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Looking Forward to 2008: Cleveland Indians
Utterly average in virtually every aspect of the game, Blake is a useful guy to have around. He’s not a good defensive player, but he’s not Ryan Braun either. He’s no threat to win a home run championship, but he’ll pop 20 home runs a year. He won’t win a batting title, but he’ll hit .270. Need him to move to right field? He’ll do it, and it may be an adventure for a few months, but he’ll eventually turn himself into a pretty decent defender. When everything is falling apart (for example, the entire 2006 season), you’ll find Casey Blake doing what he does: A little bit of everything fairly well. There’s a lot of value in this kind of player, but at age 34, the cliff is looming and it’s unclear how long Blake can continue to be the kind of player he’s been for the last five years.
Manager
Solid. Eric Wedge won’t go down in history as a legendary skipper, but he does his job fairly well, doesn’t get in the way, and puts his guys in a position to succeed. Wedge’s biggest strength is also his biggest weakness at times: His loyalty and the sense of family he has instilled in the clubhouse. Wedge is very slow to bench a player who is clearly struggling, and at times seems to value loyalty more than wins. Aaron Boone’s disastrous two-year run at third base, Josh Barfield’s 2007 season, and Joe Borowski keeping the closer role despite an ERA over 5 all indicate a manager who goes out of his way to give players a chance before jerking them in and out of the lineup. This can occasionally work to the benefit of the team.
When many managers would have given up on Travis Hafner during a mediocre 2003 season, Wedge stuck with him and Hafner turned into a star. Some managers would have been gunshy to rely on Fausto Carmona after he utterly fell apart as a closer in 2006, but Wedge stayed the course. Wedge’s patience can be both a blessing and a curse at times.
Utterly average in virtually every aspect of the game, Blake is a useful guy to have around. He’s not a good defensive player, but he’s not Ryan Braun either. He’s no threat to win a home run championship, but he’ll pop 20 home runs a year. He won’t win a batting title, but he’ll hit .270. Need him to move to right field? He’ll do it, and it may be an adventure for a few months, but he’ll eventually turn himself into a pretty decent defender. When everything is falling apart (for example, the entire 2006 season), you’ll find Casey Blake doing what he does: A little bit of everything fairly well. There’s a lot of value in this kind of player, but at age 34, the cliff is looming and it’s unclear how long Blake can continue to be the kind of player he’s been for the last five years.
Manager
Solid. Eric Wedge won’t go down in history as a legendary skipper, but he does his job fairly well, doesn’t get in the way, and puts his guys in a position to succeed. Wedge’s biggest strength is also his biggest weakness at times: His loyalty and the sense of family he has instilled in the clubhouse. Wedge is very slow to bench a player who is clearly struggling, and at times seems to value loyalty more than wins. Aaron Boone’s disastrous two-year run at third base, Josh Barfield’s 2007 season, and Joe Borowski keeping the closer role despite an ERA over 5 all indicate a manager who goes out of his way to give players a chance before jerking them in and out of the lineup. This can occasionally work to the benefit of the team.
When many managers would have given up on Travis Hafner during a mediocre 2003 season, Wedge stuck with him and Hafner turned into a star. Some managers would have been gunshy to rely on Fausto Carmona after he utterly fell apart as a closer in 2006, but Wedge stayed the course. Wedge’s patience can be both a blessing and a curse at times.
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