This is not the kind of blog and we are not the kind of people who crunch lots of numbers and tell you exactly what the Indians’ chances are of making it to the playoffs now that they’ve been swept by Detroit and are 9.5 games out with 22 games left to play. Fortunately, the wonderful people at Baseball Prospectus are exactly the kind of people who crunch lots of numbers. According to BP, the Indians have a .1% chance of being in the playoffs. To be more exact, .1% is the percentage of times they would make the playoffs in the simulated season. The folks at coolstandings.com are more optimistic. They give the Indians a .2% chance of making the playoffs.
Statistically speaking, we’re screwed. So you can say turn out the lights, the season is over, let’s wait till next year. And that’s a reasonable point of view, given how high expectations for this team were back in April and May. Barring some miracle win streak, the Indians won’t be making the playoffs this year. That doesn’t mean we have to stop watching. Given how low expectations for this team were in February and March, it’s been a fun season. I will take Bluto’s approach–nothing is over until we decide it is. I’m just not sure what the really futile and stupid gesture might be. Maybe watching the final 22 games of the season and enjoying every one of them, win or lose, because I won’t have any personally meaningful baseball to watch until next February?
Fukodome, Jiminez, Thome……pffffffff…..waste of time….back to the perennial rebuilding, $40mm payroll, slow & steady, continuous mediocirity approach…..go tribe….
We’re Tribe fans. We knew this would happen. As we’ve been saying for decades: “Wait till next year.” Now we can watch the Browns implode.
Thanks for the great Bluto link.
I don’t think next year is a rebuilding year for the Tribe at all. It would be foolish not to go for it next year, the way the pieces are lining up. The rotation has promise and some talent is here before it was expected to be.
Rotation:
Jimenez
Masterson
Carmona
Tomlin
Carrasco (unless he needs Tommy John, then this spot is probably up for grabs)
Bullpen: if we hold on to the core, should be fairly solid again.
Lineup — just going with what we know now. Some of these names may be gone.
Brantley
Cabrera
Choo
Hafner
Kipnis
Santana
Chisenhall
Sizemore
Marson/LaPorta
That’s a pretty decent lineup, and I’d say even very good if it stays healthy and the young guys make a little progress over the off season. We’ve got strong utility guys in Hanahan, Donald, and Carrera available as well.
If you consider any roster moves, things could look really interesting. This is just what we have right now. I’m sure we’ll see moves to add pitching and a right handed bat.
Keep in mind that Detroit and CWS are aging. Unless they make pickups, or their starting pitching performs to the high expectations, they won’t be as strong next year as they were this year.
Eric, I totally agree.
Let’s not take the cynical approach as a knee-jerk reaction to the season ending.
Stu, if you think Cleveland bringing back Thome was a waste of time, I think I’d probably question where your heart is. And Fukodome has arguably been our best hitter over the past month.
Jiminez, I somewhat agree with you – still a question mark.
Detroit is aging? Last I checked Jackson, Dirks, Young, Cabrera, Boesch, Betemit, Peralta (I know, that one hurts), Avila, Verlander, Scherzer, Fister, and Porcello are all under the age of 30. I mean there’s hope and then there’s simply lying to yourself.
Detroit is in a much better position because our owner actually spends money on our team instead of trading away players when they reach arbitration. Unlike in the past, the Indians don’t get good returns on these trades (think Cliff Lee). This is why when Cleveland finishes the year below .500, they will have had only two winning seasons in the last ten years.
The proposed lineup quite simply isn’t good enough to compete with Detroit, especially when it requires that Sizemore and Hafner are healthy, which is a near impossibility (you can probably through Choo in there too). Cleveland was a nice story in the beginning of the season, but it was apparent that things would come crashing down. You can’t fake talent.
Hey, the Indians got me to football season, which is a LOT more than I expected at the beginning of the year.
The Indians are in position to contend next year. IF they do SOMETHING. Preferably something BIG. Given the trade they made, it might actually happen. I personally want to see them dig up CCs old uni and replace the name with Fielder. Everyone send a Tommy’s menu to the Milwaukee clubhouse – vegetarian delight!
chip, thome is hitting .230 and has a couple dingers…he is an old horse who is done, like junior was here in seattle….what does he have to do with our future?…that’s where my heart is…yours is stuck in the past idolizing a washed up superstar who left you for a bigger bag of gold….get over it…he’s done.
Thome wasn’t about future to me, I certainly do not idolize him, and I never even considered Thome to ever be a superstar.
It was simply a feel good story. I never thought trading for him would affect the team’s performance. It just made me feel good to hear/see Tribe fans react when Thome was in the on-deck circle for the first time, and each and every time he comes up to bat. To me, that’s what baseball is about. Entertainment. Loving the players on your team – win or lose.
I understand your frustration, we all have it. We’re Cleveland fans. I just think you can’t go and hate on one of the most feel-good moments of the year – Thome back in a Tribe jersey. If you didn’t appreciate that moment, I just think there’s something wrong with you.
i’m not much for sentimentality, i’m about results….if that makes me less of a fan so be it…somehow holding this General Manager and the team responsible for their moves is seen as an indication of disloyalty…..they get paid a lot of money to make the right decisions…..and the fact is they messed up….the biggest need on the team was right handed power bat…they got zip there…instead we got – thome….waste of time and not about our future, but about feel good (pffff)…fukodome is a lifetime 270 hitter with limited power who’s living up to his reputation…..if that’s a core holding for us in the future outfield please kill me…..jiminez….bust…we were the only bidder in the room at the end of the day and that’s a bad sign….why didnt we get fister from M’s for a song like detroit did v. our overpaid meatball serving gutless “ace”?…smart teams/GM’s do that….there’s a reason cleveland is a loser year after year – bad decision making and a supportive fan base that keeps looking for next year…where is your pride and outrage? we deserve better.
I would not say Jimenez is a meatball throwing, gutless ace. But he is not worth what we gave for him. The reds were smart, keeping Chapman, Fransisco, and Mescoraso.
the burden is on jiminez t prove me wrong….he came with the ace tag, let’s see it…if you saw that v-mart dinger you saw a meatball.
bullpen has really stepped up in the past few games….frank hermann is garbage and should not be on this team next year….waste of great effort by huff….lineup impressive as always….then again it was against an amazing piching squad of…..er…..uh…..who??