In Search For An Outfielder – Cleveland Indians

In Search For An Outfielder – Cleveland Indians

So far, we have identified two outfielders on two teams ripe for picking:

                Atlanta – Reed Johnson

                Arizona – A.J. Pollock

Baltimore – Nolan Reimold

                Boston – Jerry Sands

                Chicago Cubs – Brett Jackson

Chicago White Sox - Dayan Viciedo

Cincinnati – Chris Heisey

I spend no time here trying to figure out who to trade them or whether the Mets should just keep checking the waiver wire each day to see if my choice becomes available. All I do here is try to duplicate, for you, what I assume someone (with a VP on his business card) is doing in the Mets office this week.

We now move on to the Cleveland Indians, who currently had five (5) outfielders on their 40-man before they announced their deal Sunday with Nick Swisher. Now, they have six (6):

                Nick Swisher - 4-yrs, $56mil, with additional option

                Michael Brantley – lefty -   pre-ARB – MLB/552-AB, .288

                Ezequiel Carrera – lefty –  pre-ARB -  MLB/147-AB, .272

                Tim Fedroff – lefty –

                Thomas Neal – bats right –  pre-ARB -

                Drew Stubbs – bats right -  ARB-1  -

This is normally a very conservative team that builds from within so the Swisher deal caught me by surprise. Stubbs comes over from Cincinnati and will start along with Brantley. These three are obviously your starters.

2B Jason Kipnis (14-HR, 76-RBI) also serves as a backup outfielder.

Tis leaves one righty that really has no place to play on this team:

Mets target:  Thomas Neal - played AA in 2012 - 405-AB, .314/.400/.467/.867, 12-Hr, 51-RBI and was rewarded with promotion to parent team in September (23-AB, .217)... plays AAA in 2011 for the Giants (.295)... career (7-yrs) .299 minor league hitter... .840 OPS... primarily left field... will play 2013 as a 25-year old.