Cover Boy – The Double-Edged Sword?
September 11, 2008If You Build It…
September 11, 2008Indians 7, Orioles 1 (box)
What a start by Scott Lewis, the just-turned 25-year old lefty in his first career start. Though not racking up the strikeouts with the same ease that he did in the minor league levels, Lewis was comfortable. He never appeared to be overmatched. And he got outs. While a few too many were in the air for my liking, the kid tasted his first bite of a major league plate – one that he’ll be eating from for quite some time.
Some of his breaking balls were eerily similar to what we saw from Cliff Lee during his first season with the big league team. His fastball is not overpowering, but his location was; also something very Lee-like. Only three times during the entire game did Lewis have three balls on a batter. And as seen by the box score, none of the three were able to muster a fourth ball as Lewis walked zero batters on the night.
And to touch on the fact that Lewis was not sent back out for what would have been a historical night of a complete game shutout, Eric Wedge had the following to say:
“We even thought about getting him out of there after the seventh,” Wedge said. “But he ran through the seventh pretty efficiently. If you send him back out there, he’s probably around 110 or so, and we didn’t want to do that.”
Lewis himself was not disappointed, as he admitted to only nearing the 100-pitch mark three other times during the entire season. And as discussed in our injury update from yesterday, this is the time of the season for precaution. The last thing we need is more “elbow soreness” from a prospect pitcher that we should see every fifth day for the foreseeable future. Would I have liked him to get the CGSO? Of course. But the Tribe won the game, and we now have another rising start to possibly look forward to watching next year and beyond.
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Of course, one of the main reasons that Lewis was able to coast through this game like he was on downhill skis was thanks to the bat of one Kelly Shoppach. Not only did Shoppach manage to go 3-for-4 withtwo home runs, three runs scored and a walk, but he also managed to round the bases in what could have been a world record time during both long balls.
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Honestly, have you ever seen a player sprint around the bases like Shoppach does during home runs? Ryan Garko may want to take notes, as he has had some moments even when the ball is in play. But I digress as Shoppach now has 19 home runs and is hitting .271/.345/.532 for the entire season. To continue along with our post All-Star break splits from a few weeks ago, Shoppach is hitting .295/.382/.624 (1.006 OPS) – good enough for 13th in all of baseball, and the best catcher by nearly 150 points. Not too shabby, eh?
Again, we will have to come to terms with the fact that we’ll either have a 20-home run catcher on our bench next season, or we will cost Victor Martinez a lot of money in the future by moving him to first base. Obviously, .300, switch-hitting catchers are bit more valuable than the same numbers at first base. And obviously, we have some areas that need to be addressed (evidenced by Jhonny Peralta’s error that somehow didn’t get credited as one). Dangling the power source that is Shoppach may just be the way to get an instant improvement.
But for now, I’m willing to sit back and enjoy the ride. Shoppach will undoubtedly have his chance at hitting his 20th home run before too long. And while it is all for naught in regard to the season as a whole, at least there is some silver lining to the dark, dark cloud that was the 2008 year in Tribe baseball.
8 Comments
Is it better for the 2009 Tribe to have Shop as the every-day catcher, and VMart as the everyday first-basemen? I know you’d rather have VMart’s production in the catcher’s spot, but at this point the Tribe doesn’t have a lot of viable first-base options (Garko, I’m glaring in your direction). And, this year is a start reminder that catchers’ bodies do tend to betray them from time to time. IMHO it would be easier to find a stop-gap replacement at first than it would be to give up Shoppach and not have that kind of solid work behind the dish if VMart should get hurt.
I agree in theory. However, given the paydays being shelled out to the rest of the league, Victor is on the books for $5.7mm next year, and then has a club option of $7mm in 2010. One would assume that Victor would be able to pull more money for himself as a catcher than he would for a first baseman – so while playing him at first on ocassion would be better for the team, would it be something that Victor is okay with?
Well, there are potentially two sides to that coin. Victor turns 30 this off-season, and he has to realize that his days of catching 130 games a year are going to be numbered before too long. As good as he is hitting relative to most catchers in the league, he just doesn’t have the “catcher’s body”. His legs are going to start breaking down, and that will affect his productivity at the plate.
I think he stands to have a longer, more productive career with a switch in position to first base, and one could argue that would enable him to make as much–if not more–money long-term.
Shall we consider it a good omen for this Saturday that a Buckeye had a great debut last night?
I’m going to side with Scott here. For right now, it’s great to have both these guys on the team, but I’m thinking in the offseason it’ll be time to sell-high on Shoppach. We have too many needs on this team, especially in the bullpen, to keep two above average catchers.
I think Victor will leave the Tribe after his contract if we make it clear that we’re moving him to first full-time. He takes too much pride in his work behind the plate to move to first without objection. If we’re willing to live with his departure, perhaps we should keep him at first for the next few years, but will his production be worth it? He’s so much more valuable as a catcher. Now I’m just confusing myself.
Scott Lewis was fantastic. He reminded me of Chuck Finley (in his prime obviously) a little.
I’m also torn on the Shop/VMart debate. The idea that Victor is more valuable as a catcher is really a fantasy baseball idea. He is only ‘more valuable’ as a catcher if we have a stud at 1B. Otherwise it doesn’t matter. The question really should be who is a better contributor to the team, Shop or Garko? Shouldn’t that tell us where Victor should play?
Rick-
That’s the angle from which I’m looking at it. And, unless somehow this year is just an aberration, Shop is more valuable than Garko. If Garko played a defensive position of more importance–and played it very well–the water would be a bit murkier. If he brought something more tangible–like speed on the bases–it would change the scope a bit.
But he doesn’t. Garko is on this team to hit, and that’s the ONLY reason. If he doesn’t do that, is he worth a roster spot that keeps someone else who might bring something else to the table off the team? I don’t think so. He’s played like a very poor man’s Travis Hafner this season.
[…] games. Granted, this was done mostly in part to huge performances by guys like Anthony Reyes and Scott Lewis, but also in part to Jensen Lewis getting the job done at the back end. Asdrubal Cabrera and Ryan […]