30 Teams in 30 Days 2018 05 Cleveland Indians

Sticking with the theme of teams projected to win their divisions with no real trouble, here's the Cleveland Indians! This team won 102 games last year (before falling to the Yankees in an epic ALCS) and made the World Series the year before that, so they are obviously built to win. Let's take a look at the roster!

All-Acquired Factor

The thing about these playoff contenders is that there's usually very little year-to-year roster turnover, simply because there aren't too many glaring holes that need to be addressed. One such hole was created in Cleveland when Carlos Santana left via free agency, and it was promptly filled by Yonder Alonso, a first time All-Star in 2017 due to a flyball-oriented transformation of his swing. He did fade pretty badly in the second half, but he already has two home runs (including a grand slam) batting mostly cleanup for the Tribe. The only other two new acquisitions on this team's Opening Day roster are two former non-roster invitees: a returning backup outfielder from that 2016 World Series team, Rajai Davis (ranked 565 by MLB.com), and the part-time closer of the 2017 Twins, Matt Belisle (557, the only ranked non-closer reliever on the team other than lefty ace Andrew Miller, who's at 167).

Fantasy Astrology Relevance

Reigning AL Cy Young winner Corey Kluber and Carlos Carrasco are two of the ace-caliber pitchers headlining last year's fantasy astrology champion Aries "Rams" (watch Game 1 of this Divisional All-Stars ALDS to see the third one in action), and Jason Kipnis is currently filling in for the injured Daniel Murphy on the same team. Alonso is also on the Aries roster, but a projected bounceback year from Miguel Cabrera and big time power projections for Matt Olson are keeping him on the bench for now. The fact that the Virgo "Maidens" can plug Jose Ramirez in at either 3B or 2B (opening up a spot for either Chris Taylor or Mike Moustakas, respectively) gives them a tremendous amount of versatility. I always see a ton of upside whenever I look at the Scorpio "Scorpions" thanks in large part to all-around star Francisco Lindor and shutdown closer Cody Allen, but so far they haven't been able to put things together and advance deep into the playoffs.

Injuries

The only visible injury situation on the SI preview roster is left fielder Michael Brantley, who's situation was already well-known before the offseason even started, which is why his ranking did not change between Spring Training and Opening Day. That's not the case for the player who has taken his spot in the outfield, Tyler Naquin, who was left off MLB.com's player preview at the time Spring Training games started, but now appears on the list at a whopping 790. The injury bug also affects the competition for the Fifth Starter spot: Danny Salazar would have occupied Josh Tomlin's SP4 slot if not for a case of shoulder inflammation, an injury that caused his preseason ranking to slip down to 210. The reason Tomlin's ranking is shaded red is because he was overtaken on the depth chart by wild-haired righty Mike Clevinger, whose ranking is trending up to 168.

Song

Look Out Cleveland - The Band

Even though the lyrics of this song are fairly negative in nature (a storm that's approaching the city of Cleveland), it's a far superior piece of music than the only other Cleveland-centric song I could think of: the cover of Ian Hunter's song "Cleveland Rocks" by The Presidents of the United States of America, which became the theme song of the Drew Carey Show.

Colossus

When I look at the Indians, I see a pretty complete team: a strong lineup with some star power, a solid rotation top to bottom, and a bullpen with a couple of shutdown relievers. Likewise, I consider the battle against Argus, Colossus #15, to be a similarly complete boss fight experience: there's a bit of strategy involved in figuring out how to get up on top of the castle ruins that it's guarding, then there's the traditional stabby-stabby part where you attack his weak spot high atop its head, and then there's a bit of mystery where you have to discover its "hidden vitals" to complete the job. Like Argus, the Indians are a team with a lot of strength, but also some uncertainty, with no fewer than five key contributors slated to hit free agency next year (the four shown in the chart above, plus Andrew Miller). And with only smaller-market funds to work with next offseason, we'll see how long they can continue their strong run.