Sports Watch Monitor 2015 Cactus League Reports – Cleveland and Kansas City
Sports Watch Monitor 2015 Cactus League Reports – Cleveland and Kansas City
Sports Watch Monitor has a correspondent covering the Cactus League Spring Training to get you prepared for a season of betting baseball. Here is the sixth in our exclusive reports this month, this coming from Surprise, AZ, where Kansas City calls home.
Game Observations –
Kansas City starter Yordano Ventura had great velocity but his pitches looked like they were on a string and major-league hitters like Cleveland had in their lineup attacked this tosses and tagged Ventura for seven hits and four runs. The righthander did manage five strikeouts in three innings, but will have to be much sharper and have more movement the next time out.
Closer Greg Holland struck-out two in an inning of work and veteran Chris Young threw two innings but gave up three hits, including a home run in Kansas City’s 6-5 come from behind victory.
Having seen Lorenzo Cain and Eric Hosmer the last few springs, they are carrying themselves with a different body language, being more confident in their abilities after last year’s experiences.
Indians hitters were spraying the ball all over the yard and had built a 4-1 lead after five innings of action. Though it was just one game, in watching closely, the only batter among the Indians starters that did not take good swings was Jason Kipnis, who is coming off a poor injured-plagued season.
Shawn Marcum is attempting to make the Cleveland roster and pitched three solid innings. Charles Brewer enter the contest in the sixth inning and conceded six rope shots, walked a batter, giving up five runs, while retiring only one Royals hitter.
Kansas City Royals Prospects for 2015
Motivation should not be a problem for Kansas City after being one game away from becoming World Series champions. With the changes in the roster, does manager Ned Yost have enough on the replacement side to have K.C. defend their American League title?
The sportsbooks do not think so, with Kansas City the fourth choice on futures odds just to win the division and whose win total is just 80, a nine-game decline. The losses of James Shields, Billy Butler and Nori Aoki will be felt, especially over a long 162-game schedule. What Yost hopes is newcomer Alex Rios will be more focused playing for on championship caliber club and Edinson Volquez can step right in to a pitcher’s park and pitch well backed by a quality defensive at almost every position.
Those more optimistic find a contingent of everyday K.C. players are in or near the prime of their big league careers and either should duplicate their efforts from last year or even improve upon them in some cases. If this happens and DH Kendry Morales turns out to be a suitable replacement for Butler, the Royals offense will be better than presumed.
If Yost can find enough starting pitching, the bullpen has proven they can close out games with late inning leads and the Royals are back as contenders in the AL Central and surpasses the win total.
Cleveland Indians Prospects for 2015
Cleveland’s 24-game improvement from 2012 to 2103 sent then to AL wild card game. Normally such a burst calls for regression. Oddmakers pegged the Tribe for 82 victories a year ago, a drop 10 games.
But with Terry Francona running the team, this is no longer the – mistake on the lake – and the Indians surpassed market expectations and won 85 games.
The Indians offense was average a year ago by AL standards at 4.1 runs per game and they are hoping Kipnis bounces back and Brandon Moss coming from Oakland adds more punch. The core group of Michael Brantley, Lonny Chisenhall, Carlos Santana and Yan Gomes just needs a little help and if received, the Tribe should tally more runs.
The starting pitching potential is strong with Corey Kluber, Carlos Carrasco, as long as still youngsters Danny Salazar and Trevor Bauer do their part.
In looking at Cleveland, if the starting pitching losses Detroit suffered in the past year hurt them, the Indians being the second choice to win the division might have some good value. If you believe this like we do, playing the OVER on the Indians 84 wins would be a natural fit for 2015.
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