As expected, Indians activate C Lou Marson and option C Yan Gomes to AAA.
— Jordan Bastian (@MLBastian) April 24, 2013
The Indians probably could have gotten away with not placing Marson on the DL if Santana hadn't also gotten hurt; they could have called up Gomes for a couple days, then sent him down when Lou was ready to play again. But because of that confluence of catcher injuries, they not only had to send Marson to the DL, but also add two catchers to the roster. It's not that big a deal, though, and probably helped the Indians in the process, as Gomes not only hit well in his first stint with the Indians, it allowed them to carry a three-man bench this past week without any problems, even with some day-to-day injuries.
Now that Marson has been activated, that three-man bench (Marson, Aviles, Raburn or Giambi) isn't as flexible. The good news is that many of the Tribe's starters can play multiple positions, so they should be able to get away with it until Michael Bourn comes off the DL, which will make Raburn and Giambi true bench players again.
This next stretch of games allows the Indians an opportunity to, if they want to, call up Carlos Carrasco so that he gets his 8-game suspension out of the way. With yesterday's rainout and two off days in the next couple weeks, the Indians will only have to use their fifth starter (in this case Corey Kluber) once from now until May 7th. So they could send down two relievers (one for Carrasco now and one for Bourn at the end of the month) and still be ok in the bullpen. They would still have seven relievers in the bullpen plus Kluber until Bourn comes off the DL, and would only have to deal with a six-man for a couple days. However, that assumes that the rest of the rotation will be pitching 6 innings a day, and that's a very unrealistic assumption given recent history.