It was nice of Cleveland to win on the final day and avoid having a .500 or worse team in the playoffs. As you can see John Swanda won the AL ERA crown going away even after a few rough starts at the end and Shane McClanahan tied for the AL wins lead despite having his worst season statistically. Not shown here is that Swanda finished 3rd in AL pitcher WAR at 4.9.
We kind of closed on a slow note, playing below-.500 ball in September/October, but the division was long wrapped up and over the final week or two I liberally used the bench. Otherwise great numbers all around with the exception of the defense, where the DI/BABIP numbers were mediocre and the zone rating awful.
Another MVP-caliber season from Wander and a career year from DeLoach highlighted the offense. At the other end of the spectrum what happened to Tork and Santana? Tork missed almost all of August but when he returned in September he didn't hit a single homer with his last one coming on July 31. And he only hit .218 overall, so hopefully he's saving his homers for the playoffs or we might have an early exit. Santana was just lousy throughout the year but the alternatives (Head, Mears) weren't any better; he's another guy I just have to hope produces in the playoffs.
A fine and deep rotation led the way this year. Guys like German, Sears and Bradley (and later Whitlock) could be starters for most other teams. Castillo wasn't as bad as his ERA might indicate and although his BABIP was a little high it wasn't out of whack so he seems more of a bad luck victim. Mac took a step back this year giving up far more homers than anyone else on the squad but is still our #1 starter and will open the playoffs with Swanda, Castillo and Eldridge behind him. In the pen Camilo Doval was a great acquisition to solidify the 9th inning while we're stuck paying Pete Fairbanks another $9.5M next year to hopefully not suck like he did this season.