The Cleveland Indians are awful

I thought they'd compete to win the World Series this year. I really did.
What's amazing to me is how complete their awfulness is. They don't really hit that well, although they score runs. Their starting pitching has been awful, and so had their bullpen.
At this point, i think you can stick a fork in them; they're done. Going into tonight's game, they are 9 1/2 games back, but it's actually 11 in the loss column.
They have to win 11 games in a row to get back to .500. If they did that it would:
a. be a miracle, and
b. make me think they might just be contenders after all.
However, I would be surprised if they aren't selling off players by mid-June. The problem with this is I don't see how selling off veterans for prospects helps them contend in 2010. I think Terry Pluto or one of the other Plain Dealer columnists said this earlier. They need good players, because they aren't that far from being good, and a number of their best players are getting closer and closer to free agency.
If I was planning for 2010, I'd start by trying to find a couple of good starting pitchers. Not the Carl Pavano/Anthony Reyes kind, but legitimate top- or mid-rotation starters. How they'll do that I have no idea, but they have Mark DeRosa, Jhonny Peralta, Ryan Garko, Ben Francisco or Kelly Shoppach to trade. Those are all players with talent that other clubs might want.
There also are talented pitchers in the Tribe's bullpen. They've almost all gotten off to monumentally bad starts. Kerry Wood, Rafael Perez, Rafael Betancourt and Joe Smith should be candidates to bounce back, especially if they were supported by a stronger rotation that would keep them from being over-worked and better defense.
Therefore, I'd look for ways to make my defense stronger to support those pitchers, maybe starting by finding a really slick-fielding middle infielder to pair with Asdrubal Cabrera, and then a good glove at third. This next move might be radical, but I wonder if moving Grady Sizemore to left in favor of a Garry Maddox-type center fielder would help? (Remember: Two-thirds of the world was covered by water, and the rest by Garry Maddox.)
With a lineup that includes Sizemore, Cabrera, Victor Martinez and Shin-Soo Choo, they should be able to score runs. Maybe Travis Hafner could be added to that mix, but, at this point, I don't think anyone knows what to expect from him.
The bottom line (which, in this case, really is the bottom line of this post): If they can keep some runs off the board through better pitching and defense, they won't have to score as many.