Clevelinks: Cleveland Indians Promote Three; Time to Trade Cody Allen?

Cleveland Indians Promote Three in Front Office

At is nearly certain that the Cleveland Indians will add offense this winter, as the team scored the fifth fewest runs in 2015. The difficulty to adding offense, however, is that the Indians will need to subtract something else, as Matthew Kory of FanGraphs writes. Some have suggested that the Indians trade a starting pitcher, such as Danny Salazar, but Kory argues that trading Cody Allen for a batter would be the optimal route.

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Allen, who turned 27 yesterday (happy birthday!), has saved a total of 60 games for the Indians in 71 attempts. The right-hander is an elite reliever by any measure, and the baseball world just witnessed the San Diego Padres receive a king’s ransom for Craig Kimbrel. As Kory points out, Allen may not be as good as Kimbrel, but he will be less expensive over the course of team control. The high price of closers could mean that Allen would fetch a similar package as Carlos Carrasco or Danny Salazar, but losing 65 innings of dominant closing would be preferable to losing 200 innings of dominant starting.

In other news, the Cleveland Indians made several promotions in their front office, as chronicled by Mark Sheldon of MLB.com. Matt Forman, the new director of baseball operations, has been with the team for three seasons. He was the assistant director of baseball operations last year. The team’s former senior analyst, Sky Andrecheck, is the new senior director of baseball research and development. Finally, Keith Woolner is now the principal data scientist for baseball analytics. Woolner has been with the team for nine years.

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More from around the AL Central:

Cody Allen, Carlos Carrasco, and where to Subtract in Cleveland – FanGraphs

Francisco Lindor’s Surprising Pop – RotoGraphs

Indians Promote Three in Baseball Operations – Indians.com

Naquin Among Five Protected from Rule 5 Draft – Indians.com