Over the past couple of weeks the writers at Cleveland Wins have concentrated on the Browns because of the recent NFL draft and the beginning of a new Minicamp soon. Plus, Cleveland fans never seem to get enough of the Browns. But as the weather gets hotter and the NBA season draws to a close, our attention will turn more completely to the Indians and Cavs.
With the draft lottery to come and the actual NBA draft after that, there will be plenty to cover for the Cavs. Look for more draft player analyses and strategic commentary on the direction the Cavs should go this off-season. Much of the material has already been developed and just hasn’t reached the blog yet. We hope you like our NBA draft commentary and discussions on the Cavs. Much of our material is meant to be thought provoking and to create a bit of controversy.
With the baseball season now in full swing, you will see more and more commentary on our Tribe. They have been playing well of late and we might have something to say about that as well. This is starting out as a very interesting season for the Indians and I think we should all take a close look at this team and support them.
Again, I would welcome your comments and appreciate your support. Have fun with Cleveland Wins and there is more good stuff coming soon. We don’t have a large enough writing staff to add new material daily, but our plan is to increase the frequency of posts for you to enjoy. However, we will not just put out a blog post for the sake of adding content. We will be sure to have something interesting to say first!
I would also like to point out that www.waitingfornextyear.com is an excellent blog and something you should check out daily. Their content updates faster and the quality is excellent. They also have links to other good sports sites. Another good site for Cavs content is www.realcavsfans.com. I think the premier site for pure Indians content is www.indiansbaseballinsider.com. Tony and his crew do a fabulous job. There are many other good blogs out there and Cleveland Wins hopes to be one of your “go to” sites on the web.
Last year at this time the Tribe’s record was better and we all knew our team was poor. That lasted for a long time as the Indians hung on to a lead in the division while our team never was improved by management. This prompted players like Chris Perez to lash out at the fans for not “supporting” the team. What he didn’t realize at the time, but the fans already knew, was that the team was destined to fall. You can’t blame Pure Rage. On the surface, he was 100% correct. The fans were nowhere to be found and the team was in first place. By the end of the season, Perez was as critical of management as he was earlier of the fans. What changed his tune? The simple realization that the Indians front office was hiding in the sand hoping their band aids would work AND the ownership was hiding behind the false assumption that their “pay behind” rather than “pay ahead” strategy would work. Well, we all know the result. The worst August in Cleveland Indians history!
Everyone ripped the ownership and management of the Indians (except those hiding in their warm Tribe blankets hoping the team would magically appear). Scott Boras, one of the most outspoken critics among those willing to speak, made it very clear that the Indians were showing no signs that they wanted to compete. Even after the Terry Francona hire, Bobby D (who I personally think VERY highly of) was still hiding behind the company line that the fans were unfair by criticizing the team so harshly for “one bad month”.
Luckily, Paul and Larry Dolan did not exactly see it that way. Neither did Mark Shapiro and Chris Antonetti after they really thought about it. They decided that “business as usual” would get them exactly what they got last season, a disaster!! So they set out to change all that. Now we know that they did not plan out each move in advance. Some things just fell to them (Michael Bourn). But, to their credit, they pounced on each opportunity and really helped the team for 2013 and beyond. Every move was intended to plug holes and provide a path forward for the team.
Their first trade was brilliant and I noted so on Twitter at the time. To get Mike Aviles and Yan Gomes for a journeyman reliever that had a good couple of months for us was nothing short of spectacular. Both players will help now and in the future. They got the best manager available. And they addressed EACH weakness of the 2012 team as they went. They also addressed the farm system by strengthening our outfield for many years to come without depending on a farm system void of outfield talent. They added right handed hitters, right handed power, one previously proven starter, a couple of very good relievers, and an aging veteran with power remaining and a coaching future. They strengthened the bench and our depth at AAA. This effort needs to be rewarded!!!! Yes, the Indians are not a perfect team. They have a terrible problem with starting pitching made worse by a brain dead Carlos Carrasco and an arm dead Brett Myers and an emotionally dead Ubaldo Jimenez. But they couldn’t address ALL the holes in one off season. It is very very clear to all and to Antonetti that starting pitching is priority one and signing Brantley and Kipnis is priority two.
So now, it comes back to us!!! The fans MUST step up and support this team which is vastly improved over 2012. Just like we knew the team was milk toast last year and didn’t show up no matter what the record, we need to show up this year despite the early struggles. I asked Indians management and ownership to “pay it forward” for years and the cries fell on deaf ears. We all have. Now they paid forward and we need to pay forward as well. This team has obvious holes, but it should be exciting and will win it’s share of games. With luck, we will challenge for the division title or a wild card playoff birth. If we don’t, at least THIS time we can say we had unfortunate injuries (and we actually have) or that we had bad luck and say it with a straight face.
So, even though I have seen some shoddy baseball for the past couple of weeks, I will support this team. I will believe that “paying forward” by the ownership will pay off in the end. I could be wrong but what the heck. I am a fan after all. And that is not about to change. What do you think?
Cleveland Wins is starting to gain some significant traction as a sports blog and we plan to enhance the site as much as possible in the near future. Thank you to all who have visited us and retweeted us and liked us. We will need your support going forward and greatly appreciate it. My thanks to @cwins_BA and @Cwins_chris for really assisting with the site by blogging and helping with site development and advertising.
So with that, I am excited to introduce our new Facebook page at www.facebook.com/clevelandwins . This will be used to give our followers another way to communicate with us and will give us another way to reach all of you. So check it out and let us know how you feel.
We also have a growing presence on Twitter and have 5 active twitter accounts that are used to connect with our blog visitors. The accounts that have a direct connection to www.clevelandwins.com are: @kirklob , @cwins_jim , @cwins_BA , @cwins_chris , @cybelieves . Please feel free to comment to us on Twitter, Facebook or www.clevelandwins.com .
With that in mind, I would like to encourage you to comment on our blogs and give us your thoughts. It does take providing an email address and nickname, but we really want your feedback. If you don’t see your comment right away, it will be up fairly quickly. There are some checks and balances on our site to minimize spam. Our site is secured by “Site Lock” TM.
This blog will stay at the top for awhile to announce our changes. Thanks for visiting and welcome to Cleveland Wins!!
BRING ON YOUR COMMENTS !!!! We can allow for comments with just a login name and email address. Any email address will not be passed on for any purpose. Click on the reply link near the title of the blog to sign in and leave comments. We will approve them asap. Comments are also welcome on twitter. Each of our bloggers have their own twitter accounts. @cwins_jim is my account for this blog. We have a facebook page and I will add the link to this post soon.
This blog is not all about Cleveland sports. Although many of the blogs will center around Cleveland professional sports teams, the theme mainly reflects the one headline all of the bloggers on this site want at least once in their lifetime. But despite these emotional roots, this blog will cover the world of MMA and Ohio State sports along with the Cleveland professional teams. I have followed Cleveland professional sports teams since I was a small child (more years ago than I care to admit). I analyze and probe and question. I am a fan at the core and always root for my home teams, but I do not hesitate to criticize or challenge management or players when I view that things are not done the right way. And when they are, I celebrate like everyone else. My fellow bloggers on this site are all very well known to me. They will add breadth and contrary opinions to my own. We are all strictly commentators and not reporters. We leave that to the newspapers.
I sincerely hope you enjoy the blog and will recommend it to others. Even fans of other cities might enjoy some of the MMA and Ohio State content. Welcome to Cleveland Wins!
