If you've ever watched HBO's "The Sopranos," there's a good chance you know what it's like to get fooled by a dream sequence. A recurring pattern is for the audience to begin a dream sequence thinking they are simply watching the next scene. Something typically happens after a short while that cues them to the fact that this could not be the show's true reality. At that point, the audience registers that they are watching the dream and can begin to interpret the scene accordingly.
Cleveland fans often face the same dilemma. When people grow up rooting for perennially bad teams such as the Browns, Cavs, and Indians, they must often face the difficult task of discerning truth from reality. An easy discernment comes when the Browns win the Super Bowl. I've always known that if the Browns have just won the Super Bowl, I'm either dreaming or playing Madden.
I used to have a system for the Indians, as well. If I opened a newspaper and the Indians were at the top of the AL Central, I knew I was dreaming. To my pleasant surprise, however, I'm either in the midst of one really long dream, or the Indians are, in reality, in first place in the AL Central.
This, of course, brings up an important question: how on Earth could this have happened!? A lot has been going right, encompassing starting pitching, the bullpen, and the offense. The starting pitching is young, and with Mitch Talbot's recent injury, there will soon be a new face thrown into the mix. The bullpen shares the young trait, plus bullpens are always made up of such small sample size that extrapolations can become ridiculous.
One strength thus far for these AL Central-leading Indians has been their offense. Even in their first game, where the White Sox jumped out to a quick 14-0 lead after four innings, the Indians scored 10 runs. Sure, the White Sox pitchers were probably being lazy, as it was garbage time, but doesn't the same logic hold for the Indians' hitters?
I'm going to focus on figuring this out, therefore, by asking where the offense is coming from.
The Indians are top 10 in the MLB thus far in batting average, slugging percentage, and on-base percentage. All this despite the fact that arguably their two best hitters, Shin-Soo Choo and Carlos Santana, haven't been hitting particularly well yet. While it may be an impossibility for guys like Asdrubal Cabrera and his older, second base counterpart Orlando Cabrera to keep up hitting like they have been, it's a good indicator that this is a team that can beat you anywhere along the lineup.
On top of this, Grady Sizemore, the guy often dubbed the team's best overall player, only recently returned from a knee injury to hit a home run and double in his 2011 debut against the Orioles.
The Heart of the Order
Much of the credit for this early success has to be given to the resurgence of Travis Hafner, adoringly known as Pronk. This season, he's carrying a .346 AVG, a 1.042 .OPS, a .635 SLG, and he's hit 4 home runs. These numbers are a lot closer to his 2006 numbers of .308 AVG, 1.098 .OPS, .659 .SLG, and 42 home runs than they do to any numbers in between. Normally when a guy hits this well, I don't expect it to last, but when we've seen him do it in the past for entire seasons, I'll at least stay hopeful.
If Pronk continues to his like he has been, he provides a pretty nice backstop for Choo and Santana. To go along with all his other acclaim, the MLB Network this past offseason named Choo the MLB's second best right fielder (and first place was simply a lifetime achievement award for Ichiro Suzuki similar to Cal Ripken, Jr. and Tony Gwynn being in the 2001 All-Star Game). Given what Choo has done the last couple of years, I'm confident he'll provide some major offense this season.
On June 11, 2010, in Carlos Santana's first big league game, he hit a home run. It was the start of great things to come, as he was one of the only bright spots of the Indians' 2010 season. This was especially uplifting given the fact that Indians fans were still hurting from the loss of fan favorite Victor Martinez in a 2009 trade to Boston. Given that the heart of the lineup features Choo, Santana, and Hafner, therefore, you can see where the potential meat of this offense stems.
Top of the Order
In an effort to get some baserunners for Santana, Choo, and Hafner to knock in, Indians manager Manny Acta leads off the lineup with Grady Sizemore and Asdrubal Cabrera (Droobs). Given Sizemore's fame, I'll skip right to Droobs.
Droobs made a name for himself in Cleveland during the 2007 run up to Game 7 of the ALCS. During that series, the announcers would continually shock themselves with graphics showing that Droobs was matching up statistically even or better than 2008 AL MVP Dustin Pedroia (who was already having himself a nice little career, although if the two players were brought up on opposite teams, everyone would have probably been shocked that Pedroia was comparing favorably to Droobs).
Droobs has continued to be a good player for the Indians since, playing consistently well, but he was nagged by injuries last year. Should he remain healthy in 2011, a 1-2 punch of Sizemore-Droobs should provide a nice spark-plug for the Indians lineup.
Soft Underbelly of the Order
Once you get past the top and heart of the order, any team is going to have a little more difficulty finding legitimate optimism. The end of the order, however, is often what separates the good from the decent, the great from the good, and on and on.
The Indians lineup currently ends with Orlando Cabrera (the O), Michael Brantley, Matt LaPorta, and Jack Hannahan. Thus far into the 2011 season, this is the part of the order that has meant a winning record for the Indians.
An afterthought to most, the O was a quiet offseason signing in February expected to merely compete for a job at second base. What people tend to forget with a guy like the O is that intangibles like leadership and veteran experience can go a long way. Even without the promising production the O has been providing, therefore, he still would have likely been a worthwhile signing. Given the fact that he's shown so far this year that he can still hit (and has been playing stellar defense), the O has allowed the back end of the lineup to jump off to a good start.
Next up are Brantley and LaPorta. Both young hitters came over when the Indians traded away C.C. Sabathia halfway through 2008. While LaPorta was supposed to be the gem of the deal, Brantley has been the one shining brightest. When Sizemore was out, Brantley held down the leadoff spot by hitting above a .300 AVG. The value of this is increased when you consider that speed is one of his greatest assets.
In homage to Sizemore, Brantley is now hitting after the O. This means that the Indians have the luxury of high-level run scorer hitting in front of the supposedly powerful LaPorta. Despite not currently putting up anyone's idea of monster numbers (.260 AVG, 2 home runs, 9 RBIs), LaPorta is at least beginning to show some potential. Put a guy who regularly gets on base in front of him, and the numbers start to get cushioned. This means we may finally get to find out if Golden Boy LaPorta can be the next Jim Thome (fingers crossed hoping he's not the next Ben Broussard). If LaPorta works out, the Indians have a pretty potent one through eight.
The nine hole isn't going to provide much offense. Jack Hannahan started the season like he was going to have some magical year. He has since come back to Earth, which is where I expect him to stay. He provides reliable defense at third base, and at this point, that's enough. Anything he provides offensively is a gift.
Forecast
While the Indians may be overachieving a bit, they didn't get enough credit coming into this season. Barring a catastrophic injury bug like last year (Sizemore, Droobs, Santana, and Hafner all went down with injuries), this is a team that can continue to score some runs. Given the youth and question marks all around this team, don't expect to see a late playoff run. But given all the potential strengths, not to mention guys like Shelley Duncan throwing in an occasional 10th inning go-ahead double, the 2011 Indians could be a special and fun team to watch.
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