Catching Up

I do have a bone to pick about the suggestion that Marte's numbers "have remained impressive". He hasn't posted an impressive line (AAA or ML) since 2005

I find it hard to not be concerned about Marte potentially not "turning the corner" even given the proper ML at-bats whilst in the mist of a playoff run. Any year where we weren't legitimate contenders and I'd give him job and not think twice, but following the Tiger's moves (and moves of the teams in the central in general, which will make it harder for us to repeat the same win total next year) I don't think we can take that risk.

Also, shouldn't having Marte at 3B allow us to shield some of Jhonny's craptacular range?

I suppose so, but Marte/Cabrera would take the Indians from one of the worst defensive sides of the infield to one of the best. Peralta/Cabrera would probably mean more offense and less defense than Marte/Cabrera, but still a better configuration than the present one.

So that makes acquiring Ellis problematic, because it would create a real logjam, unless they'd move Blake to the bench, something that's not happening.

Probably the best-case scenario is a transition year, where Blake and Peralta share time at third, Cabrera and Peralta share time at short, and Cabrera and Carroll share time at second. I don't really see Marte staying with the team through Opening Day.

Is Peralta's range so limited that he couldn't be moved to 2B?  Seriously.

Unfortunately, we have been patient enough, he's had plenty of time (two years folks) to even come close to that production in AAA and has not. He is out of options, and needs to be on the ML club in the middle of a pennant race. He needs to hit if he is going to stick.

I'm not sure what the rest of your post is about. He's either going to hit and play more, or not and ride the bench until being traded. There's no preferential treatment going on here. (He was justified in getting the shot at the job last year because of being only one year removed from an excellent season in AAA, and because Casey Blake became valuable to us as our RF at the time).

It's not like he tanked in Winter Haven and they handed him the job.  He performed at an acceptable level, and there was little reason to believe that, given time to adjust, that he wouldn't be able to put up acceptable numbers at the major league level.

He has been a slow starter at every level until he adjusts, and he's never had enough at bats at the major league level to show whether he can make that adjustment.

Some guys need time to adjust.  Mike Schmidt was horrible his first year.  Pedroia didn't take off this year until May.  Andy Marte got hurt before we could see whether he was going to make the adjustments necessary to stick.  I'm not saying that Marte will be the next Mike Schmidt, but I am saying that given the limited at bats he's had, we have no way of knowing.

If we're not going to commit to playing him, every day, at third base, come hell or high water, long enough to see how good he can be, then we need to trade him to somebody who will.

I would rather see Fransico get a chance over Dellucci and Michaels both who should be end of the roster players not platoon players.  For the record I don't believe Platoons work either.  Michaels has topped out and will never improve from this point forward and Dellucci is already 2 years past his prime and falling faster then Trot Nixon did.  We have a serious LF problem coming into this year and I really don't feel like Gutiérrez is going to improve enough to cover up for the lack of production out of LF.  Add in uncertain production from 2nd and 3rd as well as a correction from Catching and now you have a struggling offense.

Based on the off season moves the teams AL Central have made I could see these record corrections from last year.

Indians -8 games
Tigers  +5
Twins   +3 (if they keep Santana)
White Sox +3
Royals   +12

Records
Tigers    93 69
Indians   88 74
Twins     82 80
Royals    81 81
White Sox 75 87

Uhh. Ok KW. Ok.

Also: we can't just ASSUME he could shift to 3B and be fine! What if we shift him to 3B and he sucks? Then what?

All the players that have been mentioned as attractive acqs for 2B and letting ACab move to short are pretty much Jhonny's equal or better on offense, albeit with more of a "middle infielder" approach as opposed to JP's power/strikeout profile.

Ellis, Roberts, Hudson all have similar career ops as JP, comparing even more favorably if you just take the last 3 years of each (which includes Jhonny's great '05 season).

Seems to me the marginal difference is on the offensive side, not the defensive side, where the difference in having ACab paired with any of the above 2B would, in most evaluations, be significant.

Infield defense is one of the few areas that the Indians can do improve without that much cost, and they can do it with players on hand. And given that they may have three ground-ball pitchers in the rotation this year (Carmona, Westbrook, Laffey), it would seem to be well worth it to at least try.