Cleveland Sports Forum

Indians’ rising prospects, 2022 outfield, draft philosophies, and baseball rule changes: Meisel’s Mailbag


By Zack Meisel 3m ago
HOUSTON — A few days after the fact, members of the Indians organization, fans and reporters are still marveling at Franmil Reyes’ home run to center field in Oakland, which landed in a suite above the batter’s eye.

It was officially recorded as a 437-foot blast by Statcast, but the International Space Station also picked it up on its radar.

Reyes put on a display during batting practice Monday, which is far from a shocking development. This performance, however, stood out. Reyes peppered the concrete wall that stands behind the left-field seats at Minute Maid Park. He socked one beyond the train tracks that are perched atop that wall, and another between a pair of pennants pinned to the window panes behind that wall, about level with the top of the foul pole.

And, right on cue, Reyes belted a 70 mph curveball from Zack Greinke into the left-field seats a few hours later.

Let’s get to your questions.

Note: Questions have been edited for clarity and length.


Franmil Reyes hit his 16th homer of the season Monday in Houston. (Thomas Shea / USA Today)
Without a consistent left-handed pitcher since The Year of Kazmir, are there any intriguing lefties in the organization who could project as starters in the next few years? — Carson M.

Here’s the full list of lefties to start a game for Cleveland since Scott Kazmir spent the 2013 season in the rotation: TJ House, Bruce Chen, Ryan Merritt, Logan Allen and Sam Hentges.

That’s it. Five southpaws, who have made 44 starts over eight years.

Scott Moss probably would have received a chance by now had a neck injury not limited him to 14 innings at Triple-A Columbus this season (and none since June 11). He’ll turn 27 in October and isn’t considered a high-ceiling prospect.

The guy to monitor is Logan Allen. No, not the aforementioned Logan Allen. That’s Logan S. Allen.

Logan T. Allen, the club’s second-round pick out of Florida International in 2020, has captured plenty of attention in his first professional season. He follows that familiar Indians formula: impressive collegiate numbers, sound walk and strikeout rates, a brilliant performance in the Cape Cod League the summer preceding his final year in school, and now he’s blitzing through the system, having earned a promotion to Double-A Akron earlier this month. In two outings for Akron, he has allowed one run and one walk in 8 1/3 frames.

Overall this season, the slightly younger Allen has registered a 1.51 ERA with 14 walks and 77 strikeouts in 59 2/3 innings. He’ll turn 23 in September and could debut at some point next year.

The Indians have a number of their top prospects due for Rule 5 draft protection this year: Joey Cantillo, Bryan Lavastida, George Valera, Aaron Bracho, Brayan Rocchio, Tyler Freeman, Jhonkensy Noel, Richie Palacios, Jose Tena. Since so many of those players are infielders, is making room for all of them possible, or do the Indians need to trade some? — Matthew S.

They need to make a trade at some point in the next five months. They need to consolidate. There’s a key point that I haven’t seen stressed enough: The Indians would love to protect all of their intriguing prospects, and they can clear out some roster clutter to do that. But a team’s 40-man roster includes 26 active major leaguers, and that doesn’t leave enough space for all of the prospects who need protection.

There will, of course, be prospects who are left unprotected yet won’t be selected. The Indians need to evaluate their players and also survey how other teams view their players, so they have a strong grasp about who to protect and an idea of what value they might have in a trade.

Do you care to project the 2022 Opening Day outfield (without a trade)? — John C.

I’d guess there will be a trade of some degree to bring in an everyday outfielder, either this month or, more likely, over the winter. For now, it seems as though the Indians are content shuffling Harold Ramirez, Bradley Zimmer, Daniel Johnson and Oscar Mercado in and out of the lineup to see if any of them deserve a head start in the 2022 outfield competition.

Playing by your anti-trade rules, I’ll go with Ramirez, Mercado and Johnson, though Nolan Jones could certainly start in right field if he debuts this September or the service-time-manipulation loophole is closed in the new collective bargaining agreement. (Either way, a trade that addresses at least one outfield spot makes sense. For more on the outfield situation, click or tap here.)


Harold Ramirez is stating his case for being part of the Indians’ future outfield plans. (Charles LeClaire / USA Today)
Can you shed some light on the Indians’ drafting philosophy? They clearly target a certain type of player — either high school pitchers with electric stuff or seasoned college arms with great command, and contact-oriented hitters but with (19 of their 21 picks this year) spent on pitchers, I’m curious how much of that is them wanting to restock the pitching on the farm versus an organizational philosophy to draft the “best player available” no matter what. — Ethan S.

First, let’s check with amateur scouting director Scott Barnsby: “We felt like this was the strength of the draft: college pitching. The depth was really impressive. One of the things we take a lot of pride in is getting to know the players and getting to know their makeup. I think what we’ve seen is a lot of the players that we’ve selected — it speaks to their makeup, how they utilized the downtime last year — we saw consistent jumps with these guys. We stuck with the theme. It wasn’t the specific plan going in, but it was certainly the strength of the draft and we do feel like we took advantage of that.”

It’s no secret that the Indians tend to focus on pitching in the amateur draft and middle infielders in the international market, but they were far from the only team to amass a collection of pitchers last week. The Angels, for instance, didn’t draft a single hitter in their 20 selections.

Here’s president of baseball operations Chris Antonetti on whether the team drafts for need: “It really doesn’t (matter how many pitchers we draft) because there are really unlimited opportunities, given the amount of pitching (roles). Whether it’s in the rotation or bullpen, it’s easy to get guys innings. It gets a little bit tricky at times on the position-player front, where there are only so many shortstops, second basemen, first basemen, third basemen you can have and you have to start making choices on how you allocate the playing time. So that’s a consideration, but I would say it’s not the driving consideration for us.”

Has the Tribe inquired about signing Bartolo Colon? It seems he can still offer at least five to six innings, which is saying more than some guys currently pitching. Plus, he’s a fan favorite. It couldn’t hurt to look into it. — Alex D.

A player actually mentioned the idea to the front office a few weeks ago. How serious he was when suggesting it is unclear. Colon is 48, older than Antonetti, general manager Mike Chernoff, Jaret Wright, Tiger Woods, Tom Brady and Leonardo DiCaprio. When Colon first pitched in a professional game for the Indians, Terry Francona was managing Michael Jordan in Birmingham, Ala., and Antonetti was an undergrad studying business administration at Georgetown.

Colon had rough tenures with the Twins, Braves and Rangers in 2017-18 and hasn’t pitched in the majors since. He has been solid for Monclova in the Mexican League this year with a 3.55 ERA in 10 starts and a microscopic walk rate. But, no, he will not be returning to the organization he signed with 28 years ago.

In semi-related news, Shane Bieber finally started a throwing program Monday afternoon, as he played catch on the field before batting practice.

I think a lot of fans have written off Will Benson, though this year he seems to finally have put it together, not only walking more but also using his power more effectively in Double A. Oscar Gonzalez is another guy who has kind of come out of nowhere to start raking this year, and he was moved up to Triple A. For some of the fringe prospects, was the year off actually a blessing in disguise? — Zachary A.

It’s probably a case-by-case basis, but it’s possible that the year away from a competitive game setting allowed certain players to take a step back, exhale and reassess. Benson did spend a month in the makeshift Constellation Energy League last summer. Players still worked at their craft last year and received virtual coaching. But entering this season, all prospects, especially those who didn’t participate at the alternate site in 2020, were a bit of a mystery.

I asked James Harris, the organization’s vice president of player development, for his insight on Benson and Gonzalez. He credited both players for working diligently in 2020 to ensure it wasn’t a lost year, as well as Junior Betances (Double-A Akron’s hitting coach) and Mike Mergenthaler (Akron’s bench coach) for creating an environment in which they could thrive. He noted Benson has made better hard contact on pitches in the strike zone and Gonzalez, ever the free swinger, has improved his pitch selection.

Benson has posted a .246/.404/.514 slash line with a sky-high walk rate, an exosphere-high strikeout rate, nine stolen bases and nearly one extra-base hit every two games. Gonzalez has registered a .320/.354/.551 clip with 13 home runs and 13 doubles.

With rule changes being tested in the minors and the Atlantic League, which ones do you see happening in MLB for 2022 or 2023? Which changes should take place to increase balls in play or action in general? — Michael U.

Commissioner Rob Manfred indicated the runner-on-second rule and seven-inning doubleheaders will disappear after this season. After initial resistance, I have actually come around on the runner-on-second rule. A pitch clock and an automatic strike zone seem like inevitable developments.

Here’s a reminder of the rule changes the sport is experimenting with in the minors:

Triple A: slightly larger bases
Double A: all four infielders must have their feet in the infield dirt
High A: pitchers must step off the rubber when attempting a pickoff
Low A: only two pickoff attempts per plate appearance
Low A West: 15-second pitch clock
Low A Southeast: automatic strike zone

I’m in favor of changing something with shifting, whether it’s keeping infielders’ feet in the dirt or requiring two fielders to stand on each side of second base. I’d like to see hitters rewarded more often when they smack a one-hopper up the middle, for instance. Yes, it’s on hitters to make adjustments, too, but with how much data and technology pitchers have at their disposal, I think it’s a more difficult task for hitters than some suggest. Making one of those tweaks (but not both) seems like a fair compromise.

Francona’s take on the shifting discussion: “They’re trying to get more offense in the game, I understand that. But you seem like you’re rewarding guys who don’t use the whole field. That, to me, doesn’t make sense. We’re trying to get guys back to using the whole field because you’ll get rewarded for it, for hitting correctly. Now, all of a sudden, guys can pull the ball and you’re going to get rewarded for it. I think it’s a little backwards.”

This will remain a popular topic this winter as the league and players association negotiate a new CBA.

Lots in there on my favorite subject and some of the players I am most interested this year including Logan Jr. and Will Benson. I strongly doubt Nolan Jones is ready to play OF in the majors when he's hitting 225 in AAA and striking out more than Benson and walking less.. Benson is a solid OF, Jones is still learning and spending time at both 3B and the OF.

Benson 254 plate appearances 45 walks 71 strikeouts in AA with a 918 OPS
Jones 245 plate appearances 35 walks 82 strikeouts in AAA with a 747 OPS

I;d like to see Benson debut in AAA. He usually stumbles when he arrives at a new level. So get his AAA premiere under his belt this summer and then we;ll see what he can do on his return in 2022.
Oscar G is in Columbus now, hitting singles. He's gone unprotected twice already; might be nearing the point where he'd be a minor league free agent which gives more freedom than Rule 5 eligibility

Is baseball’s sticky stuff crackdown leading to more pitcher injuries?

By Eno Sarris and Katie Woo 1h ago 12

A few days before Major League Baseball began cracking down on the use of sticky substances, Tampa Bay Rays starter Tyler Glasnow was placed on the 10-day injured list with a partial UCL tear and a flexor strain. He did not shy away from how he believed he ended up hurt.

“I woke up the next day and it was like, I am sore in places that I didn’t even know I had muscles in,” Glasnow said to reporters. “I felt completely different. I switched my fastball grip and my curveball grip. I’ve thrown it the same way for however many years I’ve played baseball.”

Glasnow was adamant that the sudden change he made to his grip played a direct role in his injury.

“I just threw 80-something innings, and then you just told me I can’t use anything in the middle of the year?” he said. “I have to change everything I’ve been doing the entire season. Everything out of the window, I had to start doing something completely new.

“I’m telling you, I truly believe that’s why I got hurt.”

It has been one month since MLB announced revamped enforcement of the existing ban on sticky substances. In that time, spin rates are down — over half the league has seen a statistically significant decline. Strikeout rates are down, by a little. The seemingly weekly no-hitters have abated. Pitchers have stopped disrobing as they leave the mound, but are still subject to routine hat, glove and belt checks from umpiring crews. So far, only one pitcher, Seattle’s Héctor Santiago, has been ejected and suspended for a potential sticky substance violation.

But there is no doubt that an additional question lingers in the back of a pitcher’s mind: Are they at greater risk of injury due to these sudden changes?

“My elbow fucking hurts,” one veteran pitcher told The Athletic recently. “My forearm and elbow have been sore ever since I stopped using pine tar.”

The sudden crackdown on these foreign substances, employed to help give pitchers better grip, has led to hurried attempts by pitchers to improvise — and that may lead to strains and stresses on body parts already pushed to capacity. In general, it seems that players understand something had to change; but the timing of it all is a major factor. Cardinals reliever Andrew Miller serves as a member of the MLB Players Association executive board. When asked by St. Louis media a few days before the June 21 crackdown, Miller said the biggest gripe he heard around the sport was that it seemed like pitchers would have to implement the “cold turkey” approach.

“I guess maybe MLB would argue there’s a buffer zone,” Miller said. “A rule’s a rule, also. But there’s not a whole lot of time for guys (that have been using it). Some guys haven’t hidden it as well as others, some guys are starting to be more forthcoming. But the chance to adapt — I imagine guys that have been using stuff are throwing bullpens without it or playing catch without it, as they should be, and trying to figure out how they’re going to survive.”

A pitching coordinator agreed that the timing was unfortunate.

“When people train a certain way for years, it could be helpful to say, ‘next year, the rule comes into hard-core effect, practice and prepare accordingly,’” the coordinator said. “Some guys would then have had a longer process of easing off of it rather than the guys who are currently feeling a physical difference in how their muscles are working.”

But what’s done is done, and the reality is that pitchers may be dealing with the consequences of that sudden change right now, in ways that are already showing up on injured lists and could lead to an even more significant injury spike later in the season.

While it can be relatively easy to make the correlation between a change in routine or execution and an increased injury risks, it’s important to understand how that occurs. Lawrence Rocks, a renowned chemist and author who has dedicated a portion of his research to baseball-specific studies, says it comes down to understanding the differences between components of the human body and the scientific makeup of each.

Let’s start, however, with the baseball itself.

“When the baseball comes from the factory, it has a shine on the skin that makes it aerodynamically unstable,” Rocks said. “It’s like a golf ball with no dimples. So, the balls are rubbed up, all a bit different. It takes off the shine and makes them more aerodynamic.”

To continue establishing better grip, pitchers would go to a rosin bag. Then substances like sunscreen and pine tar were implemented. But the use of foreign substances skyrocketed to such an extent (cough, Spider Tack) that MLB was forced to step in and implement further reinforcement of the rule banning all substances.

But banning all substances, even less harmful ones like pine tar, is where Rocks believes the sport can run into problems.

“If sticky substances, like pine tar, are removed, the pitcher needs the same grip to hold the ball tighter,” he explained. “That puts strain on tendons. My take on this is, is this going to lead to some sort of tendon or ligament trouble to getting a tighter grip on the ball to throw with more spin?

“The difference between tendons, ligaments, cartilage and muscle has been overlooked.”

Mike Sonne, a Ph.D. who works with teams on pitcher biomechanics, agreed with Rocks that there’s added strain on the muscles, and therefore more fatigue.

“A large group of muscles in the forearm, close to the inside of the elbow (called the flexor pronator mass) contract forcefully during the pitching delivery to protect the ulnar collateral ligament (the UCL). If those muscles didn’t exist, the force passed through that ligament would cause a tear on almost every single pitch thrown, according to cadaver studies,” Sonne wrote in a post on his website. “The need for this muscle to contract to protect the elbow is why issues like muscle fatigue have been found to be the biggest risk factor for elbow injuries and Tommy John surgery. Pitchers that throw while fatigued are up to 36 times more likely to have elbow surgery.”

Sonne modeled what this increased fatigue — and in this instance, interpret fatigue level as the amount of force-generating capacity the muscle has lost — would look like during a start, and used Max Scherzer’s no-hitter.



By his reckoning, overall fatigue would increase by a third for a pitcher weaning off grip enhancements.

Rocks argues that kind of fatigue increase is a surefire way to see injuries skyrocket. A tighter grip puts more stress on tendons and cartilage, both of which pad places like the wrist and elbow. The chemical makeup of tendons and how it progresses as players age is critical.

“Players are getting stronger, but not necessarily more flexible,” Rocks said. “So, a difference between energy and power arises. The tendons provide power and the muscles provide energy. It’s like a bow and arrow. If tendons become very brittle and then they’re stretched, they lose all flexibility.

“That’s what’s happening with tendons versus muscles. Can the tendons keep up? That’s where the power comes from. That’s why there are athletes, pitchers for example, who are very thin and can throw the ball over 100 miles an hour, and there are athletes who are rather short and rather thin, and they can still hit the ball 450 feet.”

In the middle of the season, it all happens too fast to adjust and pitchers’ body parts may be suffering the consequences. And there’s little evidence that teams are adjusting for that added fatigue by adding days of rest or taking pitchers out early.

Should we be seeing an increase in injuries, then? We may already have.



Follow the blue line (2021) on the graph and you’ll see that, in the past four years, there hasn’t been a bigger spike in injuries this late in the season than what MLB saw this year. Coming on the heels of the enforcement announcement, it could be inferred that one caused the other.

But it’s also true that, in 2018, with no such enforcement efforts, we saw three peaks that were almost as bad as the one we just underwent this season. So call the current data inconclusive.

Which would be fine, except there should be two spikes in injury rates when fatigue is increased. So a second peak could still be coming.

“I would actually think a jump at the start (of the enforcement period) as an acute response, almost like the jump we see at the start of the seasons,” Sonne said. “Then we’d see a period of normalcy then long term — like the end of season spikes — for more chronic fatigue.”

“We already have an epidemic of elbow injuries. Tyler Glasnow sent a warning shot over the league. A pitcher of his level — saying that he made whatever the sudden changes were, grip pressure or something else — and then immediately developing an elbow problem is scary,” renowned Tommy John surgeon Dr. David Altchek told the New York Daily News.

While the effort to rid the game of the more extreme grip enhancement substances might be a noble one — selective enforcement of rules on the books can lead to terrible outcomes, as baseball keeps learning over and over again, and actually enforcing this rule could lead to fewer strikeouts, a stated goal for the sport — the details matter.

Why was the enforcement stepped up in the middle of the season? Was it because a few hitters griped publicly? Was it because of media coverage of the sticky stuff? Was it because offense was down and strikeouts were at an all-time high again?

We may never get a full accounting of the reasoning behind the mid-season effort, just as we may never know exactly how many more injuries this effort has caused among major league pitchers. But, for a sport that has long wondered how to better keep its best players on the field, it’s fair to wonder why they would pick a timeline that would increase injuries by any measure.

(Photo of Glasnow: Douglas P. DeFelice / Getty Images)

Evolution of ‘Manny being Manny’: Borrowed underwear, uncashed paychecks, carefree confidence for a ‘hitting savant’



By Zack Meisel 8
When Manny Ramirez finally lifted his head, nearly 270 feet into his leisurely trot, he peered up at a visitor’s dugout teeming with howling teammates. Candy Maldonado raised two fingers. Carlos Baerga formed a stop sign with his hands. Sandy Alomar Jr. convulsed with laughter.

To his surprise, Manny’s first major league hit was not a home run, but a ground-rule double that caromed off the warning track and disappeared into the left-field seats at Yankee Stadium. As his teammates and his nearly 100 friends and family members in attendance that September night in 1993 celebrated his milestone, Manny halted his procession, flashed a smile and retreated to second base.

Thirty years ago, Mickey White discovered the shy kid with the mesmerizing swing just across the Harlem River. White, Cleveland’s scouting director, hailed from Pittsburgh, and he vowed he would never pass up the chance to draft the next Roberto Clemente.

The Indians couldn’t afford to flub their first-round pick in the 1991 draft, not with a new ballpark and a heightened sense of urgency on the horizon. This selection needed to rescue the organization from its decades-long exile from relevance. Aaron Sele, a college pitcher, seemed like a safe choice, but as the draft approached, Indians general manager John Hart couldn’t shake the image of Manny’s hallmark swing.

“He was a hitting savant,” says Dan O’Dowd, a longtime Cleveland front office executive.

Over the ensuing decade, before he bolted to Boston, before the “Manny being Manny” mania exploded and before PEDs, trade demands and quarrels with teammates, management and traveling secretaries marred his reputation, Manny blossomed into one of the league’s most imposing sluggers, the antagonist who turned up in pitchers’ nightmares. He developed into a run-producing fixture in a perennially prolific Indians lineup, and an enigmatic character who stored uncashed paychecks in his locker, gave away his trophies to the team psychologist and treated Cleveland’s clubhouse like family-style dining, as he borrowed teammates’ bats and sported their underwear.

His hitting was otherworldly. His humor was from another dimension.

“He was a professor at MIT in the batter’s box,” Hart says, “and a freshman at a junior college on the bases and in the outfield.”

“A freshman in kindergarten,” countered Hall of Fame Indians beat writer Sheldon Ocker.

In his 10 years with Cleveland, this is when Manny became Manny.

Travis Fryman would trot to the dugout from his station at third base, rest his glove and sunglasses on the bench and head to the bat rack to prepare for his trip to the plate. One day, his bat vanished. He scoured the dugout, barked at the bat boys and mentally retraced his pregame steps.

He peered at the scoreboard to view the count on Manny, who preceded him in Mike Hargrove’s lineup. Fryman was tardy for his appointment in the on-deck circle. His mind was spinning, his body frantic.

And then he noticed it, the familiar piece of lumber cocked above Manny’s right shoulder. Manny hacked at a pitch with Fryman’s bat and ripped a double off the left-field wall.

Fryman wanted to avoid the Little League ritual of scooping up and using his teammate’s discarded bat. He instead grabbed a Jim Thome model from the rack. The rest of the game, he dashed to the dugout after the third out to secure his property.

Manny ignored the customary, oft-unspoken protocols. To him, bats weren’t some sacred treasure. In one particular game, he wielded four different bats via four different teammates and recorded four base hits. In another, he socked a home run with a broken bat. Initially, reporters marveled at the might required to muscle a baseball beyond a fence after the heater splintered his bat. Manny clarified, however, that the bat was cracked before he even left the dugout.

When Ocker, who covered the team for more than 30 years, questioned why he didn’t select a sturdier stick, Manny shrugged.

“Oh, I like the bat,” he said, erasing no confusion.

Teammates never bothered to analyze his actions. They preferred to preserve the mystique. No one truly understood his quirks, but that was OK. He was Manny. Erratic, but lovable. An assassin at the plate, and affably aloof everywhere else. Always aiming to provoke laughter, but never willing to reveal whether he was in on the joke.

Manny Ramirez
Manny Ramirez in 1999. (David Maxwell / AFP via Getty Images)
If a player were missing a piece of equipment or an element of his uniform, he would make a beeline for Manny’s locker, a graveyard of teammates’ belongings. Manny’s frequent pilfering prompted several locker relocations. Pitcher José Mesa demanded clubhouse attendants banish Manny to the opposite side of the room so his gear wouldn’t vanish.

During batting practice, Manny donned the bullpen catcher’s pants, which were five sizes too big and nearly swallowed him whole. He fastened them with a belt at his chest, over his jersey top. With his teammates shaking with laughter, Manny strutted into the batter’s box to swat baseballs into the outfield seats.

No layer was off-limits. If Manny suffered through a skid at the plate, he’d snatch an article of clothing — a T-shirt, socks, even underwear — from a teammate who was thriving.

“Guys would be looking for their underwear and Manny would be wearing it,” says pitching coach Mark Wiley.

Manny coveted those laughs like he craved a 3-0 fastball. Then again, he didn’t always track the count in his at-bats because he was so fixated on recognizing a specific pitch and launching it into orbit. He’d sometimes wait for the umpire to direct him to first base after a fourth ball. He was a carefree outfielder obsessed with hitting, who occasionally dabbled in comedy as a side gig.

“Eddie Murray, every now and then,” Hart says, “he’d just look over at Manny sometimes and waggle his finger and Manny would calm down.”

“There was never an ounce of malice in his bones,” Alomar says.

On June 17, 1994, in the thick of a 10-game winning streak, the Indians huddled around a TV in the clubhouse, captivated by the O.J. Simpson white Bronco chase. One player said, “Can you believe what O.J. is doing?” Manny walked into the room, having just showered, and nonchalantly replied: “What’s Chad up to now?” The rest of the team, convinced the rookie right fielder thought teammate Chad Ogea was fleeing police in a nationally televised pursuit, erupted with laughter. Later that night, Manny notched a pair of doubles to fuel another Cleveland victory.

“We’d all have a little laugh,” Hart says, “but in the back of my mind, I was always such a strong believer in him that I just said, ‘I want this guy to be the greatest hitter that ever played the game. He has that kind of ability. I want him to be known as a great player, not as some clown.’”

In June 1991, the Indians gathered their signed draft picks for a workout at Baldwin Wallace University, about 20 minutes south of Jacobs Field and downtown Cleveland. When Manny stepped up to the plate for batting practice, Earth stopped rotating on its axis.

Cleveland’s first-rounder sprayed home runs and line drives to every nook of the outfield, wowing the college players, most older than Manny, who witnessed the performance. Bob Fisher, the longtime head coach at Baldwin Wallace, had never watched baseballs travel to these remote locations, let alone by a reticent teenager.

The showcase enabled the Indians’ front office to exhale after they had endorsed Manny in favor of Sele, Allen Watson and Shawn Estes, a trio of big league-bound starting pitchers. They had pondered whether they could draft one of those hurlers and then snag Manny with their second pick, but the proposition seemed too risky.

“All it takes is one club,” White reminded Hart.

The afternoon the team introduced him as its top pick, Manny completed his first round of batting practice at Municipal Stadium, the Indians’ cavernous, decaying dungeon. Manny treated his major-league audience to an array of opposite-field home runs.

“Nothing after that day surprised me,” Alomar says.

Later that year, after Manny captured Minor League Player of the Year honors for his gaudy statistics in rookie ball in Burlington, North Carolina, he flew to Cleveland for a debriefing of his first professional season. Mark Shapiro, one week into his new gig as a baseball operations assistant, picked up Manny from the airport and drove them to what he described as one of the most uncomfortable meals of his life. The two dined at a restaurant inside the Powerhouse, an old power plant converted into a collection of eateries, clubs and an arcade in a brick building in the Flats, the bar-speckled banks of the Cuyahoga River in downtown Cleveland.

Manny didn’t say much. He mixed in an occasional smile between his one- and two-word answers to Shapiro’s futile bids to spark conversation. Shapiro, five years his senior, finally handed Manny a roll of quarters. Manny beamed. The two ambushed every Pac-Man, pinball and pop-a-shot machine in the venue.

“That broke the ice,” Shapiro recalls. “The rest of the night, we laughed and talked.”

Manny was homesick the moment he landed in Burlington, the antithesis of his environment in Washington Heights, where he was comforted by familiar faces, fellow Dominican Republic transplants. He threatened to quit during his first minor-league season. To persuade him not to squander his unrivaled hitting acumen, the Indians leaned on Mel Zitter, Manny’s high school mentor who had coached him in the Brooklyn-based Youth Service League. The Indians also signed veteran outfielder Donell Nixon to guide Manny through the upper levels of the minor leagues.

“His bat progressed him through the minor leagues so fast that we couldn’t develop the rest of him,” Shapiro says. “It was almost impossible.”

If not for Manny’s immediate output at the plate, Cleveland’s executives wondered, who knows how his story would have unfolded? He registered a .326/.426/.679 slash line at Burlington, with 19 home runs in 59 games.

“He was trying to survive each day,” O’Dowd says. “The only time he was ever comfortable in his life, at that point in time, was when he was in the batter’s box.”

In 1993, Hart dispatched Ted Simmons, a Hall of Fame catcher who had joined the Indians as a pro scout, to a game in Toledo to identify the talent at the team’s Triple-A affiliate, the Charlotte Knights. The Indians were aiming to bury four decades of misery when they shifted into their sparkling new ballpark the following year. Hart demanded insight on whether Manny or Thome could help vault Cleveland toward contention.

After Manny’s first at-bat, Simmons called Hart.

“Hartbeat, oh, my God,” Simmons told him. “I just saw this kid hit a ball 450 feet.”

An hour later, another bulletin.

“You’re not going to believe this,” Simmons relayed. “I just saw him hit one to right-center, the same distance. John, this guy is ready.”

Two years after he was drafted, Manny reached the major leagues, swatting home runs and doubles that masqueraded as home runs.

Manny Ramirez
Manny Ramirez homers in 1999. (David Maxwell / AFP via Getty Images)
Early in his career, Manny sat one afternoon with Julian Tavarez in the visitor’s clubhouse at Kauffman Stadium in Kansas City. Manny rarely engaged in noteworthy conversations with reporters, and he never initiated the dialogue. On this day, though, he summoned Ocker to their table and asked the early-50s newspaperman for a loan.

“How much?” Ocker asked.

“Sixty thousand dollars,” Manny said.

Ocker flipped his pants pockets inside out to reveal only a few clumps of lint.

“How about $30,000?” Manny relented.

Ocker inquired about the plans for this potential windfall. Manny said he and Tavarez each wanted to purchase a new Harley Davidson motorcycle. When reporters congregated in Hargrove’s office for his pregame interview session, Ocker told the manager about Manny’s quest for cash.

“Yeah, I already know,” Hargrove said. “He asked John Hart for an advance on his salary.”

Manny landed a signing bonus of about $250,000 following the draft. By 1996, following the signing of a four-year extension, he was earning a seven-figure salary. And yet, neglected paychecks routinely fluttered out of Manny’s locker in the Indians’ clubhouse at Jacobs Field. He once left one in a pair of cowboy boots in the visitor’s clubhouse in Texas. The team’s controller required the PR director to talk to Manny about depositing the paychecks.

The PR director asked Manny: “How are you doing for money?”

“I’m doing great,” Manny said. “You need some?”

The PR director politely declined and instead suggested Manny hadn’t been cashing his paychecks. Manny rummaged through his cleats and batting gloves and teammates’ belongings at the bottom of his locker and unearthed three unopened, crumpled envelopes, each containing a check worth two weeks’ salary.

“These?” Manny asked.

“They found stuff from April in August,” Alomar says.

In those days Manny mastered the art of escaping responsibility for the dinner tab. After a night of premium seafood and a few bottles of wine with teammates, he’d excuse himself to use the restroom when the bill arrived. And he’d never return.

“You have no idea how many times he’d say, ‘Hey, I forgot my wallet,’” Baerga says.

“He’d go, ‘I didn’t bring my credit card,’” Alomar says. “Or, ‘I didn’t bring cash.’ Manny would say, ‘You guys have more service time than me. You take care of the tab.’” Of course, Manny had plenty of cash. He once left $25,000 in his locker over the offseason. A clubhouse attendant discovered the money while cleaning out Manny’s space. The Indians deposited it for him.

If Manny tapped on a teammate’s hotel room door, room service wasn’t far behind. Manny would greet Baerga or Tavarez or Omar Vizquel and say, “Let’s eat together today!”

“I’d say, ‘I just finished eating,’” Baerga says. And then, a hotel employee would appear with trays of chicken wings and burgers and French fries — all charged to the unwitting teammate’s room.

When the Indians promoted Manny to the majors in September 1993, he spent his first homestand at a Marriott in downtown Cleveland. He packed his suitcase the morning of the team’s series finale, after which the Indians flew to Texas. The bellhops at the Arlington hotel delivered each player’s luggage to his room. Manny’s was missing. Hotel staff scanned the lobby and the team bus before they deduced that Manny had never toted his suitcase to the ballpark in Cleveland earlier that day.

“He did that twice,” Baerga says. “Twice! We had to buy some clothes for him.”

“He’d buy clothes on a road trip and then leave them in his locker for the clubhouse kids to keep,” Alomar says.

Clubhouse attendants regularly drove Manny’s burgundy, souped-up Chevy Impala to the car wash. Manny instructed them to use the cash in the glove compartment. A few singles would cover the cost. Instead, as one clubbie recalled, he opened the glovebox and out spilled a pile of $100 bills, totaling about $10,000.

Manny reclined the driver’s seat as far back as the mechanism would permit, and the clubbies didn’t want to alter his settings, so they crept along Carnegie Avenue as they struggled to see over the steering wheel. Manny would cruise through the Flats, pull into a parking lot and crank the volume of his music to its limits, the bass thumping.

“One year he came in and the car was yellow,” Alomar says. “I was shocked. It looked like a taxi.”

Police officers in nearby Lakewood constantly contacted the Indians, insisting they implore Manny and Vizquel to adhere to the speed limits on their drives home. The request would work for a day or two. Then, Vizquel’s canary-colored Porsche and Manny’s black Mercedes — he eventually upgraded from the Impala — would zip through the streets on the west side of town. When busted for speeding or for boasting unlawful window tints, Manny would sometimes submit a New York driver’s license. Other times, an Ohio driver’s license — whichever card he selected from his stockpile.

Once, when an officer told Manny he had to give him a ticket, Manny replied: “I don’t need any tickets. I can get you tickets.”

After he received his penalty, a fee he could pay with one swift reach into his glovebox, Manny pulled away. He immediately made an illegal U-turn, which earned him a second ticket in a matter of minutes.

Manny smacked a thigh-high fastball and immediately dropped his bat. The baseball sailed past the center-field wall and bounced around the abandoned picnic area at Jacobs Field. By the seventh inning on a sunny Sunday afternoon in October 2000, no one was enjoying lunch with a view. Every fan was standing at their seat, many holding signs featuring Sharpie-scripted sales pitches.

One message read: “Manny please stay! Dolan please pay!” Another read: “We love you, Manny! Please stay!”

Manny admired his work for a few moments, taking deliberate paces toward first base. Then he commenced his final trot around the infield as a member of the Indians. A home run siren and 2 Unlimited’s “Get Ready for This” blared from the ballpark speakers, drowning out fans’ pleas to the free-agent-to-be. Slider, the team’s furry, fuchsia mascot, stood atop Cleveland’s dugout and bowed to Manny as fans begged for a curtain call, one last chance to acknowledge the guy who had morphed from an unfamiliar draft pick in 1991 into a lineup staple and off-the-field riddle nearly a decade later.

Manny was on the doorstep of a heartbreaking exodus, but unlike his eventual divorce from Boston — an ugly split incited by years of dubious injury claims, squabbles with the front office and clubhouse turmoil — his final chapter in Cleveland was defined by home runs and standing ovations.



Manny Ramirez homers in his final game at Jacobs Field on Oct. 1, 2000. (David Maxwell / AFP via Getty Images)
“We were the best offensive team in baseball for eight or nine years,” Hart says, “and as great as Thome was, probably one of the best power hitters, Albert Belle, great power hitter, Robbie Alomar, Carlos Baerga, great hitters — the best hitter I’ve ever been around in my 50 years in baseball has been Manny Ramirez. I had Alex Rodriguez in Texas. The absolute best hitter I’ve ever been around is Manny. I’ll go to my grave saying that.”

Manny didn’t demonstrate as much dedication to the other facets of his game. He would occasionally forget the number of outs when roaming right field, so the team psychologist crafted a laminated sheet that reminded him to track the score, the number of outs and to which base he should throw the ball. Once, when he was running on the pitch, a middle infielder for the opposition told him the batter had hit a foul ball, so Manny returned to first base, where he was tagged out. There was no foul ball.

But when it came to hitting?

“In reality, he was one of the smartest players I ever played with,” Alomar says. “He was phenomenal.”

And it’s why he has never wanted to stop hitting. He has surfaced at any ballpark on any continent that will welcome him. When failed PED tests foiled his bid to play in the majors into his 40s, Manny bounced around the minors with several clubs, played in the Dominican Winter League and a Japanese independent league and even appeared in 49 games for the EDA Rhinos of the Chinese Professional Baseball League. Last winter, he struck an agreement to play in Australia, though that partnership fizzled before he ever stepped into the batter’s box. Even as he approaches 50, he’s in search of a bat and a cage or a field.

For 7 p.m. games, Manny would stroll into the ballpark at 10 a.m. He worked out, watched video and then trekked home to take a nap. By 2 p.m., he was back in the cages. Manny could be flaky in any other situation, but never with his hitting routine.

Manny, Thome and Belle would arrive at the team’s spring training facility in Winter Haven, Florida, an hour before their teammates to occupy the two batting cages adjacent to the clubhouse. By the time the rest of the players changed into their gear, Manny would be drenched, liquid proof of his hundreds of hacks.

Manny pored over video of Juan Gonzalez and Edgar Martinez and mimicked how they positioned their hands on the bat. He studied pitchers’ tendencies with hitting guru Charlie Manuel. He modified pitching machine settings to replicate specific pitches, such as Kevin Brown’s sinker, so he would know precisely when and where and how he needed to swing to bruise the perfect spot on the baseball as it plunged toward the dirt.

Russell Branyan, a brawny, rookie slugger, was struggling to grasp why he couldn’t catch up to fastballs, so he enlisted the help of the guy who constantly obliterated them. Manny urged him to change his point of contact, to swing earlier. By the time Branyan decided to swing, the heater had settled into the catcher’s mitt. The conversation incited a Branyan power surge.

Manny could self-diagnose what was ailing him at the plate, which, in Wiley’s view, explained why he never displayed frustration in the dugout. No helmet-spiking. No Gatorade cooler-attacking. Just an occasional, softly muttered expletive.

“I think it was because of his superior confidence,” Wiley says. “He knew how good he was. He never had slumps.”

On July 16, 1995, Manny whacked an inside fastball from Oakland’s Dennis Eckersley halfway up the left-field bleachers for a walk-off home run in the 12th inning, his third consecutive game with a homer. This one sealed a four-game sweep. As Eckersley trudged back to the dugout, bewildered by Manny’s feat, he uttered a drawn-out, “Wow.”

“There’s no other way to put it,” O’Dowd says. “Manny was as gifted a hitter as anybody who has ever worn an Indians uniform.”

Manny clubbed 236 home runs with Cleveland, third-most in franchise history. His .998 OPS ranks first, ahead of Shoeless Joe Jackson and Hall of Famers Jim Thome and Tris Speaker. He racked up 165 RBIs in 1999, the most in one season by any player in the last 83 years. No one exhibited better bat speed or possessed a more alluring swing. The way he hunched forward and deliberately motioned his bat toward the pitcher. The way he could cover the entire plate so no region of the strike zone offered the pitcher security. The way he released his right hand from the handle during his follow-through. The abruptness with which he dropped his bat in the dirt the instant he struck a baseball he knew was destined for the outfield seats or the moon.

“When he came out of his mother’s womb,” says one longtime Indians executive, “God touched his head and said, ‘You’re a hitter, kid.’”

When the team squared off against the Yankees or some other daunting foe in the postseason, Manny played coy. He would chat with an opposing player during batting practice and suggest he was scuffling at the plate, that his bat lacked its usual spark, that the team didn’t need to concern itself with his plate appearances. Baerga and Vizquel eavesdropped on some of those conversations and rolled their eyes.

“We would look at each other, like, ‘Here we go again. Manny says he doesn’t feel good,’” Baerga says. “He was joking around. He never said he felt good. When the lights came on at 7 p.m., he was ready.”

Manny tallied 13 of his MLB-record 29 postseason home runs during his years with the Indians.

He amassed Silver Slugger awards and All-Star Game nods and Man of the Year honors from the Cleveland chapter of the Baseball Writers’ Association of America. He never cared to retrieve his hardware, though. One award sat atop his locker all season until he gave it to the team psychologist. Others, he attempted to pawn off on anyone he encountered, from Baerga to the guy who rubbed Delaware River mud on the baseballs in the umpire’s room before each game.

“He’d say, ‘Carlito, go and get it for you,’” Baerga says. “You know how many Player of the Month awards Manny won? Silver Sluggers? I don’t think there’s a single picture of Manny grabbing a trophy at the ballpark.”

That was Manny, mysterious and inexplicable, but always commanding attention, long before “Manny Being Manny” gained national acclaim.

“I think because people looked at him as kind of goofy at times,” O’Dowd says, “that gets lost in the fact of how serious he was about his craft and becoming the best.

“Manny told me right to my face: ‘I want to be the best hitter that’s ever played this game.’”

Bobby Bradley’s bid to be the Indians’ long-term first baseman: Meisel’s Musings



CLEVELAND, OH - JULY 09: Bobby Bradley #44 of the Cleveland Indians hits a game winning solo home run off Jake Brentz #59 of the Kansas City Royals during the ninth inning at Progressive Field on July 09, 2021 in Cleveland, Ohio. The Indians defeated the Royals 2-1. (Photo by Ron Schwane/Getty Images)
By Zack Meisel 4h ago 10
HOUSTON — With an ever-changing outfield rotation and players joining and returning from the injured list, attempting to predict manager Terry Francona’s nightly lineup is a futile task. Attempting to project who will fill the nine spots in his batting order next season? That’s an impossible assignment.

Franmil Reyes seems certain to hit in the middle of the Cleveland Hazards’ 2022 lineup. Barring some undeniable trade offer, José Ramírez will remain the club’s third baseman. After that, well, there’s a lot to sort out. We’ll sift through the rubble over the coming months. One player who has a chance to cement his status, though, is Bobby Bradley.

The question following the rookie slugger: What’s the baseline production the team would require from its first baseman? Bradley has been as advertised thus far, responsible for a lot of strikeouts, a lot of home runs and a lot of unfastened jersey buttons.

“He’s been the real Bobby Bradley I’ve known since back in the day,” said Reyes, who played against Bradley in A ball in 2015, “attacking every pitch, fighting every at-bat. It’s really special.”

Bradley owns a .215/.326/.504 slash line. His 124 wRC+ indicates he has been 24 percent more productive than the average big-league hitter. With that sort of output, his hefty strikeout rate — once every three trips to the plate — seems a bit more tolerable. His walk rate is a healthy 12.1 percent and it has salvaged his on-base percentage, which sits just above the league average for non-pitchers (.321).

FanGraphs’ ZiPS projection model forecasts Bradley as a league-average bat the rest of the season, with a dip in power. To this point, Bradley has slugged 10 home runs in 121 at-bats. That ratio — one homer every 12.1 at-bats — would rank fifth in the majors, behind only Shohei Ohtani, Fernando Tatis Jr., Kyle Schwarber and Vladimir Guerrero Jr., if Bradley had racked up enough at-bats to qualify. That’s elite company.

There’s not a ton of competition at first base in Cleveland. Bradley will likely handle the position the rest of this season. Nolan Jones or Josh Naylor could factor in the conversation next year. And with question marks at all three outfield spots and future uncertainty in the middle infield, it would make life a bit easier on the front office if Bradley proved deserving of a spot in the 2022 lineup. If he can sustain his walk rate and slugging percentage, he’ll be in good shape. He has at least another 10 weeks to state his case.

The Baker-Francona bond
Astros manager Dusty Baker shared a clubhouse with Tito Francona, Terry’s father, during his first two years in the majors. Baker broke into the big leagues as a 19-year-old with the Braves in 1968, when Tito Francona’s career was winding down.

“He was always really nice to me,” Baker said, adding that Francona, Hank Aaron, Rico Carty and Clete Boyer called him “The Kid.”

Baker said the team’s veterans bought him his first sports coat, a gold and green plaid number.

“I could wear it with different-colored pants that made it look like I had about eight outfits,” Baker said. “The team had to travel in sports coats or suits, so you had to have one to get on the plane.”

When the Astros visited Cleveland earlier this month, Terry Francona made a point to walk over to Baker’s office to catch up with him. He said when he was a young manager, Baker told him how his dad went out of his way to treat him well.

“I’ll never forget that,” Francona said.

Quote to note
Terry Francona, on tying Mike Hargrove for second place on the franchise wins list for a manager at 721: “The only thing I will say is it gives me a reason to say something about Grover. One, to be included in his company, I’m honored. And two, he might be the single worst golfing partner I’ve ever had in my entire life. And put that one first.”


Oscar Mercado smiles after scoring on Ernie Clement’s three-run double Wednesday. (Thomas Shea / USA Today)
Final Thoughts
1. Michael Brantley’s primary hitting coach has always been a man not affiliated with his team. In between rounds of batting practice before Tuesday’s game, Brantley consulted with his father, who was clad in an orange Astros polo as he stood a few rows behind home plate. The elder Brantley spent four seasons in the majors with the Mariners in the late 1980s. He later coached with several teams, including a three-season stint as the Blue Jays hitting coach. His son is a five-time All-Star who entered Wednesday’s game leading the majors with a .336 batting average and boasting one of the league’s healthiest strikeout rates.

Mickey Brantley, by the way, recorded the best game of his career against the Indians, totaling five hits, including three of his 32 career home runs, against Cleveland on Sept. 14, 1987.

2. Joe Smith made his 808th career appearance on Tuesday night, which moved him past Nolan Ryan into 48th place in big-league history. Smith logged 324 of those outings with Cleveland, by far the most with any of his six teams. (He also pitched for the Angels, Mets, Cubs and Blue Jays, and has been with the Astros since 2018.) Jesse Orosco, a member of Cleveland’s bullpen from 1989 to 1991, sits atop the all-time list with 1,252 appearances. Bryan Shaw said this spring he wants to chase down Orosco’s record. He’s a little more than halfway there, with 655. He’ll turn 34 in November.

3. Scott Atchison, now scouting for the Yankees, monitored the series at Minute Maid Park. He pitched for the Indians in 2014-15, served as an assistant coach who was tasked with creating advance scouting reports in 2016-17 and shifted to the role of bullpen coach in 2018-19.

4. Roberto Pérez used to play third base growing up in Puerto Rico, but he had never manned the opposite corner on the infield before he replaced Bradley during Tuesday’s game. Bench coach DeMarlo Hale asked Pérez if he had a first-base glove.

“No,” Pérez replied, “I’m going with my catcher’s mitt.”

Hale ultimately snagged Pérez a glove that belongs to assistant hitting coach Victor Rodriguez.

“I was kind of nervous, to be honest,” Pérez said. “I’m not used to taking groundballs or anything like that. They hit rockets to first base.”

Pérez said Brantley gave him some grief for his footwork around the base. Pérez did start a double play in the eighth inning.

“If I had the opportunity to do it again, I’d do it,” Pérez said. “I have to practice first.”

5. Pitching coach Carl Willis, on Eli Morgan’s changeup: “Honestly, when I first saw it, I had a little bit of concern that maybe it was too drastic of a change of speed and the hitters would be able to keep their hands back and adapt to it. But his arm speed is so consistent with his fastball and changeup, he doesn’t telegraph the pitch, if you will. He throws it with conviction and we’ve seen a lot of swing-and-miss and we’ve seen guys hit it off the end of the bat. I think now there’s enough video and there’s some history being made with him on major-league mounds. I don’t know that there’s a lot of times that they don’t expect it, and they just can’t wait long enough. So, it’s very effective.”

He throws it with conviction and we’ve seen a lot of swing-and-miss and we’ve seen guys hit it off the end of the bat. I think now there’s enough video and there’s some history being made with him on major-league mounds. I don’t know that there’s a lot of times that they don’t expect it, and they just can’t wait long enough. So, it’s very effective.”

But even Morgan after the game yesterday when the second home run came off a change up said hat he can't just keep throwing it pitch after to pitch to the same hitter; eventually it lands in the stands

To continue on the Eli Morgan thing he really looked the part vs. Astros last night! He's maturing.

Can't imagine he can ever be more than a No. 5 starter. Since teams often figure him out during the course of a start, he could be better as a middle inning reliever.

Cleveland owner Paul Dolan and the franchise’s path forward as the Guardians



CLEVELAND, OHIO - JULY 23: The Cleveland Indians show a video to fans announcing their name change to the Cleveland Guardians prior to the game against the Tampa Bay Rays at Progressive Field on July 23, 2021 in Cleveland, Ohio. (Photo by Jason Miller/Getty Images)
By Zack Meisel and Jason Lloyd 23m ago 1
CLEVELAND — Paul Dolan stood Friday afternoon at the top of Section 340 on the club level at Progressive Field, arms folded, staring out at his kingdom.

It was an hour before batting practice, the quiet before the storm. The team owner peered out at an empty field, save for a few grounds crew members, at a sea of unoccupied, forest-green seats and at a massive, red, script “Indians” sign perched above the league’s largest scoreboard. In a matter of months, the branding around the ballpark will receive a makeover, and that sign will meet its demise.

“It doesn’t fit in my basement,” Dolan said.

This is a year of transition for the franchise — for its product on the field, the payroll that influences the front-office decisions that fuel that product, a name change and, eventually, a lease extension, ballpark renovations and new minority investor. That’s … a lot.

But we’re beginning to see and understand what it might look like when all of those ominous clouds looming overhead start to disappear. Think back to 2016. The team made a World Series run. John Sherman came aboard to pump some cash into the operation. There was money. There was excitement. There was a bright future, a talented core. There was an opportunity to land a prized free agent, which had the ticket office and team shop buzzing before Christmas.

How do they get back to that?

After a few downward-trending years marked by a plummeting payroll, unaddressed roster weaknesses, backlash about the team’s branding decisions, and questions about the name and the franchise’s future in Cleveland, the organization has charted what appears to be a promising path forward. Now, that doesn’t guarantee a parade is in the Guardians’ near future. This franchise is still carrying the longest title drought in the major leagues, and the roster requires quite a bit of refinement.

That said, high-ranking team officials told The Athletic the payroll will increase, starting next season. They finally ripped off the name-change Band-Aid. And, as we detailed in the first piece in our multipart series and Dolan reiterated Friday, the team isn’t leaving Cleveland.

There will be stability, and perhaps even some momentum, heading into 2022.

Jason Lloyd: The last two months of the season could be painful, but the young arms like Triston McKenzie, Eli Morgan and J.C. Mejia will be better off for what they experienced this year. I wrote Friday, and I know you agree with me, that 2021 feels about as bad as it will get. If so, that’s not too bad. This team is .500, the payroll has bottomed out and should start increasing again, and some of the influx of minor-league hitters should be reaching Cleveland by next season.

The Orioles and Tigers are nearing their fifth consecutive seasons below .500. The Pirates can’t escape the NL Central basement. Throw out last year’s 60-game mirage and the Marlins have losing seasons over the past decade.

So it could be a lot worse.

In terms of the actual name change, what became apparent to me Friday is at least part of the reason Guardians prevailed is because of the trademark challenges some of the other names presented. Finding a name they could obtain a trademark for I think proved more difficult than perhaps anyone realized it would be.

One of the other contenders, Spiders, wasn’t dismissed because of trademark concerns, but because of the history associated with its name.

“‘Spiders’ was an interesting consideration early on in the process. There were some pros and cons to it. On the cons side, you had some teams that struggled on the field,” Indians president of business operations Brian Barren said. “There were also some great Spiders teams. It tended to be more of an affinity to, gosh, the last time we had a Spiders Major League Baseball team, it wasn’t necessarily a good thing.”

Zack Meisel: Guardians always seemed like the most harmless choice. I was under the impression they would do a big reveal during the offseason, before the holiday shopping rush and once they could spend more time on the various designs. They needed to know by midseason, though, if they could pull this off in time for Opening Day 2022. And once they determined they could, the clock started ticking. They kept everything under such secrecy.

How often are meetings held? No comment.

Who’s involved in the process? No comment.

What’s served for lunch at the meetings? Jimmy Joh— er, no comment.

But when that inner circle expanded as the team started preparing the Tom Hanks-narrated video, the creation of the logo and other aspects, there was increased risk of a leak. And they feared not being ready to announce the new name on their own terms.

On Friday, July 23, the great mystery was solved. And now they can move forward, with a significant burden lifted for those in the organization and a popular question answered for those who follow the team.

Lloyd: I’ll give the organization credit for announcing it when they did considering they have a pretty important season-ticket renewal deadline looming next week. It would’ve been easy to postpone any announcement until after the deadline in hopes of avoiding having fans unhappy with the name change not renewing their packages. Instead, they proceeded and announced it when they were ready to avoid any leaks.

“The folks that lead our season ticket holders, our overall sales business, have gotten really good about having that first renewal deadline at the trade deadline or right in front of the trade deadline. We’ve let those processes continue as they normally would,” Barren said. “When we felt we were in a position to actually unveil the name, we said, ‘We’re going to go when we were confident we could do it.’ It happened to be (Friday). If it had been three weeks ago, we would’ve done it then, and if it had taken another three weeks, we would’ve gone past that deadline.”

Dolan indicated the team was facing its own set of deadlines to have merchandising done on time. They were close to not being able to have Guardians ready for 2022.

“I think we kind of got it done under the wire. But we got it done,” Dolan said. “You’ve got to get your name out there soon enough so that manufacturers can start on merchandise, uniforms and all that kind of stuff. They would have preferred more time than we’re giving them.”

Meisel: So, where is this all headed? The name change has been unveiled. At some point, they’ll start replacing every mention of Indians in the ballpark (and their other facilities across North America). The lease negotiations should reach the finish line before long. A minority investor should eventually join the fold. Those are all critical components for the health of the organization.

But it all boils down to on-field success. That drives everything. And, oh, by the way, with all of the hullabaloo about the franchise, the trade deadline is Friday afternoon.

Lloyd: We’ve already laid out the challenges this trade deadline presents. The offseason, however, is another opportunity to invest back into the club. If payroll really is expanding next year, I know a great place to start: extensions for Shane Bieber and José Ramírez.

It’s logical to get something done with both. As Bieber creeps closer to arbitration, and therefore closer to free agency, signing him could become more challenging. That’s why I wanted to see something get done last winter. Ramírez is under team control for two more years, taking him through his age-31 season. He should have another three to four productive years beyond that. It would be nice to see him spend his entire career in Cleveland — a rarity these days in any sport.

With so much changing, those are two constants I’d love to see remain in Cleveland.

Meisel: Those are a couple of moves that would actually unite everyone as the organization forges ahead along this new path.

Cleveland Indians: Triston McKenzie has solidified his spot in the rotation
by Kyle Edmond16 hours ago Follow @kyleedmond7


It was a tough start to the season for Cleveland Indians pitching prospect Triston McKenzie. A first round pick in the 2015 MLB Draft, McKenzie had long been considered one of the club’s top prospects. He was coming off a strong audition in 2020 and had high hopes for 2021. However, he saw a few bumps that had him sent down to Columbus.

It took some time for McKenzie to find his way, but the 23-year old starting pitcher, soon-to-be 24 on August 2, has found improvement in his craft. After his slow start to the season, McKenzie has started to settle in and it’s very possible he’s once again earned his spot in the starting rotation, even after everyone is back healthy.

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In the month of July McKenzie has been able to show a bit more consistency. It isn’t every start, but that’s not going to happen for most 23-year old starting pitchers. Fans of the Cleveland Indians have been spoiled with the club’s pitching prospects finding immediate success over the last few seasons. Just because it’s taking McKenzie a bit longer doesn’t mean that the talent isn’t there.

In July, McKenzie has started a trio of games now and those appearances have been able to illustrate his season in a nutshell. However, the positive is that the good starts outweighed the bad. The better fortune has brought his season ERA down almost an entire run.

McKenzie began the month on July 9 against the Kansas City Royals and put together arguably the best start of his career, or at least this season. He was able to toss a season-high seven innings for the Tribe while not allowing a run. In fact, he allowed just one hit and walked only one as well. Opposing batters in that game couldn’t figure out McKenzie and he was able to tally nine strikeouts.


While Cleveland won that game, McKenzie unfortunately wasn’t able to get the win. However, his dominant performance on the mound allowed the team to pick up the 2-1 victory.

McKenzie’s next start didn’t go as smoothly, facing the Houston Astros on July 20. He gave up five runs over four innings plus. He allowed a single run in the first and third, but a fifth inning eruption is what hurt his stat line the most. Luckily, he was able to bounce back in his next start, something that hasn’t always happened, especially early in the season.

Going against the Tampa Bay Rays, a team that has proven to be Cleveland’s biggest kryptonite this season, McKenzie had another stellar outing. He tossed six innings and gave up just a pair of runs while striking out six. He again didn’t get the win, but like Kansas City, McKenzie’s outing is what allowed the Tribe to rally back. The best part about it, though, was for the third straight start, McKenzie walked just one batter.


For a pitcher that struggled with the walks early, that’s the best sign of improvement the organization could have asked for. Entering July, McKenzie had walked 39 batters over 11 appearances, averaging 3.5 walks per outing or an average of over seven walks per nine innings.

In the month of July, McKenzie has walked just three batters over three starts, getting that walks per nine down to just 2.5 over the course of the month. If that can continue that would be a huge step for the young pitcher’s progression.

Over eight games during the 2020 season, six of which were starts, McKenzie flashed his potential with an ERA of 3.24 and an average of 11.3 strikeouts per nine. As it turns out, the key to that success was his 2.4 walks per nine.

What McKenzie is doing now is the closest we’ve seen him to that 2020 form this season. Since he’s been able to get his walks under control the rest of his game has followed. During the month of July his ERA is at 4.09, even with the blow-up against the Astros, and his walks per nine have settled back down to his 2020 form.

What’s interesting is that while McKenzie’s walks per nine have come down, so have his strikeouts per nine. After averaging 12.1 entering the month, he’s at just 9.8 in July. Perhaps he’s focusing more on just getting outs rather than striking out each batter. Whatever it is, it’s working. If he can keep this up, he should find himself back in the starting rotation where he started this season, even after everyone has returned from the injured list.

But the sexual-assault allegations against Trevor Bauer have turned a pitcher in his prime into a pariah in his own clubhouse, where no teammate has spoken publicly about him or come to his defense and, according to two sources, the majority of players don't want him back.

— Mike DiGiovanna (@MikeDiGiovanna) July 25, 2021

The Dodgers on Thursday finalized their three-year contract with Trevor Bauer, with the reigning National League Cy Young Award winner guaranteed up to $102 million over the life of the deal.

Bauer’s contract is structured in such a way that he can opt out of the deal after 2021 or after 2022. The payout, per Jabari Young at CNBC, is as follows:

$10 million signing bonus
2021: $28 million
2022: $32 million
2023: $32 million

If Bauer opts out after 2021, he gets an extra $2 million. If he opts out after 2022, he gets $15 million. That effectively makes this potentially either a one-year, $40 million deal, or a two-year, $85 million deal, though with three guaranteed seasons the total contract has a lower average annual value ($34 million) for competitive balance tax purposes.

The Cleveland Indians, the trade deadline and a potentially busy week ahead: Meisel’s Musings



CLEVELAND, OH - JUNE 28: Cesar Hernandez #7 of the Cleveland Indians runs to first base against the Detroit Tigers during the fourth inning at Progressive Field on June 28, 2021 in Cleveland, Ohio. (Photo by Ron Schwane/Getty Images)
By Zack Meisel Jul 26, 2021 32
CLEVELAND — Trade conversations have increased in recent days throughout the league, and that trend will continue as Friday’s deadline nears.

In Cleveland, president of baseball operations Chris Antonetti and general manager Mike Chernoff operate with a “nobody is ever off-limits” approach. They’re always keeping one eye on the club’s short-term needs and another on long-term solutions. (Nine out of 10 ophthalmologists do not recommend such a tactic.)

That strategy, coupled with the team’s July swoon, has left rival evaluators wondering how active the Indians might be this week. As a result, teams have checked in on or are monitoring players from every area of the roster. The club’s short-term needs are not as critical now that its postseason chances have dwindled.

Cesar Hernandez is the most sensible trade candidate, given the organization’s glut of young middle infielders. He has a $6 million option for next season that could appeal more to other teams than it would to Cleveland. The Indians could move Hernandez and get a better look at Andres Giménez for the final two months of the season. The 22-year-old has posted a .269/.328/.503 slash line since being optioned to Triple-A Columbus in late May.

Giménez has split his time in Columbus between second base and shortstop. He could play either position in the majors, and teams have also inquired about the availability of Amed Rosario, who has manned shortstop since Giménez’s demotion. Rosario doesn’t seem to have a clear-cut future role on Cleveland’s infield, as prospects Giménez, Gabriel Arias, Tyler Freeman and Owen Miller could all receive opportunities within the next year. Rosario is under team control through 2023.

José Ramírez could be a popular name on the rumor mill this week (and this winter). Never say never, of course, but it would be rather shocking if the Indians dealt their lineup cornerstone. A rotten, injury-riddled month hasn’t drastically shifted their thinking about their top position player, who has incredibly affordable club options for 2022 and ’23 ($12 million and $14 million).

The team entered this season with a paltry payroll and the youngest roster in the league, so it’s thinking long-term moves more so this year than in recent years. Cleveland has investigated outfield options who have multiple years of team control, sources said.

“Where those opportunities lie and how much of them (are) oriented on just this year versus the rest of this year and the future,” Antonetti said, “that’s a sliding scale, and so our goal is to execute transactions that help us both in the short- and the long term. Whether we’re able to do that, we’ll have to see what opportunities are out there for us.”

There aren’t a ton of teams equipped to land Ramírez (who would welcome an opportunity to stay in Cleveland long-term), anyway. The Blue Jays, Mariners, Brewers and Mets could all make sense to a varying degree, but there are hurdles in just about every scenario, the greatest one being the Indians believe they can contend the next few years. Obviously, they stand a better chance at doing that if Ramírez is on the roster. Plus, the number of suitors would probably increase over the winter (and once a new collective bargaining agreement is in place; the current CBA expires in December).

It’s difficult to envision a Ramírez trade that wouldn’t hinder efforts to field a competitive team in 2022 and ’23. The Indians swapped Trevor Bauer and Mike Clevinger for players who could help them in both the present and future. That would be a more difficult task with Ramírez. The Indians also insist they’ll carry a higher payroll next season, so it’s not as though they’ll be burdened to deal away the only player on the roster projected to earn more than $7 million. The Indians hold all of the leverage.

Final thoughts
1. Triston McKenzie threw 63 of his 87 pitches for strikes Sunday afternoon. That set up his secondary stuff to be especially effective, as his curveball and slider produced 10 whiffs, seven called strikes and four foul balls on 23 swings.

The key for McKenzie: Since he returned to the big-league rotation earlier this month, he has issued only three walks in his three starts. In his previous 11 appearances, he averaged nearly a walk per inning. The next two months are pivotal for McKenzie as he attempts to demonstrate he’s deserving of a guaranteed rotation spot in 2022.

2. Emmanuel Clase has increased his reliance on his slider lately, as hitters had come to expect a 100 mph cutter zipping their direction. The shift in strategy peaked Sunday when he threw 11 sliders and only three cutters. Tampa Bay hitters offered at seven of the sliders; they swung and missed on five of those seven swings.

3. Manager Terry Francona missed his second consecutive game Sunday because of a severe head cold. He tested negative for COVID-19. Ramírez was given a scheduled day off to pair with Monday’s off day to rest his nagging elbow. The team reinstated Cam Hill from the 60-day injured list and optioned him to Columbus. To clear a spot on the 40-man roster for Hill, the club shifted Shane Bieber to the 60-day IL. That’s just a formality because Bieber was bound to miss more than 60 days anyway as he recovers from a shoulder strain. Bieber last pitched June 13.

“It’s been a little bit slower to respond than maybe we had hoped,” Antonetti said. “It’s something that’s just lingering in there a little bit.”

4. J.C. Mejia’s splits paint an interesting (and rather uninspiring) portrait.

Mejia in the first inning: 15.58 ERA, 1.057 OPS against
Mejia in the second inning: 0.00 ERA, .291 OPS against
Mejia in the third inning: 7.56 ERA, 1.251 OPS against
Mejia in the fourth inning: 4.91 ERA, .646 OPS against
Mejia in the fifth inning: 14.54 ERA, 1.165 OPS against

Righties vs. Mejia: .210/.290/.306 slash line
Lefties vs. Mejia: .316/.380/.643 slash line

Mejia surrendered five extra-base hits (two doubles, three homers) against the Rays on Saturday night, all to left-handed hitters.

5. The Indians signed their first 20 draft picks this week. Eighteen of them are pitchers. Their top three selections offered some insight into which major leaguers they admire.

Gavin Williams, No. 23 pick, RHP from East Carolina: Gerrit Cole

“A right-handed pitcher that throws hard. That’s what I try to do.”

Doug Nikhazy, No. 58 pick, LHP from Ole Miss: Clayton Kershaw

“Definitely an all-time great, a left-handed pitcher like me and there are things about his breaking ball, especially, it’s just like a big 12-6 breaking ball that I’ve tried to figure out how he throws it. I slowed it down, chopped it up (into) little videos and everything. There’s a lot about his game that I appreciate and love to emulate.”

Tommy Mace, No. 69 pick, RHP from Florida: Cole or Tyler Glasnow

“Two big, tall right-handed pitchers that are power arms that you try to emulate as best as possible.”

Cleveland Indians trade chatter: What’s next for Cesar Hernandez, Amed Rosario and Roberto Pérez?


CLEVELAND — Here’s the latest buzz regarding the Indians and the approaching trade deadline. (OK, it’s more of a faint hum than a buzz.)

• Roberto Pérez caught up with his friend/mentor/idol, Yadier Molina, on Tuesday afternoon at Progressive Field. The Cardinals drafted Molina in 2000. This is his 18th big-league season with St. Louis. He turned 39 earlier this month.

“It’s nice to stay with one team,” Pérez said, “but it’s tough to do.”

Pérez said he can’t imagine playing for another organization. He has been with Cleveland since the club drafted him with the 1,011th overall pick (33rd round) in 2008.

He has wondered, however, if his tenure with the franchise might soon reach its end.

“You think about it naturally,” he said.

Pérez has posted a .149/.265/.347 slash line in only 118 plate appearances this season. The 32-year-old was sidelined for two months after suffering a fractured finger when he was crossed up on a pitch from James Karinchak.

The Indians devoted nearly $9 million to the catching tandem of Pérez and Austin Hedges this season, which represents almost 20 percent of the club’s payroll. Pérez has a $7 million team option for 2022. Hedges will be owed between $3.5 and $4 million in 2022, his final year of arbitration.

The club has no commitments on the books beyond this season. Pérez, José Ramírez and Cesar Hernandez have team options; otherwise, no salary is guaranteed. But would the Indians spend $11 million on their catching tandem? They did sign Wilson Ramos to a minor-league contract earlier this month. He’s batting .300 with a .754 OPS in 52 plate appearances for Triple-A Columbus. He could join the big-league club if the front office opts to deal a catcher this week.

The Blue Jays could use a veteran, defensive-minded catcher to pair with bat-first rookie Alejandro Kirk since Danny Jansen recently landed on the injured list with a hamstring strain. Toronto, however, is seemingly in the mix for just about every available player this week, and pitching remains its top priority.

• Hernandez remains Cleveland’s most logical trade candidate, but there are limited suitors, and it’s difficult to envision any team forking over anything substantial. The White Sox are seeking a replacement for Nick Madrigal, who is out for the season. The Mariners and Red Sox could make some sense, though Boston would prefer help at first base.

Hernandez’s $6 million club option for 2022 does offer another team some additional value. He has already established a new career high with 18 home runs. Hernandez’s advanced metrics and walk and strikeout rates are in line with his production last season. Defensively, however, he has struggled, after capturing a Gold Glove Award at second base in 2020. He ranks in the bottom 10 percent of the league in Statcast’s Outs Above Average.

• At least one team has inquired about Amed Rosario, but he’s lower on teams’ shortstop wish lists than, say, Washington’s Trea Turner or Colorado’s Trevor Story. Turner exited the Nationals-Phillies game Tuesday after testing positive for COVID-19. Story is a rental, as he can become a free agent this winter.

It’s difficult to project where Rosario fits in Cleveland’s future. It’s probably not in the infield, with better defenders in Andrés Giménez and Gabriel Arias knocking on the big-league door, plus Owen Miller, Tyler Freeman and Ernie Clement vying to join (or, in Clement’s case, stay in) the major-league infield mix.

Rosario has two more seasons of team control. He could always return to center field if the team moves on from Bradley Zimmer and/or Oscar Mercado.

• The Indians have checked in on long-term outfield solutions, but that seems like the sort of trade that might be easier to execute during the offseason, when more teams can be open-minded about their plans.

There’s no indication that Cleveland has actually inquired about him, but Minnesota’s Max Kepler is an interesting possibility to be traded somewhere this week. The Twins are clear sellers, and Kepler is under team control through 2024 at a reasonable price: $6.75 million next year, $8.5 million in 2023 and a $10 million team option for 2024. Kepler owns a career .761 OPS and consistently rates well defensively.

Speaking of outfielders, this is simply thinking out loud: Zimmer could fit for a contender with a stable outfield but a need for a speed-and-defense type of backup. He will turn 29 this winter, and it’s difficult to imagine the Indians wanting to guarantee him a big-league spot next season.

• Pitching is, per usual, a hot commodity. At least a couple of teams are monitoring Cleveland’s staff, and while the Indians will always listen on any player, it’s unclear if they would consider moving a starter or reliever. They learned this season they don’t possess the MLB-ready depth they’ve had in the past. Shane Bieber, Zach Plesac, Aaron Civale, Triston McKenzie and Cal Quantrill could be a strong quintet for next season, especially if McKenzie and Quantrill continue their recent developmental trends.

Would Cleveland trade a reliever? Bryan Shaw, a rental, is an obvious candidate. There isn’t a contender that would be averse to adding to its bullpen. The Reds acquired three relievers in a span of about 12 hours on Tuesday/Wednesday. The Astros dealt for Seattle closer Kendall Graveman on Tuesday and were close to acquiring Yimi García from the Marlins on Wednesday, according to The Athletic’s Ken Rosenthal. The Braves, Athletics, Phillies, Brewers, Mets and Blue Jays could all be in the market for relief help.