second base material; however, it wouldn't be too hard find a spot for him if he actually comes through on his considerable potential.
Code:
Pos Player Age G GS AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI SB CS BB SO AVG OBP SLG
1B *Bill Eldridge 26 153 153 568 67 159 29 2 16 70 0 0 85 62 0.280 0.376 0.423
2B Art Tribble 23 53 53 227 27 65 10 10 1 17 8 1 9 12 0.286 0.316 0.432
2B Rusty Dardar 28 66 37 165 10 36 5 0 1 19 2 1 7 1 0.218 0.251 0.267
2B #Mario Vázquez 22 22 22 94 12 14 5 2 1 9 2 0 3 9 0.149 0.173 0.277
3B Chris Clark 23 106 95 371 43 89 20 5 4 44 6 7 13 24 0.240 0.268 0.353
3B Jeff Gunn 21 1 1 4 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0.250 0.250 0.250
SS Carl Kagan 24 127 118 469 52 125 17 5 3 55 3 3 33 33 0.267 0.315 0.343
SS Vernon Friedrich 26 123 118 438 44 99 16 2 6 52 1 2 48 43 0.226 0.308 0.313
SS #Bill Swinney 26 45 24 96 8 19 5 1 0 11 0 1 2 8 0.198 0.212 0.271
Outfield
The
Juan Carlos Munoz-Jay Carbaugh seems to have come out about even for both sides: both guys stunk last year. Munoz was pretty much horrible all season long. He had a niggling finger injury that kept him out of the lineup for all of May and most of June but even at that he played like he came back too soon. Cleveland never could find anyone to replace him so they just kept trotting him out there, hoping that he'd finally turn his season around. That never happened. He was still a better find than
Bruce Struck, whose .353 average in 139 Montreal at-bats translated into a single major league extra-base hit, or
Columbus Glaze, a man who has somehow crafted a 10-year major league career despite having no marketable baseball skills.
Alphonse Conway looked like a budding young star when he hit .316 with 38 doubles in 1931. In '32, he underwent what Indians fans hoped was a slump, although his numbers looked suspiciously similar to those he had in 1930. Last year he dropped down another peg. Now he's 30 and no longer deserves the words "young" or "star" near his name.
Pedro Serrea has been Cleveland's starting CF, more or less, since 1927. The fact that he had injury issues made Conway play a bit more center than right but it should be easy enough to make room for him in '34 if he's healthy.
It'll be easy because, well,
Keenan Thomas did absolutely nothing following a torrid April (.323, 7 runs, .400 OBP). He'd be the team's biggest disappointment if it weren't for Vernon Friedrich, but he was plenty big enough in his own right.
Code:
Pos Player Age G GS AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI SB CS BB SO AVG OBP SLG
LF *Juan Carlos Muńóz 30 94 91 345 35 81 13 7 6 47 4 1 38 18 0.235 0.310 0.365
LF *Bruce Struck 22 50 22 109 10 22 0 1 0 5 1 0 3 18 0.202 0.237 0.220
LF Columbus Glaze 32 37 12 68 10 16 6 0 0 9 0 2 7 8 0.235 0.312 0.324
CF Alphonse Conway 29 119 111 463 54 118 21 5 7 49 1 0 32 21 0.255 0.308 0.367
CF *Pedro Serrea 27 59 57 239 26 69 12 1 2 21 4 2 15 9 0.289 0.339 0.372
CF Dan Douglas 25 33 23 93 11 24 7 2 0 13 0 1 7 10 0.258 0.317 0.376
RF *Keenan Thomas 25 107 75 297 39 73 17 3 2 21 0 2 42 13 0.246 0.343 0.343
RF Suk-hoon T'ae 26 12 5 27 1 6 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 2 0.222 0.222 0.259
RF *Kevin Dubose 22 4 4 15 0 2 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0.133 0.133 0.133
Team Totals 26.3 1817 1386 5378 573 1325 243 52 54 555 32 23 413 444 0.246 0.302 0.341