C.Cya Sabathia

     I have been waiting for this for a while.  I have not been wanting it to happen, but I knew it would. Why?  Pitchers that have fantastic years go on to bigger and better.  Although some of C.C.’s value has gone down due to his weak performance in the post season last year and the beginning of this season, he has regained much of it due to his performance as of late as well as his amazing ability to get a ridiculous amount of K’s.  In addition to this, I knew for a long time that he would go to an NL team because he actually has a bat, which is a rare find in pitching.
     Sabathia is a career .300 hitter. Granted, this average comes from a mere 40 at bats.  However, in these 40 at bats, C.C. has 2 homeruns and 7 RBI’s. Considering the average player gets around 500 at bats a year, this would extrapolate to 25 HR’s and 87 RBI’s which is downright unbelievable for a pitcher.  Granted, this is a very rough estimation, because of the small sample size [40 at bats from across 7 seasons].  Even though these are rough numbers, Sabathia could bat to the level of half of these numbers and still be considered a pitcher who can swing the bat.

Words of advice to the Brewers:
– C.C. is a tremendous talent and a relatively young pitcher. His single biggest downfall is his nerves, which he admitted played a very large role in his postseason performance last year.  If you can coach him past that, C.C. will consistently be a 15+ game winner, and begin to carry that through to the postseason.

To the Indians:
-You are fixing some of the problems in your bullpen.  Rebuild the bats.  Batting practice everyday.  Over and over.  Forget about the technique of hitting.  Take swing after swing after swing and you will begin to see the ball.

Abysmal

     Abysmal – That describes the Indians year so far. Who is to blame?  I’m not qualified to answer that question because I don’t know what person [moron] is making the calls, but I can surely answer “What is to blame?”  So, here are the reasons the Indians are currently 11.5 games back:

Closing Pitching
Bats

     That’s it. Two simple reasons. Let me explain.  Cliff Lee is 11-1 with a 2.26 ERA.  Impressive? You’re damn right.  What’s more impressive?  He SHOULD be 14-1 or possibly 14-2.  Lee has 4 No Decisions, 3 of which should have been wins and one that is on the fence. Let’s review these 4 ND’s:

May 12th against Toronto(L 0-3)    9.0IP   7H   0R   0ER   2BB   5SO   0HR
June 14th against Padres(L 3-8)    6.1IP   8H   2R   2ER   0BB   6SO   1HR
June 20th at Dodgers     (W 6-4)   7.1IP   6H   1R   1ER   1BB   3SO   0HR
July 1st at White  Sox    (L 2-3)    8.0IP   6H   1R   1ER   1BB   3SO   0HR

     This should stun you. Four No Decisions, one of which was 9 inning shutout ball and no more than 2 runs given up in any single game.  Each one of these losses broke my heart.  Who is to blame?  Closing pitching and the bats.

Here are the Indians closers:
Joe Borowski            6 Saves out of 10 opportunities, 7.56 ERA,  3L’s
Rafael Betancourt     4 Saves out of  6  opportunities, 6.03 ERA,  4L’s
Masa Kobayashi       4 Saves out of  6  opportunities, 3.29 ERA,  4L’s

     That’s it. 14 Saves. ALL year.  Not hard to see why they’ve only won 37 games. 14 out of 22 saves converted.  Pathetic. 14 Saves is the lowest amount of any team in the AL.

     So who is largely to blame for this besides the closers?  Not the starting pitching.  Sure , the starting pitching has been a little shaky.  To offset this though, Cliff Lee has been stellar,  CC has been pitching like he used to over the past couple games, Paul Byrd continues to be reliable, and Laffey is doing well, yet the losing continues.  No run support.

     The biggest hole in the lineup is power.  The Indians are an AL team.  The team leader in home runs is the leadoff hitter.  Victor Martinez and Travis Hafner on the D/L have been terrible for the bats. 

My suggestions:

Rafael Betancourt is a setup man. He was one of the best in baseball last year. He is not a closer.  Stop trying to make him one.

Joe Borowski is terrible.  Sure he lead the league in saves last year (45), but he had a terrible ERA(5.07).  The only reason he had so many saves, is he had tremendous run support.

Make Masahide the closer. He has really only had one bad outing when he pitched in the 9th or 10th.

Get Victor or Travis well, or bring in(or up) some big bats. You need it badly