Don’t be so quick to give Indians edge
There are so many reasons the Yankees could be on their way home by Wednesday night. The Bombers are on the road in Cleveland, dealing with 35,000 cardboard printouts staring them down, completely unfazed by their star-power. They’re in a playoff round built on winning two of three coin flips. Maybe some Cleveland die-hards pose as bellhops wherever the Yankees stay, then plant midge larvae on Gary Sanchez’s catching gear? Anything to coax an extra passed ball or two. It’s 2020: Anything can happen. But for the more grounded Yankee fan, the bigger fear is getting shut down by an elite pitching staff led by Shane Bieber, and an efficient, rangy defense that makes big plays while refusing to beat itself.
For those who place unwavering faith in the adage that good pitching beats good hitting, the thought of facing the excellent Bieber-Carlos Carrasco-Zach Plesac trio in a short series is daunting. And it is. But it shouldn’t make Cleveland the favorite, or lead anyone to see it as the worst possible matchup for the Bombers outside of Tampa.
CLEVELAND’S OFFENSE IS BAD
Jose Ramirez should be the American League MVP, and is maybe the favorite based off his 2020 excellence and late-season heroics.
This says as much about Ramirez’s excellence as his teammates’ offensive ineptitude.
Ramirez, behind his career-best .993 OPS and top-tier third base defense, led all AL position players in Wins Above Replacement.
But what separates him from a crowded field — one that includes Bieber — is the last word of that stat. Cleveland’s entire lineup, cumulatively, is miserable on offense. The Indians hit .228/.317/.372 , which is about as bad as it looks. (Fangraphs rates their offense 14% worse than the league when factoring in their ballpark and the league, which as a whole hit .245/.322/.418.)
That makes Ramirez overwhelmingly better than anything they could substitute him with, and vital to his team’s run production in a way very few other hitters are.
With Carlos Santana falling off a cliff from 2019, the Indians might have three respectable bats (Francisco Lindor, Franmil Reyes and Cesar Hernandez) besides Ramirez.
Yes, Cleveland allowed the fewest runs in the league, and 61 fewer than the Yankees, leading to an ERA nearly a run lower than the Bombers, 3.29 to 4.35. After Bieber, Carrasco and Plesac posted sub-3 ERAs, while Gerrit Cole (2.84) was the only Yankee starter to do so.
Still, the Yankees present — with exception of the White Sox lineup — by far Cleveland’s greatest test this year. Though the Yankees don’t have an MVP favorite, they’re stacked with killers up and down the lineup. DJ LeMahieu and Luke Voit won the batting title and home run crown, respectively. From breakout stars like Clint Frazier, success stories like Gio Urshela, and two of the most feared power bats in the league in Aaron Judge and Giancarlo Stanton, the Yankees are to offense what Cleveland is to pitching.
But, because of the coronavirus-related travel restrictions, teams only played opponents in their region, which means none of the typical division cross-mingling we’re used to. This makes who a player faces a real factor when understanding surface stats, and one that narrows the gap. Eight of the bottom 15 teams in OPS, including Cleveland, played in the Central.
Opponent strength is true on either side of the ball, of course, and there’s some chicken and egg at play. Great pitchers can drive down hitters’ stats just as poor hitters can juice pitchers’ stats.
There is a stat that accounts for pitchers that get to feast on the Pirates instead of the Blue Jays. Baseball Prospectus’ Deserved Runs Average (DRA) accounts for not only ballpark and defense, but opponent quality to churn out a number on an ERA scale. DRA- uses 100 as a league-average baseline, so the lower the better.
Assuming J.A. Happ’s tremendous late-season run slots him into Game 3, check out both teams’ expected rotations. (Deivi Garcia and Jordan Montgomery edge out Happ in DRA.)
Bieber still had the best DRA in the league among starters. And Cleveland’s projected rotation to no one’s surprise, ranks better.
Cole had the third-best DRA among starters in 2019; given more time in 2020, the $324 million man wouldn’t be a mismatch against Bieber. Plesac outdoes Happ, but Tanaka and Carrasco are a virtual wash.