Francona wants to keep Salazar

Reports from the baseball winter meetings in Orlando, Fla., have the Chicago Cubs showing interest in Indians starting pitcher Danny Salazar.

Indians manager Terry Francona, speaking on Dec. 13 to a group of writers at the meetings, did not sound excited about the prospect of losing Salazar, even if a trade would add a much-needed power hitter to the Tribe lineup.

“How many trades have you seen? None,” Francona said. “Yeah, I wouldn’t blame teams to come to the meetings and ask us about our pitching because we think we have pretty good pitching. But you haven’t seen any of them leave, either. We value it a lot. Unless somebody just knocks your doors off, we plan on keeping it.”

The Indians’ pitching staff led by Corey Kluber and Carlos Carrasco led all of baseball with a 3.30 ERA. Salazar was 5-6 in 19 starts with a 4.28 ERA in 2017. He also pitched in relief four times.

“We’ve certainly had our frustrations (with Salazar) at times, but if you get too frustrated and send him somewhere else and he ends up being the guy you were hoping because you weren’t patient enough, that would be troubling,” Francona said.

“He shows at times what he can do, but we’re still trying to get to the consistency where we know we can put his name in and go get ’em.”

The rumor of Salazar possibly to the Cubs was first reported in a tweet by Bruce Levine of CBS Sports in Chicago. The Cubs, who beat the Indians in the 2016 World Series, are trying to strengthen their starting pitching.

“The Indians are looking for left-handed hitting in return,” Levine tweeted. “Nothing is close.”

Other major points of Francona’s pow-wow with reporters:

• Deciding what to do with Jason Kipnis is a riddle the Indians are trying to solve. Kipnis can play second base or center field.

“What we know is, when

healthy, we have a really good player,” Francona said. “We don’t quite know where he’s going to play yet. So what we need to do is get our house in order, let (team president) Chris (Antonetti) and Cherny (General Manager Mike Chernoff) and those guys do their thing, and then communicate to Kip, because that’s fair to him, so he can get ready for the year.

“That’s what we always do. Normally, guys are pretty receptive when you’re honest and you talk to him, and not just talk but, listen. They’re usually pretty receptive. Kip is going to be in our lineup somewhere.”

• Who will play third base in 2018?

“Right now?” Francona said. “It could be Jose Ramirez, could be Yandy (Diaz)or (Giovanny) Urshela. Nothing’s really changed from the last game of the season, but we don’t

know until we fill out our roster, and then we’ll kind of figure out where are we best suited.

“Are we best suited keeping Jose at second, put him back at third? Put Kip at second? Those are things we’ll answer. We haven’t answered yet. It’s nice to know you have some flexibility.”

• The Indians have contingency plans if free agent first baseman Carlos Santana signs with another team. He has drawn interest from the Red Sox, Rockies, Padres, Texans, Mariners, Phillies and Mets.

“We’ve got Edwin (Encarnacion) we can certainly put there,” Francona said. “We can put Lonnie (Chisenhall) there if we want. I think we’d probably like to sign somebody.

“... (Santana) turned himself into a very good first baseman. He’s hard not to like, lovable. You see him, before the games, come up and kiss me on the head,

get handshakes with everybody. He’s a great kid.”

Santana hit .259 with 23 home runs and 79 RBI in 2017.

• Francona said the Indians will need bullpen help now that Bryan Shaw has signed a three-year deal with the Rockies, pending a physical. He also said the Indians have relievers that can take some of Shaw’s workload.

“We have some good guys in place,” Francona said. “We’ve got Cody (Allen) and Andrew (Miller) that have done it and have been terrific. Guys like (Dan) Otero that are sort of under the radar, Zach McAllister. We have guys that can do it. We are going to have to add some more guys before we start the season.”

Indians pitchers and catchers report to Goodyear, Ariz., on Feb. 14 for the start of spring training. The full squad reports on Feb. 18.

Salazar