Indians Investing in Bargains or Busts?

The 2005 Indians were the best team in baseball after the All-Star break and just missed the playoffs by one game. They would have certainly made the playoffs if they had improved upon their astonishing 22-36 record in one-run games, leading the majors in one-run losses by a wide margin. In the offseason Mark Shapiro worked to improve that record by emphasizing fundamentally sound play, spending the winter preaching a new focus on “manufacturing runs” and promoting Luis Rivera from Single-A Kinston to coach baserunning, bunting, and first base. With mostly the same players as the previous year, all of Shapiro’s efforts produced an abysmal 6-13 record in one-run games as the 2006 Indians regressed to a sub-.500 season. The same atrocious baserunning blunders, bunting errors, and mental lapses all remained and the defense appeared to get worse.

Last year Indians pitchers led the American League with a whopping seventeen errors, which contributed to 84 unearned runs, also tops in the AL. If last year taught us anything, its that you cannot teach fundamentally sound baseball without players able and willing to play that way. One hoped that Shapiro would heed that lesson and sign players capable of that style. Here’s how the Tribe’s major offseason acquisitions grade out in the department of fundamentals and defense.

2B Josh Barfield: A definite upgrade over Ronnie Belliard, Barfield has much more range at second base and has soft hands and a solid arm. He is a good baserunner, stealing 21 bases in 26 attempts, and is reputed to be a solid bunter; the Indians were lacking in both skills last season.

OF David Delluci: Delluci is more of a power hitter, and will be expected to drive in runs more than set the table. His lack of bunting ability and speed on the bases (one stolen base in 2006) don’t affect him as much as others. However, last year he batted .185 with runners in scoring position, .083 with the bases loaded and a hideous .034 with runners and scoring position and two outs. Thankfully he will only be platooning.

RP Aaron Fultz, Roberto Hernandez, Joe Borowski- All three of these relievers are veterans and have been around the block, but their defense is awful. Only Aaron Fultz is a passable defender (.889 Fielding Percentage in 2006); Borowski and Hernandez are downright abysmal, boasting Fielding percentages of .800 and .750 respectively. As if an error every fifth opportunity wasn’t bad enough, the range factors of the latter two pitchers were both below 1; both CC Sabathia and Bob Wickman were better last year at getting to slow rollers and bunts.

Generally the Tribe have not gotten markedly better fundamentally and defensively. Our pitchers’ defense could actually get worse this season, if that is even possible. On offense Barfield will help, but we still lack one or two veterans off the bench (preferably insurance for Jhonny Peralta and Andy Marte) that can step in and deliver a clutch bunt or sac fly. If Shapiro can make those key acquisitions the offense should improve significantly. But we had better hope that last season’s defensive numbers were aberrations, or that Luis Issac can work miracles on that bullpen, or we could have another disheartening season of one-run losses.