Cleveland Sports Forum

I would bet a lot of money the comment was made by Chipper Jones.

Yeah, I guess I could see Chipper Jones having that thought. Though I would be surprised that he opted to be openly negative about a former team mate. Chipper's game has always been in my mind fortitude, consistency and class.

kenm wrote:Did Lowe pitch against us in the 95 ALDS?

Close, but no Lewinsky.

It was the '99 ALDS against the Red Sox, and I way too well remember sitting in Fenway Park in the player family section on the 3rd base side of home plate as we lost games three and four in Beantown between rain showers and games played on soft and slippery Fenway turf.

I like Terry Pluto a lot, but I haven't forgotten his writing that Boston was certain to be conquered by us after Games One and Two after our wins in Cleveland that post season .

I also still remember Terry Pluto greasing the track for getting Bill Belichick out of Cleveland.

But, I still like Terry Pluto.


Derek Lowe, pitching in 2nd inning relief of Saberhagen was the guy Pedro Martinez relieved in the 4th inning of Game 5 in Cleveland.



That was the game Petey strung 6 no hit innings and was carried off the field.

I've told the story before, but Pedro Martinez truly ended up sitting right in front of me in the Boston player family and friend section in the late innings of the blowout Game 4 at Fenway. I was wearing my baseball hat from the 1995 ALDS. It was marked with a Red Sox logo on the left, and a Tribe Wahoo on the right. Pedro gave my hat a 2nd look as he took the seat in front of me, and we exchanged "man nods."

I should have taken him out.

For the team.

Nice to have Lowe join Carmona in the rotation; two guys with ERAs around 5 and Lowe did it in the NL where 1/9 of the hitters he faces can't hit. Actually I like the idea of adding a veteran No. 5 starter but only if I can be confident that he will be dumped if he really stinks; that's easier to do with a Jeff D'Amico than a Derek Lowe for whom we are on the hook for $5M. Is he the best $5M pitcher we could get?

By far. 5 million does not buy much pitching in MLB.

Yep.

And I think Derek Lowe is a competitor. If our team is in it week by week in 2012, he'll be pitching with heart to keep it going.

I really like having a grizzled vet with an outside chance for 200 career wins in our dugout.


My biggest pause comes from him being from Michigan, but I'll throw THAT completely aside as The Cleveland Indians look forward to Goodyear, and a good year.

Numbers in a single season can be misleading.

We'll see if he has anything left for sure. But I think a guy like that is worth a shot on a single year contract.

Think Kevin Millwood.

At this point then, it seems like Masterson, Ubaldo, Carmona, Lowe and Tomlin have legs up on the 5 spots.

Ground ball extreme!!

If Lowe is a fellow Wolverine, I'm happy to have him. Maybe Zach Putnam will join the bullpen, too.

Trevor Crowe outrighted to Columbus. I strongly doubt anyone would grab him in the Rule 5 draft so we'll see him in Goodyear with his remaining modest chances to be a 4th or 5th OF. Roster now at 38, which leaves room for Chen and Bryson or Stowell. Remain several very dumpable players: OF Thomas Neal, IFs Cord Phelps or Luis Valbuena, RHPs Corey Kluber, Frank Herrmann.

Here's a really lousy corps of outfielders. This is all we have on the 40 man roster and there's nothing behind them of any consequence below them until you get down to Low A.

23 Michael Brantley L-L 6'2" 200 May 15, 1987
12 Ezequiel Carrera L-L 5'10" 185 Jun 11, 1987
17 Shin-Soo Choo L-L 5'11" 205 Jul 13, 1982
47 Shelley Duncan R-R 6'5" 225 Sep 29, 1979
Thomas Neal R-R 6'2" 225 Aug 17, 1987
71 Nick Weglarz L-L 6'3" 240 Dec 16, 1987

That's been my concerns for the past 10 or so years Civ. You might as well add thirdbase and firstbase to that list also. Doesn't leave much.

I'm comfortable with Chisenhall backed up by Hannahan at third.

1st is a dead zone, unless it's Santana. I'd rather his bat be behind the plate but Santana at 1st with great defensive catcher Marson is not a bad arrangement. We have other catchers developing including hitters (Chen), defenders (Perez) and potential younger guys: Monsalve, Lowery, Levisky.

You'd figure 1st base would be a prime location of developing bats but we have none. Then again almost all major league first basemen started at another position so our future 1st baseman, whoever it is, most likely is not playing there now.

When the Tigers released Carlos Pena back in 2006, I was hoping someone in the organization would have jumped on the Pena bandwagon. He was an awesome defender at first and any production would have been a plus as I had posted waaaaay back in time. As was the case in 2007, Pena continued to play stellar defense, his batting average was average at best, but his power numbers skyrocketed. I think back to 2007 and wonder how the playoffs would have turned out if Pena had been our firstbaseman. (On the year, 29 doubles, 46 homers, and 121 rbi's. and a .993 fielding percentage (8) errors.) All those numbers registered in the tough American League East. And they called me crazy, but what's new?

I would be perfectly satisfied with Choo and Brantley, but they do need to sign a 3rd guy of consequence. I think that will happen.

If they can also sign 1B of consequence, we are set IMO. The pitching is already a positive.