A 5-Paragraph Essay: The Regular Season: 79-65 (0.5 GB), 2nd Place in the IL-West, IL-Wild Card winner
Intro: Out of the Gates, Fast.
The Clippers exploded out of the gates by winning 5 of their first 7, and 8 of their first 11 contests. During the month of April, the Clippers were 14-9 and were led by Carlos Santana, Chris Gimenez and Jose Constanza who each sported an OPS (OBP+SLG) above 1.000. (FYI: .800 is a decent OPS, .900 is really good and 1.000 is Pujols territory).
The Clippers continued their winning ways through May by going 19-11 and finishing the first two months of the season at an impressive 33-20. Not only did Santana continue to demolish AAA pitching, but Jordan Brown was back to his offensive form and went off for a .978 OPS. Many other Clipper batsmen were mashing the ball all through the early parts of the season. However, apart from Yohan Pino, who had a great April, and Josh Tomlin, who was pretty solid all season, the Clippers pitching staff was getting shelled. The Clippers were winning in spite of their poor pitching, which is something that usually comes back to bite a team.
The Clippers had 2 things going well for them: 1) their bullpen (which was outstanding all season and won’t merit individual attention until the hyperbolic praise section of this article) and offense were two of the better units in the entire minor leagues, and 2) their pitching staff was really unlucky those first couple months of the season. One of the best sites to pull down information on Minor Leaguers from (http://www.minorleaguesplits.com/) has the ability to neutralize a player’s stats to account for luck on fly balls that turn into HR’s.
When looking at a pitcher over the course of a year, it is important not to get caught up int eh very result, and thus very luck, driven components like Win/Loss, ERA and WHIP. A good stat for looking at how a pitcher is throwing is called FIP (Fielding Independent Pitching1 – just treat it like ERA!) The reason we use FIP and luck-adjusted FIP (xFIP2), is so that we can get a gauge of how the pitcher is throwing apart from the defense behind them and the good/bad luck on HR/FB. Once you adjust for the poor luck incurred against them and the, at times, suspect defense in teh field; most of the Clippers' Starters FIP goes down a few tenths of a run. Carlos Carrasco, whose April and May FIP’s were 4.82 and 5.05, respectively, sees his xFIP scores stand at 3.97 and 4.61.
The biggest victim of poor luck was Hector Rondon who had a FIP of 7.05 over his April and May outings (before going down for the year with an arm injury), but when you adjust for his poor luck on fly balls? His xFIP drops all the way down to 3.80! Not only is that much better, that’s legitimately good overall and gives us reason to hope that whenever Rondon comes back he will be just as shiny and elite as we hoped he was heading into 2010.
Bottom Line: The Clippers hit so well that they could cover up the poor results of their starting pitching staff which wasn’t the best in the minors, but was also extremely unlucky.
Paragraph 1: Weather the Storm, Help is on the Way.
The Clippers saw their star player, Carlos Santana, depart for the Show on June 11 and while he never looked back (he had a 1.165 OPS in June at the MLB level), the Clippers managed a less impressive 16-12 record for June and a 17-11 record in July. Matt LaPorta helped greatly by coming down for 67 AB’s in June and hitting to the tune of 373/462/657 good enough for a 1.119 OPS. As did David Huff, whose struggles at the top level were not repeated at AAA: he posted a 2.29 FIP in June and would go on to be a stalwart for the remainder of the season. Michael Brantley also helped hold the fort down during June by getting on base at a .412 clip and beginning his ascent to Cleveland’s everyday CF job.
The real story of June and July; however, was the starting pitching turnaround and the emergence of two new Columbus regulars. The staff got better and better as June turned into July, showcasing some real improvement. Jeanmar Gomez (5.63>4.87>3.91) and Carlos Carrasco (5.05>4.02>2.52) each improved their FIP from May>June>July by leaps and bounds. Not only did they get better and better, they combined for 123IP over those 2 months. Translation: they pitched well and pitched often; throw in LaPorta covering for Santana and Huff taking Rondon’s place in the rotation and the Clippers treaded water very nicely.
Jared Goedert and Josh Roriguez also each got there first real taste of AAA in June and responded very nicely. Goedert went off for a 322/381/747 line tallying a 1.128 OPS in June and a .964 in July. Meanwhile, J-Rod hit 4 HR’s each month and posted a very respectable 1.108 in June and .850 in July. These new bats would prove very useful down the line.
Bottom Line: Even though the annual attrition of the roster had begun, the Clippers got timely performances from a variety of current players and new additions that kept them well ahead in the standings.
Paragraph 2: Dog Days of Summer
Going into August the Clippers had a healthy lead in the IL-West and looked to be cruising on into the playoffs, they only had to hold serve with the hard-charging Louisville Bats and the fast-fading Indianapolis Indians. However, like all things Cleveland sports, it wasn’t quite that easy. The Clippers posted an 11-18 record in August and saw themselves trailing the Lousiville bats in the final days of August. As the calendar turned to September and the Clippers played a 4:35 game (in deference to the Buckeyes’ beat down of Marshall) and finally overtook the Bats’ to regain the lead in the IL-West.
August was a month of massive change for the Clippers and for the Indians at large. Jake Westbrook was dealt to the Cardinals to start the month for Cory Kluber, who came immediately to Columbus and Austin Kearns was dealt to the Yankees for Zach McAllister who also jumped right in to the rotation. When it was all said and done, Carlos Carrasco, Jeanmar Gomez, Josh Tomlin, Hector Rondon, Frank Herrmann, Lou Marson, Jordan Brown, and Michael Brantley were all at the big league level to stay and a whole new crop of players was in place as the Clippers struggled to maintain their grip on a playoff spot. Their new rotation consisted of McAllister, Kluber, Pino, Huff and Paolo Espino…none of whom started the season with Columbus, two of which joined the organization less than a month ago. Their new infield saw Goedert, Rodriguez, Phelps and Hodges only one of which broke camp at the AAA level.
Bottom Line: Despite changes all over the diamond, Mike Sarbaugh maintained the same expectation of making the playoffs and winning baseball games. The attitude and leadership paid off as the players pushed toward the finish line.
Paragraph 3: The Playoff ‘Push’? More like Plunge.
Trailing by a ½ game for the divisional title behind the Bats and no more games against Louisville, the Clippers had to hope for some help in winning the IL-West crown; however, they had a very high chance of getting into the playoffs via the wildcard. The Clippers defeated the Indianapolis Indians and Toledo Mud Hens the first two nights of the month to secure a playoff spot before promptly losing four in a row during their let-down period. Entering the postseason on a 4-game losing streak isn’t the ideal circumstance for entering into a contest against the team with the 2nd best record in the International League.
Like any feel-good Cleveland Indians playoff story (see 2007, Major League!), the Clippers would face off against the Scranton-Wilkes/Barre Yankees in the postseason.
Bottom Line: Uh-oh was the thought going in. Just goes to show how much of a crap shoot the postseason can be sometimes.
Closing Paragraph: A Salute to Mike Sarbaugh. Oh Captain, My Captain!
The Clippers had any number of reasons to not be successful in 2010. Most of the guys had won a AA championship the year before, so weren’t hurting for a minor league crown. The team was in constant turnover due to the active nature of both the trading department and medical staff at Cleveland. Yet, they found a way to win and I see the main component being Mike Sarbaugh and his fantastic coaching staff. They held together the core of the team with gum and duct tape and managed to come out a winner.
Sure they didn’t win the division, but once you have the playoffs locked up, it’s hard to force your guys to throw on the boosters for that last week. Credit Sarbaugh for being prescient enough to rest his guys and get them ready for the playoffs.
Bottom Line: Couldn’t have done it without you Mike. Way to lead steer the ship all season long. That’s two in a row for you and all the guys that are on the verge of making it to Cleveland.
UP Next: In-Depth Player Movements, Evaluations and Developmental Notes as well as a look at the business side of the 2010 Columbus Clippers.
1FIP – A defense independent pitching statistic (DIPS) that tries to take out the affects of poor/great defense behind a pitcher. Formula: (HR*13+(BB+HBP-IBB)*3-K*2)/IP
2xFIP - Formula: ((13*(.106*# of fly balls))+(3*BB+HBP-IBB)-(2*K))/IP+constant
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