4.) Window Is Closing Quickly
I’m sorry to say this Cleveland but the opportunity for the Indians to win a World Series is going to shrink quickly.
Right now I’d say Cleveland has two solid years to win it before that window is going to really start to close. There are three reasons why I say that too.
First is the team is going to have to start spending a lot more money to keep their players or start trading the ones they can’t afford for prospects.
The same situation is kind of going on in Kansas City right now. They made back to back World Series appearances with their good young team but now that they have to start giving out big contracts to all of those players they aren’t able to afford to keep everyone.
The Indians will have a similar situation over the next two years. While a good chunk are locked up through 2020 or so, Carlos Santana is a free agent after 2017, Brantley has a 12 million dollar team option for 2018 or is a free agent after 2017, Andrew Miller will be a free agent after 2018, and then the arbitration costs for Cody Allen, Trevor Bauer, Danny Salazar, and Jose Ramirez are only going to increase each year.
That is also leaving out signing their best player Francisco Lindor to an expensive long term deal to make sure he stays.
The Indians don’t have a lot of can’t miss prospects left either to fill their places. Bradley Zimmer, the team’s number one prospect might be called up this year, but catcher Francisco Mejia and power hitting first baseman Bobby Bradley will take at least until 2018.
The only other elite level prospect, pitcher Brady Aiken is still three years away. That means what the team has now is likely their best chance with no major newcomers to stir it up.
Another reason for the window closing is the talent level in the AL, the main route for the Indians to get into the postseason and then having to win at least two series. Right now the AL is kind of in a rebuild mode.
The Yankees were major sellers at the deadline, Kansas City is in a little bit of a struggle, the White Sox are selling now, and then Toronto and Baltimore look like they will take more hits in free agency then they will bring in people.
The only two AL teams that really made strides in getting better in the offseason so far have been Houston and Boston. Houston added Josh Reddick, Carlos Beltran, and Charlie Morton, three players ranked in the top 25 free agents this year.
Boston then went ahead and got Chris Sale, one of the top pitchers in all of baseball. The AL rebuilding is a perfect chance for the Indians to strike again before the rest of the teams end their rebuild.
The Twins have one of the better farm systems in baseball and should be much better in two years. The White Sox just got a ton of prospects and shed cap with their trades this year and should be better in two years.
The Yankees also got a ton of prospects this year on top of their good farm system. Not to mention the Rangers and Astros both have top ten farm systems on top of their already playoff caliber teams.
If those prospects hit, these teams can be serious contenders in a few years.
Then there is the potential free agent class of 2018. Let’s look at names that could hit that free agent market; Bryce Harper, Manny Machado, Clayton Kershaw, AJ Pollock, Matt Harvey, Dallas Keuchel, David Price, Andrew McCutchen, Josh Donaldson, Jayson Heyward, Zach Britton, Dellin Betances, Michael Brantley, Andrew Miller, Adam Jones, Jeurys Familia, Adrian Gonzalez, Craig Kimbrel, and Nelson Cruz among others. 2018 is shaping up to be the biggest free agency year in the history of baseball.
The Indians are not a big enough market team to compete with the big boys. So while the Red Sox, White Sox, Tigers, Astros, Rangers, Blue Jays, and Yankees will be competing for these guys the
Indians will be forced to stick with what they have in 2016 and 2017. Right now it makes a lot of sense for these teams to rebuild.
They can slash their contracts for really good prospects that will be under cheap team control in 2018 and spend big money in free agency to bring in whoever else they want to compliment them.
Think about 2018 as what the Cubs are now. They rebuilt and were bad for years but had the top notch farm system and the money to bring in big free agents and now they won a World Series. Cleveland will have to beat those teams to the punch now before they might have to be the ones rebuilding.
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