Cleveland Indians: The goal remains the same in 2018

The Cleveland Indians enter 2018 looking to make the postseason for the third straight season with the ultimate, elusive goal remaining the same.

The Cleveland Indians once again enter a season as favorites to contend for a World Series title. But fans don’t want them to just contend. They want the team to win.

I get a deep fear that the Indians may have a similar fate as the 2010-2011 Texas Rangers, who went to two straight World Series, nearly winning one before the St. Louis Cardinals had one of the most miraculous comebacks in baseball history.

That Rangers team should have won and they know it. The team remains without a World Series title in franchise history.

If you are now bummed, I apologize. I am not the type of person who enters a season with pessimism. Being a sports fans is all about hoping for one year of intense excitement every few decades, so it is not like Indians fans should swear off the team if it doesn’t win a title every year.

But as time goes on and the Indians keep having talented teams fail to win it all, patience begins to run thin. My only advice is to worry about October in October. The baseball season is too long to start thinking negatively before Opening Day. This Indians team is an annual contender, which is much better than how things were a decade ago when 2007 was the only real year of promise.

ICYMI

Roundtable: The Tribe will win the World Series if…

Indians fall to Brewers to start first full week of Spring Training

Mejia bomb

Yan Gomes and Roberto Perez better have career years or they are both in danger of losing playing time. I’m not overreacting to one home run, but Francisco Mejia is only getting better with each passing day.

Some improvement up north

The Twins should continue to challenge the Indians in 2018, but they still won’t have enough to shock the world and win the division. I hope that sentence ages well.

Next: Will the team regret not retaining Bruce or Santana?

The Twins landing Yu Darvish could have really shaken things up, but that was too good to be true.