2017 Cleveland Indians

i love this team

J-Ram is a GOD!!!!!

The Indians are the first team with 13-game winning streaks in back-to-back seasons since the 1960-61 Yankees (via Elias Sports Bureau).

Kluber's got 13 K through 6 innings--close to 100 pitches, though, and a big lead.

Kluber gotta have finally passed Sale for Cy frontrunner on most ballots now.

Sale had a lock on it at the break, but yeah, I would think so. The three WAR leaderboards still have Sale up by a combined game-and-a-half (Sale leads two, Kluber the other), but that basically seems like a toss-up.

still think Sale wins narrowly today, strikeouts + Red Sox + "narrative"

lucrative

loo-kruh-tiv

adjective
1. producing a great deal of profit; moneymaking
2. The 2017 Cleveland Indians

18!

3 shy of the "modern" record (since 1930)

and the Dodgers have lost their 10th straight. what is going on here

Their lineup is filthy at this point, no real weaknesses at all.

Pretty good shot at matching that modern record.

Myles Jaye vs Carlos Carrasco
Matthew Boyd vs Corey Kluber
Buck Farmer vs Mike Clevinger

going to see them this weekend

From @jonahkeri : On June 14, Cleveland stood at 31–31, having scored 11 more runs than the team had allowed. Since then: 56–25, +198.

— Alex (@nullster) September 11, 2017

The Indians’ season isn’t complete. Their pitching numbers are going to change, possibly for the worse. And it should go without saying that our WAR metrics are far from perfect. They don’t, as one example, consider strength of opposing schedule. Maybe regular WAR is too far removed from reality. Maybe RA9-WAR isn’t removed enough. Maybe it’s too sloppy to just find the average of the two numbers as if it really means anything. You can argue as much as you’d like to, because there is always room for disagreement. But there’s a legitimate case to be made that the 2017 Cleveland Indians have the best pitching staff in baseball history. This is the evidence. By all-time WAR/162, they rank in first place. By all-time combined WAR/162, they rank in first place. They still have games to play, but they can perform worse while remaining where they are.

http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/so-the-indians-might-have-the-best-pitching-staff-ever/

19

+100 differential during these 19 games

134 results for your search "WWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWindians"

Kluber lookin' pretty good w/ a 1-0 lead

20 in a row, wow.

8 K/0 BB shutout for Kluber

I guess it goes without saying that if the Yankees won 20 in a row it would be the biggest sports story of the year. Somehow the streak doesn't feel nearly as big as it should.

they should've done it before football season started

meh, variance in win distribution.

(I can't be a hypocrite, I thought the Moneyball movie's emphasis on the A's streak was straight-up pandering bullshit.)

I am impressed by 20 wins in a row

Like I said on Twitter yesterday, the talk here in town is less "Guys, the Indians are about to win their 21st game in a row" and more "DID THE BROWNS WIN A MORAL VICTORY IN THEIR LOSS TO PITTSBURGH?"

wow the indians radio guy is pretty annoying

which one? tom hamilton?

i thought Cleveland was 'a great baseball town'

it is!

hamilton is beloved here

not my style i guess. he just literally YEEELLLLLLLLED about ramirez taking a ball.

tbh i don't feel bad for the cleveland indians not getting coverage for their winning streak in baseball because their logo is still so fucking awful and no one in cleveland seems to give a shit about that, either.

it is bad

plenty of us here hate it though

it is still so weird to me though that so many people think it is acceptable. my neighbor across the street, an otherwise very nice old guy, just put a giant wahoo on the front of his house

i guess more Native ppl need to move there to shame 'em

I have so many "save the chief" friends and it makes me livid.

bray juce

It's such a weird ugly logo.

80 XBH in a season
CLE history

Averill (3x)
Manny (3x)
Belle (2x)
Trosky (2x)
Speaker (1x)
Sizemore (1x)
Morgan (1x)

And now: Jose Ramirez

— Jordan Bastian (@MLBastian) September 13, 2017

One of our sports stations had an ESPN guy on this morning talking about MVP candidates, and he came up with the most obscure first for Ramirez: first guy ever with 40 games each at second and third with an OPS over .900. That's definitely a lot of value, although the combination is a little specious.

http://68.media.tumblr.com/740d23742441301fa9e05f67ada7034b/tumblr_n8kfkrIu5J1scl662o1_500.jpg

The day of "the Decision," a co-worker wore this shirt to work. As I walked past him, I said "Nice racist shirt," and then we had a long, loud discussion outside the office and he probably still hasn't forgiven me. Never saw him wear it again, though.

The last time Indians lost:

A stamp cost 49 cents.
Milk cost https://twitter.com/MLBastian/status/907982955137695750.25.
Donald Trump was President.
Kids who are 22 days old weren't even born.

— Jordan Bastian (@MLBastian) September 13, 2017

The Indians started their 21-game winning streak playing .552 baseball. The probability of such a team winning 21 straight is 1 in 263,000.

— Jeff Passan (@JeffPassan) September 13, 2017

#ycpb

LOL at Santana getting waved around and being thrown out 12 feet from home.

They've trailed after four innings.

i'm told that during the streak they have 39 homers and their opponents have scored 35 runs

james says the indians' pythagorean expected record during the streak is . . . 20-1

Pretenders

what is the RS/RA?

hard to choose between him and sale for cy young

i would have said Sale til a month ago but it's Kluber now i think. almost as many IP as Sale despite missing a month (and Sale not missing any time), lower WHIP, lower ERA, lower BAA, much higher bWAR (though curiously a much lower fWAR), plus 5 complete games and 3 shutouts to 1 and 0 for Sale.

also, Kluber has one more win. ; )

he's within 1.0 fWAR after today's game. sale's FIP is a bit better because of all the strikeouts, but is maybe getting some home run luck -- kluber has the better xFIP

They've still got 2-3 starts each, so things could change, but today, I'd definitely vote for Kluber. Sale's been up and down since the break--awesome starts mixed in with poor ones. Kluber since he returned from the DL:

ERA - 1.77, .171/.209/.283 opposition slash line, almost a 10-1 K/BB ratio. And that's not counting today's start. Also: dominant during the winning streak.

does anyone else stay up at night feeling bummed about how kluber started too late to be a HOFer

he should do a DBZ fusion with cliff lee then they'd both get in

This gives Sale 4.9 runs of support, Kluber 5.4...I wouldn't give that a lot of weight without knowing how the runs were distributed.

http://www.foxsports.com/mlb/stats?season=2017&category=PITCHING+II&group=1&sort=2&time=0&pos=0&qual=1&sortOrder=1&splitType=0

Kluber leads in bWAR 7.1 to 5.9 (which doesn't include yesterday's start).

Sale's durability (= his big lead in IP) was maybe his biggest advantage over Kluber, but that's pretty much gone. I think it's Kluber's award to lose now.

https://www.mlb.com/indians/fans/miniteam

Kluber's bWAR is now 7.9

greatest stretch run in baseball history?

I guess it depends how you define it. Their division title was not in serious doubt before the 22 streak, so one might favor a team that came from behind, like the '51 Giants or '69 Mets. (Both went 39-11 in their last 50 and made up deficits; Indians will likely do slightly better, but always were in first place.)

2007 rockies finished 13-1 to force a game 163 against san diego (in which matt holliday never touched home plate)

yeah, that was in the back of my mind... didn't the Angels blow a big lead vs Seattle in the '90s?

it was '95, but that was more an Angels collapse (12-27!) than an M's stretch run.

95 mariners were 12.5 back on august 20; they went 25-13 and the angels went 12-25 to force game 163.

nice run, but that feels more like an angels collapse (they actually had to win their last five just to get to 163, after a 7-25 stretch)

xp indeed

it would probably be rude to mention the 2007 phillies

that falls under Collapse and u know it

'78 yanks went 52-21 to force a one-game playoff

tribe needs to go 4 and 6 the rest of the way to match that, which seems pretty doable

so, really 53-21 :)

best adjusted team ERAs of integration era pic.twitter.com/QgdywjJGrX

— Jeff Sullivan (@based_ball) September 20, 2017

Over the Indians' past 28 games, Francisco Lindor has hit .352/.431/.750 with 11 HR, 6 2B, 2 3B, 25 R, 27 RBI and more BB (14) than K (11).

— Jordan Bastian (@MLBastian) September 21, 2017

Show Hey O'Tawny
Does mainstream media underrate the Indians pitching staff? Fangraphs is the only place I’ve seen call them the best pitching staff of all time, even though most of the WAR says so

Jeff Sullivan

I think, in general, people don't have a great mental grasp of how pitching has evolved. When you think about the best staffs ever, you tend to focus on the starting rotations. The other thing about the Indians is they're so deep they *never* give the ball to a bad pitcher

For the sake of argument, let's compare the Indians to the Braves from 1993 - 1999
That is, combining all those years

Braves starters had an ERA- of 77. The Indians starters have an ERA- of 79
But Braves relievers had an ERA- of 87. Indians relievers have an ERA- of 65
Maybe the Braves had more Hall-of-Famers. The Indians are better from top to bottom, because every pitcher on the staff counts

https://mobile.nytimes.com/2018/01/29/sports/baseball/cleveland-indians-chief-wahoo-logo.html

chief wahoo is going away! (in 2019) (and only from players uniforms, not from merch sold in the stadium) (and the team is still called the indians)

not good enough, obv

sounds like manfred has the right idea, though

But over the past year the commissioner of baseball, Rob Manfred, has pressured Paul Dolan, Cleveland’s chairman and chief executive, to make a change.

Citing a goal of diversity and inclusion, Manfred said in a statement provided to The New York Times that the Indians organization “ultimately agreed with my position that the logo is no longer appropriate for on-field use in Major League Baseball, and I appreciate Mr. Dolan’s acknowledgment that removing it from the on-field uniform by the start of the 2019 season is the right course.”

not good enough, but better than nothing, or outright hostility (see the washington catheads)

not good enough obv but i'm relieved that they are finally doing something

it will take decades if not more though for wahoo to disappear from cleveland entirely. i'm convinced there will still be some dive bar in parma, oh in 2118 that will keep its giant wahoo light-up sign above the bar

them still being able to make money off of the logo is pretty gross

yea

Now we get to be met with the spectacle of idiots protesting a baseball team because it isn't sufficiently racist anymore.

Finally: The Indians Are Replacing Their Racist Mascot Chief Wahoo With A White Woman Wearing A Native American Halloween Costume https://t.co/HIzE3nkI50 pic.twitter.com/4WRfTDBbqQ

— ClickHole (@ClickHole) January 31, 2018

you wonder how some promo ppl function daily

http://mlb.nbcsports.com/2018/04/16/mlb-pulls-chief-wahoo-jackie-robinson-caps/

Am I doing this right. pic.twitter.com/yAfvncQJx8

— Sung Min Kim (@sung_minkim) April 19, 2018

BE SCARED, RED SOX AND YANKS FANS

Also, that play that just got overturned was some bullshit.

Encarnacion got this 30th home run for a seventh consecutive season the other night. Don't know how many times seven has been reached, but Wikipedia has a list of eight consecutive seasons and that's pretty rare: 18 players, most from the PED era. Most are either in the HOF or would be absent PEDs; the only clear non-HOF'er is Teixeira, Delgado (in that PEDs have nothing to do with him not being in--I'd call him borderline, not clearly not qualified), and (arguably) Sosa.

Unless he has some unforeseen Ortiz-like finish he's about to spring on us, Edwin will not be going into the HOF. (I bet there are some relatively ordinary names who also did it seven times...I'm not trying to diminish what he's done, and I remain a big fan.)

You what's pretty amazing? Encarnacion has stolen 61 career bases in 74 attempts, an 82% success rate. So he's a better base stealer than Rickey Henderson (81%), though not as good as Tim Raines (85%). I have to reconsider his HOF case.

Just as he was when he was traded from Cleveland to Boston, Victor Martinez was very emotional after the Indians honored him as he enters retirement. #Indians pic.twitter.com/hPUmvybmmZ

— Hayden Grove (@H_Grove) September 15, 2018

Kipnis' 1000th hit:

Getting your 1,000th career hit? Awesome.
Doing it on a walk-off grand slam? Even better.
(via @SportsTimeOhio)pic.twitter.com/yWRska8hUl

— Sports Illustrated (@SInow) September 20, 2018

If you'd asked me, I would have said "That's been done before" (and probably would have proceeded to name one of the '70s Mets teams).

http://www.mlb.com/news/indians-1st-club-with-4-starters-with-200-ks/c-295641546

https://www.mlb.com/news/indians-1st-club-with-4-starters-with-200-ks/c-295641546