The third team from the AL Central that I will be looking at is the Cleveland Indians Baseball Team. The Indians Baseball Team are coming off a 2nd place finish with 35-25 record tied with the Chicago White Sox, 1 game back of the Minnesota Twins. They are, on paper, a dangerous team. Or at least, were. I say were because the moron owners traded away a reliable starter and the face of the franchise, in Carlos Carrasco and Francisco Lindor. Every sports league has to mandate a rule, anyone related to the Dolans shouldn’t be allowed to own teams. I digress. They obviously aren’t as good as a team as they were last year because they traded away two key players in the offseason. Let’s dive in deeper.
Projected Starting Rotation
| 1 | Shane Bieber |
| 2 | Zach Plesac |
| 3 | Aaron Civale |
| 4 | Logan Allen |
| 5 | Tristan McKenzie |
The one constant, it seems like, with Cleveland is they have great pitching and pitching depth. Although they lost quite a bit of pitchers, and good ones at that like Trevor Bauer, Corey Kluber, Mike Clevinger and Carlos Carrasco over the years, they still seem to find a way to develop great pitching prospects. Now, they still have a good looking pitching rotation, with the likes of Shane Bieber and Zach Plesac. Bieber is someone to keep an eye on simply because he is coming off one hell of a season. He had an unreal season last year, but it felt like his juju wore off once the postseason came as he had a clunker of a start in game 1 vs the Yankees in the Wild Card series. The big question going into the season for Bieber, is will he be able to repeat the success the had in 2020 for the 2021 season. The next guy I want to look at is Plesac. Zach is an underrated pitcher who hit a rough patch last year when he broke COVID protocols. That was a big problem specifically, because the team had promised Carlos Carrasco (a cancer survivor) to stay safe. And when he and Mike Clevinger broke protocol, they hurt the trust with the team. Both were sent to Triple A and Clevinger was eventually traded to San Diego. Now that they moved on from the situation, I can see Plesac continuing his success and being an important part of the team.
Projected Line-Up
| 1 | 2B Cesar Hernandez | S |
| 2 | 3B Jose Ramirez | S |
| 3 | LF Eddie Rosario | L |
| 4 | DH Franmil Reyes | R |
| 5 | RF Josh Naylor | L |
| 6 | C Roberto Perez | R |
| 7 | 1B Jake Bauers | L |
| 8 | CF Oscar Mercado | R |
| 9 | SS Amed Rosario | R |
The line-up is where I think the team will suffer the most. Not only are they going to miss the production and leadership from Francisco Lindor, but they will also miss the production and leadership from Carlos Santana who walked in free agency to Kansas City. Their line-up is still a good line-up but it won’t be as good as it was last year. Names to look at are, first, Jose Ramirez. Jose is their most valuable player, but I don’t expect him to put up as big of numbers as he did before because he won’t have as much protection and will be pitched around more. The other name I want to look at is Franmil Reyes. Reyes will be key to the team as he one of the only “power bats” in the lineup aside from Jose Ramirez. If Reyes is able to be productive as Ramirez, then that will put Cleveland in a position to succeed and compete for a playoff spot.
2021 PECOTA AL Central Projections
PECOTA has Cleveland finishing in 2nd place ahead of Chicago. I don’t see that happening. As I said before, I expect Chicago to win 1st place and Minnesota to finish 2nd. That leaves Cleveland finishing in 3rd place. But, I do expect them to remain competitive the entire season with Minnesota edging them out for 2nd place and possibly even the 2nd Wild Card spot in late September. I think the down fall of Cleveland will be the line-up as it doesn’t have as much “juice” as they have in the past.
