Rebuilding isn’t really all that fun as a Tribe fan.  How many of you thought that our “window” would be somewhere in the neighborhood of five years after a rebuild?  I did.  So, on second thought, how does two years sound to you?  Instead of a great big picture window in the front of our house, as a Cleveland Indians fan it feels like we replaced the mail slot with the tiniest little pane of glass which is our window to compete.  In some ways this year’s Indians team is exactly the one I clamored for over the last decade.  I am sure that makes me sound absolutely insane to a lot of you.  Well, just so you know, it makes me feel insane to the point that I am wondering if there is any philosophy that a fan can have with the Cleveland Indians that will make sense most of the time.

My philosophy was a well-reasoned reaction to history.  The Indians went from competing at a top level every single season with almost no economic realities in play to constantly playing catch-up while coming to grips with the size of the market that Cleveland truly is.  I could deal with that.  Or so I thought.  After watching Albert Belle, Manny Ramirez and Jim Thome walk out the door for giant dollars, I vowed that the Indians should never do that again.  They should always trade players like that so they could replenish the farm system.  That is exactly what Mark Shapiro did over the last two years.  Maybe it is even working.  The Indians do seem to have a lot of younger players who might eventually allow the Indians to compete at a high level again.  For whatever reason, though, even when I said that is what the Indians should do, I haven’t had the patience or maturity to really deal with the process.   [Read more...]