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The 2020 Cleveland Indians

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I’m not sure the national narrative regarding the Indians is as positive as the narrative here on rcf Carnegie & Ontario

The National narrative for the Indians is, they have to trade Lindor this offseason. I have seen nothing else at all about them really.

I get small market teams need to capitalize on who they have and make sound decisions about it, but going into 2020, the Indians should have the best rotation on paper in baseball.

Everyone was citing our lineup and I get on paper it doesn’t look great but in the second half of the season we were one of the better lineups in the AL in overall production. Now we won’t have Naquin, Puig or Kipnis back, but I feel their production can be replaced by in house guys at the end of the day. I almost hate the loss of Naquin the most since the platoon of him and Luplow was ridiculously good.

Idk I just sincerely feel the 2020 Indians will end up being the best team they had during this run at the end of the day. They have the right mix of guys now.
 
The National narrative for the Indians is, they have to trade Lindor this offseason. I have seen nothing else at all about them really.

I get small market teams need to capitalize on who they have and make sound decisions about it, but going into 2020, the Indians should have the best rotation on paper in baseball.

Everyone was citing our lineup and I get on paper it doesn’t look great but in the second half of the season we were one of the better lineups in the AL in overall production. Now we won’t have Naquin, Puig or Kipnis back, but I feel their production can be replaced by in house guys at the end of the day. I almost hate the loss of Naquin the most since the platoon of him and Luplow was ridiculously good.

Idk I just sincerely feel the 2020 Indians will end up being the best team they had during this run at the end of the day. They have the right mix of guys now.
The injury to Naquin could be a blessing in disguise.. Knowing he is going to miss time early, the Tribe could turn to an in house option like Daniel Johnson to platoon with Luplow knowing that Naquin's eventual return could be a safety net..
 
I don’t get MLB.com and some other writers since projecting the White Soxs to win the Central next season? Wtf lol Also staying once again we should trade Lindor. Do they take in account we have the team that won 93 games back and in the second half was on of the better offenses in the league? I don’t get these writers sometimes

They're probably not better than Minnesota yet, but they will be by 2021. I think they'll be in wild card contention and finish ahead of the Indians next year.
 
I think a lot rests on the White Sox's starting pitching. They have some nice offensive pieces already and Robert and Madrigal will certainly be in the mix early on.

Giolito looks like an ace. Cease was a top prospect. I am not sure what Kopech's timeline is, but I imagine he'll be ready for 2020. If they spend money wisely/in the right places, they could be a pretty damn good team next year.
 
I think a lot rests on the White Sox's starting pitching. They have some nice offensive pieces already and Robert and Madrigal will certainly be in the mix early on.

Giolito looks like an ace. Cease was a top prospect. I am not sure what Kopech's timeline is, but I imagine he'll be ready for 2020. If they spend money wisely/in the right places, they could be a pretty damn good team next year.
That's 3 arms. Don't forget the return of Carlos Rodon to make 4 for the rotation. That said they should still look to add a solid rotation FA if they can. Doubt they can attract Cole/ Strausberg but they should be involved in the next tier - Wheeler/ MadBum/ Odirizzi/ etc..

While some had been surprised the ChiSox didn't deal parts of the bullpen away in July 2019, I believe they had an eye toward 2020 at that point. Those parts (Colome/ etc) would be important this year.

IMHO the ChiSox will be WC contenders if things go right for them (and wrong in Cleveland or Minnesota) in 2020. Otherwise its another 3rd place finish right around .500 Come 2021, they should be very much in the race..
 
Looks like the Tribe is the 7th lowest moneyline to win it all next year. So, there's that.
 
I get they will make a jump, but Twins plan on spending a fair amount of money for a front end starter and closer while the Indians are coming back with a pretty good roster even if they don’t spend money. White Soxs should improve but I don’t see how they will be better than both the Twins and Indians at the end of the day. It just annoying how places treat the Indians at times. We need way better local and national writers.

The White Sox are on their way to being a contender and will definitely be much better in 2020. Just taking a guess here:

C - McCann
1B - Abreu
2B - Madrigal?
3B - Moncada
SS - Anderson
LF - Jimenez
CF - Robert?
RF - Garcia?
DH - ?

The rotation will have Giolito, Kopech, Lopez, and Cease, and Rodon back at some point.

If they add a few pieces in free agency, they could start looking pretty good.
 
Definitely see a three team race in the central next season.

I expect the Twins to regress a bit, the White Sox to definitely improve, and the Indians to more or less stay stagnant (91-94 wins).

Should be interesting. Tigers are still going to be complete garbage and I don't have the Royals as much more than a 75-78 win team at the absolute max.
 
No patch on the sleeve for next year:

“While we continue to evaluate the potential of introducing another alternate logo, we have elected not to replace the All-Star Game patch on the jersey for the 2020 season. We are one of five teams to not have a sleeve patch on any of our jersey tops, and one of eight teams to not have a patch on at least one of our jersey tops.”


I personally think something like the below would be a good addition to the jersey:

91VD7BNYOgL._SX466_.jpg
 
No patch on the sleeve for next year:

“While we continue to evaluate the potential of introducing another alternate logo, we have elected not to replace the All-Star Game patch on the jersey for the 2020 season. We are one of five teams to not have a sleeve patch on any of our jersey tops, and one of eight teams to not have a patch on at least one of our jersey tops.”


I personally think something like the below would be a good addition to the jersey:

91VD7BNYOgL._SX466_.jpg
No patch is better

Real ball players get it

Chuck Knoblauch is on my side
 
The White Sox are on their way to being a contender and will definitely be much better in 2020. Just taking a guess here:

C - McCann
1B - Abreu
2B - Madrigal?
3B - Moncada
SS - Anderson
LF - Jimenez
CF - Robert?
RF - Garcia?
DH - ?

The rotation will have Giolito, Kopech, Lopez, and Cease, and Rodon back at some point.

If they add a few pieces in free agency, they could start looking pretty good.

With all the young guys, I actually feel 2021 is the season to get Free Agents. Now if they get a starter long term that makes sense but they have a ton of young hitters and you gotta let some of them develop up here. I think 2021 is the year you sign free agents since that way all their top prospects have had a chance to get in ABs and playing time in the pros. I just feel going for wins now with as many unprovens as they have would be questionable. Now if they went long term starter and then short term contracts with older leader type of veterans that may be the way to go in my mind.
 
The White Sox are on their way to being a contender and will definitely be much better in 2020. Just taking a guess here:

C - McCann
1B - Abreu
2B - Madrigal?
3B - Moncada
SS - Anderson
LF - Jimenez
CF - Robert?
RF - Garcia?
DH - ?

The rotation will have Giolito, Kopech, Lopez, and Cease, and Rodon back at some point.

If they add a few pieces in free agency, they could start looking pretty good.
Those hitters are young, and most of them will surely improve as they move forward. However, it's important to note that the White Sox had a ridiculously high BABIP last year (.329), which was #1 in the league. The second-place team was Colorado at .321.

That number actually tied the 2013 Red Sox for the highest non-Rockies team BABIP in the last 90 years.

Moncada had a .406 BABIP, and since 1925 only Rod Carew in '77 had a higher BABIP. Tim Anderson wasn't far behind at .399.
 
Those hitters are young, and most of them will surely improve as they move forward. However, it's important to note that the White Sox had a ridiculously high BABIP last year (.329), which was #1 in the league. The second-place team was Colorado at .321.

That number actually tied the 2013 Red Sox for the highest non-Rockies team BABIP in the last 90 years.

Moncada had a .406 BABIP, and since 1925 only Rod Carew in '77 had a higher BABIP. Tim Anderson wasn't far behind at .399.

While a .406 is ridiculous and unsustainable, Moncada will likely always have a high BABIP because he hits the ball so hard.

Anderson seems like a likely candidate for some serious regression
 
While a .406 is ridiculous and unsustainable, Moncada will likely always have a high BABIP because he hits the ball so hard.

Anderson seems like a likely candidate for some serious regression
There's a difference between having a high BABIP and having the second-highest BABIP of the last 100 years.

When Rod Carew had a .408 BABIP, he hit .388. Moncada needed .406 just to hit .315. Carew dropped to a .364 BABIP the following year and saw his BA% drop 55 points. A 55 point drop puts Moncada as a .260 hitter, and that's assuming he still has an absurdly high BABIP. At a minimum, I would expect his BABIP to drop to around .350.
 

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