AL Central

The Cleveland Indians announced that they signed first baseman Nick Johnson to a minor league contract and invited him to spring training. If Johnson makes the team, he has a club option for 2012.

Johnson appeared in only 24 games last year for the New York Yankees. Johnson batted .167 (12-72) with a .388 OBP, four doubles, two homers and eight RBI.

“Brennan Boesch is an equal opportunity slugger. Right field, left field, centerfield; right handed pitcher, left handed pitcher—it doesn’t matter. He doesn’t just box himself into hitting home runs! Singles, doubles, triples and even a grand slam are all on the stat line of this young rookie’s major league career. The kid is swinging a golden bat right now and for one, I don’t see him stopping any time soon.”

-Andrew Kulha, Summer 2010

Spring Training is well underway, and after assessing what the Indians have to offer in terms of position players here, it's time now to take a look at the team's pitching. 

One of the most interesting races in baseball should be the AL Central Division.  The Midwestern division isn't the sexiest in baseball, but it's highly underrated. 

ESPN will give more coverage to one Red Sox/Yankees series than they will to the combined seasons of the five teams in the division, but the fans of those teams know it's shaping up to be a great race in 2011.

Ever since Travis Hafner's power was sapped after the 2007 season, his contract has become more and more of a burden for the Cleveland Indians. $13 million for the 2004-2007 Hafner, who averaged 32 HR with a .410 OBP, a 156 OPS+, and a 4.5 WAR, isn't bad. $13 million for the 2008-2010 Hafner, who averaged only 11 HR with a .353 OBP, a 114 OPS+, and a 1.0 WAR, is horrible. The Indians cannot begin to be able to pay Hafner's salary for his current level of production.

Our 2011 fantasy baseball projections will be released one-by-one until the top 100 players have been revealed. These rankings consider past achievements, current performance and expected future results based on standard 5×5 H2H settings.

The baseball was launched into the furthest, most terrifying reaches of Comerica Park, where the only ball caught is on a bounce or scooped up to stop it from rolling.

As it climbed into the June night’s air, you could hear an entire crowd of 17,000-plus gasp, as if they all had been simultaneously slugged in the gut.

If it was possible to read the minds of such a throng, you could do so in two words, only one fit for print here. The first was “Oh.”

With Micheal Cuddyer, Joe Mauer, and Justin Morneau yet to see any spring training games, Jason Kubel has been getting his cuts in the three-hole so far this spring.

Kubel is making those spring at-bats count, hitting .545 with a home run and four RBI's and a 1.636 OPS after a week of games.

"Right now, I'm just happy with the way things are going so far this spring, just with the way I've started off, the way I'm swinging, the way I feel," Kubel said.

Over the past three or four years, third base has been one of the shallowest positions in fantasy baseball—with only a few players worthy of an early-round pick.  

As the 2011 season quickly approaches and fantasy owners begin drafting their teams, many owners will be pleasantly surprised to see that the third base pool is no longer filled with just a small handful of players.

Has the Big Hurt done enough to make it to Cooperstown? If my calculations are correct, he will be eligible for his first ballot appearance in 2014.

He passes the eyeball test for sure. If you watched him play, it is easy to just say, “Yes, Thomas is a Hall of Fame player.”

He surely has very good numbers across the board, whether you grade him traditionally or using advanced metrics.