Cleveland Sports Forum

Or:

Winners take risks.

So do losers.

TBD.

Jumpimg in in the way back from San Francisco.

We got Jimenez and we won tonight.


All the way!

Neal, 23, has spent the 2011 season at Triple-A Fresno, where he has a .295/.351/.409 line. Baseball America ranked him 96th among all MLB prospects before the 2010 season and seventh among Giants prospects before the 2011 season. Neal, who played on a youth travel team with Mike Leake, Stephen Strasburg and the son of Giants manager Bruce Bochy, has an enviable combination of power and arm strength, according to Baseball America, which suggested he could become an everyday player. However, Neal has seen his power numbers decline this year (13 doubles, two homers, .409 slugging percentage).

Donald called up to replace Cabrera.

It will be very interesting to hear the reasoning for the deal by the Tribe brain trust. Not the principle, but the inclusion of the top 2 pitching prospects in the organization.

Remember Rockies GM O'Dowd said it would take a Hershel Walker type offer for him to trade Ubaldo.

Still need a bat.

Ubaldo on the deal:
http://colorado.rockies.mlb.com/video/p ... id=8877456

rocky raccoon wrote: I believe these moves mean the season is a failure if the Tribe doesn't win the Division this year.

Too much future to give away for a middle rotation guy.

But if Jimenez trends back upward, and the Tribe wins the Division, you gotta feel pretty good going into a playoff series with he and Masterson at the top and Tomlin the #3.

Heck, you add in Fukodome and Ludwick and you could make the case that the Tribe is trying to impersonate the World Champs formula of 2010.

As one who has often spoken out of the need to go for it now, I can't be down on this trade.

Go Tribe!

Well, the thing is that Jimenez isn't a rental. They have him for 2 years after this.

The Indians did give up a lot, especially when you consider that they are giving up arguably two prospects better than any single prospect that they got in return for Cliff Lee, who still had 1 1/3 years left on his deal (compared with 2 1/3 for Jimenez, which is more but not a lot more). Plus, Lee was a better pitcher then than Jimenez is now.

But I understand their thinking. Pomerantz is still a solid prospect, but typically, if the first college pitcher taken in a draft is fated to be a star, he's in the major leagues very, very quickly. Pomerantz is just now getting to AA. I think it's fair to question just how good he's going to be.

What the Indians had to be weighing is this: assuming Jimenez is OK, he and Masterson shape up as the #1 and #2 you need in the postseason, and in a best case scenario, Carrasco keeps developing to the point he's better than the average #3. This indicates that they see their new window as running from now through 2013, at which point they're going to need to start trading veterans again. They could have held on to Pomerantz and White, but what happens if even one of them gets hurt (Adam Miller) or doesn't develop (Jeremy Sowers), or what happens if neither is ready to become a rotation anchor before 2014?

The trade looks like a big gamble, but the way I look at it, they are trading the small possibility of White, Pomerantz, and Masterson leading a playoff rotation for the greater likelihood (but smaller number of years) that Jimenez and Masterson could do the same thing.

Anyway, it's a strange feeling for the Indians to be rolling the dice like this. Even in the '90s when they knew they were going to the postseason every year, they never once made a trade anything like this.

The Neal guy would be a potentially valuable property if he could play centerfield, but it doesn't appear that's the case. It's more likely that he's the new Ben Francisco, which is still not a totally bad thing to get in exchange for someone who has about as much life remaining as Amy Winehouse.

Unless I am missing someone, the only player in Indians history whose first name began with U is Eucal "Uke" Clanton, who was from Antlers, Oklahoma, had one at-bat for the Tribe late in the 1922 season, and struck out.

So he was Moonlight Graham with an even better name.

Charlie T. wrote:

rocky raccoon wrote: I believe these moves mean the season is a failure if the Tribe doesn't win the Division this year.


The trade looks like a big gamble, but the way I look at it, they are trading the small possibility of White, Pomerantz, and Masterson leading a playoff rotation for the greater likelihood (but smaller number of years) that Jimenez and Masterson could do the same thing.

Anyway, it's a strange feeling for the Indians to be rolling the dice like this. Even in the '90s when they knew they were going to the postseason every year, they never once made a trade anything like this.

Rocky.....awesome play by play here today. Awesome to read after the fact when I learned what went down late in the California evening.


My biggest thought right now is that The Tribe Brass has put their organizational resources where my mouth has wanted them to for several weeks to aid 2011. I might have a minor case on "too late" with regard to offense, but I don't now think our deals of the last couple days were available earlier in this trade season.

Let's win tomorrow, put the pedal to the metal.....and hang on and cheer through August and September.

Balls to the wall moves today.

First time I've been proud of our Brass having guts and I think smarts in some time.

Go Tribe!

There's another factor I forgot to mention earlier, which is that Jimenez gives the Tribe the possibility of ace production at non-ace prices, which is something all small markets would kill to have. Jimenez's annual salary going forward is going to be much less than what the Indians were paying Sabathia in his final season. It's even less than what the option years on Carmona would cost, in the very unlikely event those got picked up.

For the record I can't remember where I eventually came down on wright vs Pedro but I did go back and firth a lot on that-this deal however could best be described as wright and bartolo for Pedro after he threw all those innings against us with a bad arm-maybe some would stool make that deal-don't think I would