Cleveland Indians catcher Roberto Perez (55) and relief pitcher Anthony Swarzak (51) – Mandatory Credit: Rick Osentoski-USA TODAY Sports
If the Cleveland Indians can wake up their bats in 2015, they could give the KC Royals and other AL Central opponents a run for the division title. The impetus driving the Cleveland Indians this year is their tough starting pitching rotation led by 2014 Cy Young Award Winner Corey Kluber.
Aside from the Jobu reference, Clevelands bats really are in the bottom half of the team MLB offensive statistics. Through April 25, the Indians are 21st in MLB in batting average with .234, 20th in slugging percentage with .364. In terms of OPS (the statistic which gained fame in Moneyball) the Indians are 22nd in MLB with .657.
These offensive statistics for Cleveland have culmanated in acquiring only 58 runs (26th in all of MLB) and averaging 3.625 runs/game. Considering the Royals’ pitching rotation, bullpen, and defense together are third in all of MLB only averaging 3.12 runs/game and fifth in allowed batting average at .224, this gives the Royals a decisive advantage on paper.
Next: Starting Pitching
Cleveland Indians starting pitcher Corey Kluber (28) – Mandatory Credit: Jesse Johnson-USA TODAY Sports
What is keeping the Cleveland Indians alive this year is their starting pitching. Cleveland is second in all of MLB in strike outs just one behind the MLB leading Los Angeles Dodgers with 168 strikeouts. Corey Kluber has 31 of these strikeouts (fourth in all of MLB).
Trevor Bauer, Cleveland’s number two starter, has 26 strike outs and is second just behind Clayton Kershaw averaging 12.3 strikeout per nine innings. It doesn’t stop there with the starting pitching rotation, as Danny Salazar has 21 strikeouts, and Carlos Carrasco rounds out the typical four-man rotation with 18 strikeouts.
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Aside from these great early pitching statistics from Cleveland in 2015, there is recent history of the Kansas City Royals with their starting pitching rotation. Almost one year ago to this date, Corey Kluber pitched the best game for the Indians of almost 20 years and against the Royals, according to Jason Lukehart of Let’s Go Tribe.
Kluber struck out 11 in a complete game with no walks and struck out Eric Hosmer three times, but I will get back to this later on.
Corey Kluber is often referred to as “KluBot” because he is a robot in the consistency of his pitches. Since the beginning of 2015 season, however, his pitch choice reportoire is changing and drastically from his early career. Corey Kluber is evolving, like the Borg.
Next: The Evolution Of Corey Kluber
Cleveland Indians starting pitcher Corey Kluber (28) – Mandatory Credit: Ken Blaze-USA TODAY Sports
It has been pretty well known around the league, that early in Kluber’s career he began to use his four-seam fastball sparingly. Something happened in this past off-season though, and now he is getting different linear movement on both of his fast balls. Kluber has also started throwing his four-seam fastball almost 10X as much.
Apparently winning a Cy Young award in 2014 wasn’t enough for Kluber. He found room for improvement, much to the dismay of Royals fans everywhere.
According to BrooksBaseball, during 2013-2014 seasons Kluber threw his four-seam on average 3.74% and had 3.34 inches of horizontal movement with 9.13 inches of vertical movement. Over this time period he also used his two-seam fastball (sinker) almost 50% of the time averaging 7.55 inches of horizontal movement and 6.52 inches of vertical movement.
Kluber was also pretty consistent with using the two-seam fastball on the first pitch 56-60% of the time for left and right-handed hitters. This was pre-Cy Young award behavior though.
Kluber’s two-seam is rarely used on the first pitch for right handed hitters, and the cutter and four-seam are making up almost 70-80% of his first pitches for each type of hitter.
Next: More on Corey Kluber
Cleveland Indians starting pitcher Corey Kluber (28) – Mandatory Credit: David Richard-USA TODAY Sports
According to BrooksBaseball, Kluber’s four-seam fastball now has more horizontal movement at 7.06 inches and 7.06 inches in vertical movement.Also at this point in the season, he has almost thrown as many four-seam fastballs in a month in 2015 as much as he did in all of 2013-2014 (217 in 2013-2014 vs. 154 in 2015).
His two-seam fastball since just last season has almost as much horizontal movement (8.81 inches) as his slider does in the opposite direction (9.81 inches). The scary part of all of this is Kluber’s numbers aren’t significantly different than how he pitched over the course of all of 2014 in 21 innings so far in 2015.
Kluber has already faced 111 batters, so his strikeout rate has presumably stablized with 10.1 strikeouts per 9 innings, when had 10.3 strikeouts per 9 innings in his 2014 Cy Young award winning season. His WHIP will likely stabilize around August, but he is currently at 1.120, while he finished with 1.095 in 2014.
So the question is, how will the Royals deal with a starter like Kluber or Bauer, Salazar, and Carrasco?
Next: How Should the Royals Offense Combat These Starters?
Cleveland Indians designated hitter David Murphy (7) and right fielder Brandon Moss – Mandatory Credit: Rick Osentoski-USA TODAY Sports
Well if it is anything like the last few series, probably curse words and some bench clearings would be the best way for the Royals to combat these starters, but I have a feeling the Royals will gotten most of that off their chests. There are two contributing factors to winning against a team like this: plate discipline and speed.
White Cleat Beat
Even though the Indians have great starting pitching, their total team WHIP is 1.397 which is 27th in all of MLB through April 25th. We know this isn’t stable yet, but the KC Royals are currently second in all of MLB in OPS with .804.
This is a stark contrast from 2014 in which the Royals were 17th in all of MLB with and OPS of .690. The Kansas City Royals hitter’s plate discipline will be key during this series, and they should be able to hold off on those out of the zone pitches. Patience is also an important factor as these will likely be low scoring games won in the 7th and 8th innings, so they need to get walks off those relievers.
With Yan Gomes out until mid-to-late May, the KC Royals should be able to steal on the Indians. Detroit stole a total of five bases off of the Indians this past Saturday with four bases against former Royals catcher Brett Hayes and one base of of Roberto Perez.
This could be a low scoring series if both teams pitchers continue the way they have started 2015, but the KC Royals have the clear edge if they can keep their batting eyes sharp.
The Royals are fifth in all of MLB in stolen bases currently, so they should get some looks. The OPS and stolen bases are the classic sabermetric model that the Royals should subscribe to receive endorsement from many prediction outlets. It is working so far this year contributing to them being third in all of MLB with 5.06 runs/game.
Against Detroit on Saturday April 25, the Indians displayed a heavy left-handed batting lineup. It is good luck (for platoon reasoning) that the Royals two starting left-handed pitchers don’t have impending suspensions coming in this series.
This could be a low scoring series if both teams pitchers continue the way they have started 2015, but the KC Royals have the clear edge if they can keep their batting eyes sharp.
Next: Suspensions of Four Royals Unfair
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