Other than playing for the Tribe for a decade at an extremely above average level of play, Joe Sewell has another claim to fame. He almost never struck out. While many players who played before his time seem like they didn't swing and miss much, it is because strike outs weren't always recorded as an official stat. Sewell played his entire career after the point when they were, so his numbers are accurate. He really only struck out 99 times in over 1,500 games. His career average of more than 62 at bats per strike out is second ever in all of Major League Baseball history behind only Willie Keeler. From 1925 until he retired (1933), he lead the American League in this stat every single season. Sewell was also a doubles machine, leading the league in 1924 with 45 and hitting more than 40 five times during his career.

While playing for the Indians he did manage to accrue quite a lot of stats and now ranks among the top ten Indians of all time in career games played, at bats, runs, hits, doubles, runs batted in, total bases and walks. Joe Sewell was the back-up short-stop when Ray Chapman was killed by a pitch in 1920. He took over for Ray, finishing the season as starting short-stop and playing in all 7 games of the 1920 World Series, going 4 for 23. He was lucky to earn a championship ring in his rookie year, because he never got the chance to return to the playoffs with the Tribe. Joe also had the honor of playing alongside his brother, Indians catcher Luke Sewell from 1921 until 1930. Joe Sewell was elected into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1977 as an Indian by the Veteran's Committee. He is also a member of the Cleveland Indians Hall of Fame (class of 1951). Joe Sewell died in 1990.

This morning the Indians signed Andy LaRoche to a minor league contract, adding him to the list of Spring Training invitees that includes Felix Pie, Jose Lopez and Aaron Cunningham. Those other additions may have been exciting, but this one is the jackpot. LaRoche is a career .267 hitter, averaging over 20 home runs per season. Oops, nevermind, that's his brother Adam LaRoche. Andy LaRoche is a career .226 hitter and has hit just over 20 home runs in his entire 5 year career. He makes Matt LaPorta look like a chump with his .238/.304/.397 line.

There is no question that the Indians would be planning to play LaRoche at first, even though his primary position has been third over the past few seasons. Lonnie Chinsenhall and Jason Kipnis played well enough last year and have enough upside that the Indians shouldn't be looking to give them any more compition. Last year, Andy played games at every infield spot, so he could also technically take Jack Hannahan's tenative spot on the 2012 roster. This seems like a great move to me because LaRoche's numbers far outshine LaPorta's. Since LaPorta's debut in 2009, LaRoche has lower numbers (cumulative and average) in every single statistical catergory when compared to LaPorta. Since, like in golf, the better player always has the lower on base percentage, this is a very good thing for Andy.

The one place LaRoche outshines LaPorta is hitting against left handed pitching (LaRoche vs LHP: .275/.355/.439), a trouble spot (LaPorta vs LHP: .211/.303/.326) for Matt since the beginning of his career. This opens up a situation where the two La's could platoon at first, with LaPorta taking the majority of the at bats against righties and LaRoche hitting against left-handers. It probably wouldn't really increase production at first and may send LaPorta into a depression that makes him unfit to play at all, but it would give the Tribe a chance to increase payroll and would give fans a chance to start calling them LaLeft and LaRight. Either way, hopefully this move will lead to us cheering for a LaHero next October.

The greatest doubles hitter in Major League history, Tris Speaker, was inducted into Major League Baseball's Hall of Fame as a member of the Cleveland Indians. The Grey Eagle had his most successful seasons as a member of the Tribe, after garnering over 1,300 hits during his 9 years with the Boston Red Sox. In 1920, Speaker was the Indians player/manager and guided the team to it's first World Series championship. His 617 wins over eight seasons as manager remain the third most in Indians history. While each of the top three managers have taken the Indians to the World Series, only Speaker and Lou Boudreau have won it for the Tribe.

As an Indian Speaker lead the AL in hits and batting average, OBP and SLG in 1916 and in doubles six times over eleven years. Speaker also impressed on a single season basis, showing that his numbers were not just the result of a long career. He still holds three of the top five single season double totals and two of the top five best batting averages. He hit over .380 four times while with the Tribe and only batted under .300 during two seasons.

Although his most impressive stat is his amazing accumulation of doubles, Speaker was also impressive in many other categories. He is second all time as an Indian in career batting average, behind only Shoeless Joe Jackson, who he also trails in the all MLB rankings where he is sixth all time. Speaker ranks among the top five Indians in games played, runs, hits, triples, runs batted in, total bases, walks and OBP. He is in the top ten in at bats, steals and slugging percent.  Tris Speaker is a member of the Cleveland Indians Hall of Fame (class of 1951) and was voted into baseball's Hall of Fame in just his second year of eligibility with fellow Tribesmen, Napoleon Lajoie and Cy Young. Tris Speaker died in 1958.

Addie Joss was very possibly the greatest player to ever throw a baseball in a Cleveland uniform. Like Bob Feller, he played his whole career in Cleveland, but he was only able to play half the seasons as his life was cut short by tubercular meningitis. Joss joined the team during just their second season in the American League and quickly established some team records that have never been broken. Although a century has passed since his death, no Indians pitcher has even come close to his team records for ERA and WHIP. In fact, no pitcher in Major League Baseball history has had a lower career WHIP than Addie Joss. Only Ed Walsh, a pitcher for the White Sox during the same era as Joss, has a better ERA in all of baseball history.

Many people have forgotten about, or never have even heard of Joss due to the decades that have passed since he last pitched, but he should be remembered. Even though he only played 9 seasons he still ranks in the top ten Indians all time in career wins, losses, complete games, innings pitched and batting average against as well as holding the Indians records in ERA, WHIP and shut outs. Joss lead holds six of the Indians top ten seasons in WHIP (Indians record of 0.81 in 1908) and four of the top five ERA seasons (team record 1.16 in 1908). During his best two seasons in ERA (1904 and 1908), Joss lead the world in that stat.

In 1910 Joss only played in 13 games. He died just before the following season in April 1911 at the age of 31. In order to support his widow, a group of players got together and held the first All-Star game as a charity event. The event featured the American League All-Stars playing against the Cleveland Naps. Many future Hall of Famers were on the field that day including Ty Cobb (wearing a Cleveland jersey, but playing for the all-stars), future Indian player/manager Tris Speaker and current Naps Cy Young and Napoleon Lajoie. Addie Joss himself was inducted into baseball's Hall of Fame in 1978, better late than never, and is enshrined in the Cleveland Indians Hall of Fame.

Napoleon Lajoie was one of the most important players in Indians history. After playing six seasons in the National League with Philadelphia, including a 1901 campaign where he lead the league in just about everything, Lajoie became a free agent and was one of the first big name players to jump ship, switching over to the brand new American League in 1902 for a huge salary of about $8,000 a season. This was such a big move by the Cleveland Bronchos that in 1905 they changed the team name to the Naps. The name stayed until he went back to Philadelphia in 1915 and the team name was changed to the Indians.

When he was with the Tribe he was among the best hitters in all of baseball and always hit for a high average. He lead the majors in batting average in 1903 and 1904 and the AL in 1910. In his most successful season (1904) he lead the AL in hits, doubles, RBI, OBP and SLG. He lead the league in hits and doubles again in 1906 and in 1910 as well.

Among the career leaders in just about every statistical category, Lajoie is also seventh all time in all of baseball history with 657 doubles. The odd thing is that he is not even first on the Indians, though since the greatest doubles hitter ever (Tris Speaker) played the majority of his career with the Tribe. Lajoie still leads all Cleveland players ever in at bats and hits during a career and is the only Indian (Nap, Blue, etc) to acrue over 2,000 hits while with the team. He also ranks in the top 5 in games played, doubles, RBI, total bases, steals and batting average and is in the top 10 for runs scored and triples. His total hits (227) and batting average (.384) in 1910 remain in the top 5 single season bests for an Indian.

Lajoie also spent some time managing the team and was an overall success with a .550 winning percentage. During his reign he never finished worse than 6th in the 8 team American League and once brought the Naps to a second place finish, only a half game behind champion Detroit Tigers. Overall he is currently the 8th most winningest manager in Indians history, even though he only ran the team for 5 seasons. His winning percentage is tied for second best all-time with Mike Hargrove, only trailing Hall of Fame manger Al Lopez.

Napoleon Lajoie is in baseball's Hall of Fame as a Cleveland Nap and is a member of the Cleveland Indians Hall of Fame (class of 1951). He would most certainly have had his number retired as well, if they had worn numbers back in 1910. He was not only the greatest Indians second baseman of all time, but one of the greatest to ever play the position for any team at any time. Lajoie died in 1959.

There have been a few rumors about the Indians running around during the Winter Meetings. The majority of these have involved an improvement to the offense, specifically first base. The Indians, according to indians.com, have already proclaimed themselves out of the running for Albert Pujols, Prince Fielder and Carlos Pena (who would want him?) so they are currently looking for Matt LaPorta's replacement through trade. They have already signed Matt Pagnozzi to a minor league deal leading to even more rumors of Carlos Santana moving to first to replace LaPorta. Just for a little background information on Pagnozzi, he is a 29 year old career minor leaguer who hit .275 in AAA last year and was dropped by the Rockies and Pirates. Assuming that the Indians do not make a major signing or trade, let me show you some numbers that will hopefully stop the talk of Carlos Santana to first base.

If Santana moves to first, this will completely remove LaPorta from the lineup. This means the two options at first/catcher are LaPorta/Santana or Santana/Marson. For some people seem to be confused and think that Santana will be replacing LaPorta, but that is not the case. Santana is a given either way, so it is actually the back-up catcher who is replacing LaPorta. The reason Santana's numbers are so special are because he plays catcher. Last season he was one of the top two catchers in the AL, but when compared to firstbasemen was closer to sixth.

This is oversimplified, but I took the numbers of Lou Marson, Carlos Santana and Matt LaPorta from their time with the Indians, averaged it out and extrapolated it out over 162 games, since none of them have completed a full season yet (except Santana in 2011). First I added Santana and LaPorta's numbers together the see what we can expect from the combo if they play every single game next year.

While these numbers aren't spectacular (divide everything by two to see what it is per player), just wait until you see it when you through Lou Marson into the mix.

As you can see, the numbers from the first line that were mostly accrued by Santana have stayed the same or increased (walks and steals), but all power and hit numbers have been demolished. Most noteably, the combined slugging percent is .048 points lower. Now, a .400+ slugging percent isn't really anything that great (the Indians record is .690 by Albert Belle) at least it's better than .380. I hate that I have to spell it out like this, but I read comments of people every day talking about how LaPorta should be released in favor of the Marson/Santana combination and hopefully this will do something to eliminate that ignorance. 

Mel Harder was the last Indian to get his number retired and the only one who is not in Baseball's Hall of Fame. The Indians have a team rule that in order for a player's number to be retired they have to be inducted into Cooperstown first, but Harder has a good reason to be an exception. He played for 20 seasons with the Cleveland Indians, two more than any other player in Indians history. He played his entire career with the Tribe, spanning 3 decades, but was never able to get a glimpse of the post season, joining the team 8 years after one World Series and retiring one year before another.

The most successful part of Harder's career took place between 1933 and 1939. During this time he made the All-Star team four times and received votes for MVP three times. In the first season of his prime he lead the AL with a 2.95 ERA and lead the league in shut outs the year after. Unlike many other Indians starters that played their whole career with the team, Harder maintained his starting role until the very end, starting all 15 of his games played in 1947.

Harder has lost more games than any pitcher in Indians history. He has also allowed more runs and hits. Of course, he also has pitched in the most games as well with 12 more games played than Bob Feller. He ranks in the top 5 in wins, starts, complete games, and innings. He ranks in the top ten in every other cumulative stat that matters to a starting pitcher. Harder's best seasons were in the mid to late 1930's on a very underrated Cleveland team, during the prime of Earl Averill and the emergence of Feller. During that time the Indians never finished worse than fifth in the 8 team American League and were only kept from the playoffs by the lack of playoffs. During his whole career the Indians won 52% of their games. When looking at the greatest Indians of all time, Mel Harder has accumulated a stack of statistics that just cannot be ignored. Mel Harder died in 2002.

Larry Doby's biggest claim to fame at this point in history is that he was the first black player in the American League. Just three months after Jackie Robinson signed with the Dodgers, the Indians added the Negro League second base man who later became one of the greatest players in team history. Doby's contribution to the 1948 and 1954 World Series teams was downplayed, behind MVP's Al Rosen and Lou Boudreau and star pitchers like Bob Lemon and Bob Feller, but he was integral to the Indians lineup just about every year he played for the team.

From 1950 through 1955 Doby was one of the top two offensive players every season. In fact, if it weren't for the fact that he was only the second black players in the Majors, he probably would be in that list of MVPs. He lead the league in home runs and runs in 1952 and in home runs and RBI in 1954. Doby was traded to the White Sox in part of Frank Lane's dismantling of the Indians. Lane removed many of the greatest Indians of all time from the roster in exchange for much lesser players and Doby was no exception. He was traded to the White Sox for Jim Busby and Chico Carrasquel. The Indians then missed out of three of his last four effective years and more than 60 home runs. 

In 1958 Doby was traded back the Tribe from Baltimore and had his last season of any note, although it was his worst as an Indian. He was then traded for Tito Francona (for a second time, the first being when the White Sox traded him to the Orioles) and sent to Detroit and from there back to Chicago. In those last two seasons he played just 39 games as Doby's once stellar career faded out into darkness.

His time in Cleveland did earn him some accolades as well as prestige among the leaderboards. Larry Doby ranks in the top 10 all time in career home runs, runs scored, RBI and walks for the Indians and is one of only 6 players to have his number retired by the Tribe. He is one of the greatest centerfielders in team history along with being one of the best batters overall. Along with being recently inducted into baseball's Hall of Fame, Doby is a member of the Cleveland Indians Hall of Fame (class of 1966). Larry Doby died in 2003.

This is the reason I didn't waste my time writing a long career retrospective on Grady Sizemore when the Indians declined his option last month. Grady has resigned with the Indians for 2012 for a rumored base salary of $5 million with incentives bringing it back up to the $9 million a year salary that the Tribe just rejected. The incentives are based on total plate appearances and winning the 'Comeback Player of the Year'. This way the Indians keep their All-Star center fielder, but won't be completely devastated if he gets injured and misses a lot of time in 2012. This will also solidify the Indians outfield which, while deep, just doesn't have a whole lot of All-Star level talent. As it stands Shin-Soo Choo will remain in right field with Sizemore probably moving to left and Michael Brantley staying in center. There will be a wide selection of reserve outfielders available including Shelley Duncan (who will almost certainly make the team as a back-up outfield/firstbaseman and pinch hitter), Trevor Crowe and Ezequiel Carrera. 

Hopefully his discounted price will allow Manny Acta to give him a slightly diminished role as well. The Indians now have better lead-off hitters in either Brantley or Jason Kipnis so Sizemore can be moved down into the lineup so he is hitting closer to sixth than first. As already mentioned, Grady should be taken out of the high stress position of centerfield and moved to left. In addition to that, he should probably not start every game as he has done in the past. In order to save his knees and keep him around all season, it would probably be a good move to allow him to split time with either Crowe or Carrera. Overall this signing is a great move and I'm looking forward to seeing Grady back in the outfield in an Indians uniform.

Grady's Back

Major League Baseball owners and players agreed on a new labor deal today that should do a lot to decrease the difference between large and small market teams. Here are some of the basic changes:

• Random HGH blood testing during the off season and Spring Training. A positive test earns a player a 50 game suspension, the same as a positive steroid test. Players will be able to challenge the results of this test and it will not take place during the season as of now.
• The agreement includes the Astros move to the American League West and the addition of an extra Wild Card to each league.
• Luxury Tax will stay at it's current level of $178 million and not increase until 2014.
• Revenue sharing will be based on team income so large markets will pay more into it and get less out, while small market teams will have to pay very little in.
• A competitive balance lottery will add more draft picks for small market teams.
• Overspending on draft picks will be highly penalized. A threshold will be set for each draft pick and if the team that drafts that player goes over the threshold they will have to pay luxury tax and risk losing the next seasons first round draft pick. This rule could be renamed the Scott Boras rule as it should keep good players from falling in the draft as small market teams with high picks will no longer be afraid of not being able to sign them.
• A luxery tax will also be added to signing international players.

There are also a few more additions that will be beneficial for players, but not necessarily for small market teams.

• In 2014 the minimum salary will be set at $500,000 and there will be cost of living increases each of the next two seasons.
• The amount of players eligible for super 2 arbitration status will raise from the top 17% to the top 22%.
• In order for a team to receive a draft pick for losing a free agent, the original team must make an offer to the player of at least the average of the top 125 Major League salaries. The old system is being thrown out entirely.

Overall this new agreement bodes pretty well for the Cleveland Indians. Going down the list one by one; the new drug testing shouldn't hurt the Tribe at all. Throughout the history of steroids in baseball, the Indians have only had two players with issues (Rafael Betancourt and Paul Byrd) and are generally thought of to be a clean organization.

I wrote an article last week on how the Astros move will help the Tribe.

Keeping the luxury tax at the same level won't hurt the Indians, but it won't really help either. Only two teams (the Yankees and Phillies) are currently obliged to pay more than $178 million in 2012. A few other teams will probably near or pass that level, but it will do nothing to keep teams close to the Indians probable payroll of about $60 million.

The change in revenue sharing should be the biggest help out of all the changes being made. The Indians are one of the smallest market teams currently in baseball so they should get a considerable boost from revenue sharing. Also, because the Tigers are among the top spenders in the league, this change could mean that the Tigers will actually have to give money to the Indians. Hopefully any money earned by the Tribe in this fashion will be used to increase payroll and not be wasted or left to disappear mysteriously.

The changes in the draft and signing foreign players should help keep players within the Indians range a little better, but they haven't had a whole lot of problems in this area to this point. Most of the foreign players who get paid huge salaries are older players from other leagues (mostly Cuba or Japan) and only one of these players (Ichiro Suzuki) has actually been worth the money he was paid. The Indians have done a great job picking up young players like Victor Martinez, Jhonny Peralta and Fausto Carmona through scouting and training at academies, not by paying exorbitant salaries. The changes in the draft may allow the Indians to get more great first round Boras picks like Jeremie Guthrie. For those who don't remember, Guthrie fell much further than expected because of his unsignability. The Indians paid Guthrie $4.5 million for his 4 years of minor league service before releasing him. If this rule was in place back in 2002 when Guthrie was drafted, a team with a better draft pick would have had to deal with him.

The only other change that really affects the Indians is the new rule on free agent draft picks. The Indians have made out in the past with this rule, at least getting something for losing players like Jim Thome, Manny Ramirez and Albert Belle. In recent years players of this caliber have been traded away to get a little more for them than the draft pick. Now, players like Grady Sizemore, who may have been worth a draft pick in the past, will not be worth one, since the Indians wouldn't be willing to offer him a salary higher than $12 million a year.