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Your 2018 Cleveland Indians

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Urban said:
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The Indians bullpen have been HR prone in the 2nd half, 7th worst rate in baseball and worst of any team in the playoff run. It is 24 HR total- 11 of which have come from Ramirez, Otero, Jon Edwards, and Tomlin. Hopefully we are not leaning too heavily on any of those guys in the playoffs.
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View: https://twitter.com/ByChrisMason/status/1042227215608553472
 
Phil Mixtape said:
If Bauer is right, Tribe has the best starting pitching in the a.l. Thing that makes me nervous besides the bullpen obviously is the inconsistency of our hitters. We absolutely have to put up runs especially against the Stros. Hopefully they can find some kind of groove before the end of the month.
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In all honesty, based off this year alone, I’d rather face the Astros lineup than any other in the playoffs. Our lineup has been way better than their’s this year.
 
If Bauer comes out of the pen, one of you self absorbed assholes deserve to go remove that funny rating you smugly gave me a few weeks back. :chuckle:

If he starts, we can all just forget I brought this up. :celb (14):
 
Derek said:
In all honesty, based off this year alone, I’d rather face the Astros lineup than any other in the playoffs. Our lineup has been way better than their’s this year.
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Way better? By what measure?

The two offenses are almost clones:

HOU - Runs - 749, Hits - 1301, 2B - 271, HR - 191, RBI - 716, AVG - .257, OBP - .330, OPS - .758:
CLE - Runs - 757, Hits - 1324, 2B - 271, HR - 202, RBI - 730, AVG - .256, OBP - .329, OPS - .763

Donaldson has the potential to give us a nice boost but Oakland, Boston, New York and Houston are all in the top 5 offensively. The AL playoffs are going to be a bloodbath.
 
I'mWithDan said:
Way better? By what measure?

The two offenses are almost clones:

HOU - Runs - 749, Hits - 1301, 2B - 271, HR - 191, RBI - 716, AVG - .257, OBP - .330, OPS - .758:
CLE - Runs - 757, Hits - 1324, 2B - 271, HR - 202, RBI - 730, AVG - .256, OBP - .329, OPS - .763

Donaldson has the potential to give us a nice boost but Oakland, Boston, New York and Houston are all in the top 5 offensively. The AL playoffs are going to be a bloodbath.
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Well, yeah, we're top 5 too, 3rd actually. There's actually a bigger gap in runs/game between us and 4th (Houston) than there is between us and 2nd (New York).

I guess the Astros have closed the gap in the past month, but we were decisively ahead of them for most of the year.

I don't really care how our lineup has performed with Brandon Barnes, Adam Rosales, Erik Gonzalez, and co. getting regular AB's
 
Thought it'd be fun to do a bit of a scouting report of the AL playoff teams, I will start with Houston

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  • Alex Bregman has taken a leap forward this year into MVP talk and has been Houston's best player this season. .939 OPS with 30 HR
  • Correa has been pretty awful since returning from the DL: .174 / .257 / .223 in 140 plate appearances. Altuve has not quite been his usual self either since returning from the DL: .258 / .361 / .409. Their importance is monumental to Houston. They combined for 43 hits, 12 HR, and 28 RBI in last year's playoffs.
  • Marwin Gonzalez has struggled for much of the season but has turned it on since the start of August. .299 / .351 / .584 with 10 HR in 149 PA
  • Familiar names like Yuli Gurriel, Josh Reddick, Brian McCann, and Evan Gattis have failed to make much of an offensive impact
  • 1B Tyler White and OF Tony Kemp are "new names" who have made solid contributions
  • Their offense has been relatively middle of the pack 2nd half. 15th in OPS, 16th in HR but 6th wRC+. See above struggles/absence of Altuve & Correa
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  • The Astros rotation has been missing Lance McCullers since the beginning of August. It seems like the window is closing in on him returning. His off speed stuff is pretty nasty as evidenced in Game 7 of the ALCS last year where he closed out the Yankees
  • Their rotation is still obviously very good from looking at the numbers above, but their rotation hasn't been quite as bulletproof recently as it was early on in the season. Their whole rotation has ERAs in the mid 3s in the 2nd half. Verlander is especially HR prone.
  • It seems like Devenski probably won't make the playoff roster. Their bullpen is pretty slick- Peacock, Pressly, McHugh, Rodon, Joe Smith, Osuna, Will Harris. The bullpen is mostly new faces but the returning guys had their struggles last season
 
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When trying to predict playoff success, I believe there are a few factors that really, truly matter.

Walks, Strikeouts, and homeruns. The 3 true outcomes are the least reliant on luck.

The lineups that walk the most, strikeout the least, and hit the most homeruns are more inclined to have postseason success.

The pitching staffs that do the opposite are also set up well for postseason success.


Obviously there's no way to account for late season acquisitions or injuries when looking at these numbers, but it still paints a pretty good picture of who is set up for postseason success.

Looking at those 3 areas this year I'd rank the AL playoff teams as:

1. Houston (their bullpen numbers are ridiculous)

2. Cleveland (killed by the HR rate of our relievers)

3. Boston (whole pitching staff hurts the cause)

4. New York (they strike out a ton, and their starters have struggled)

5. Oakland (Their starting pitching is poor)
 
The AL Wild Card game will be very interesting. At this point Happ seems like the Yankee's most reliable starter, but Oakland has a very RH heavy lineup. And at the moment it looks like Edwin Jackson is probably the Athletic's best option after Manaea's injury and Anderson getting blown up in back to back games. Think we will see each team turn to the bullpen early and often.
 
I think Oakland seems pretty likely to go with an "opener" rather than one of their starters
 
Donaldson's glove at 3rd is insane.

Going to be an hell of an bench player for us in the postseason!!!
 
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