The End Of Baseball’s Last Work Stoppage Unleashed Cleveland’s Best Team Ever

Baseball’s current work stoppage is its first in nearly 30 years, but that’s still not long enough for Cleveland’s long-suffering baseball fans to forget the delicious havoc wreaked by their favorite team once baseball resumed those many years ago.

The year was 1995. The Cleveland Guardians were then known as the Indians, and it was great to be young and an Indians fan. Or, old and an Indians fan. There were plenty of both. In a six-year span from June of 1995 to April of 2001, the Indians played before a then-record 455 consecutive home sellouts, at what was then known as Jacobs Field.

In most of those years all the home games were sold out before opening day.

Opening day was late arriving in 1995 because on August 11, 1994, when the owners and players couldn’t reach an agreement on a new basic agreement, Commissioner Bud Selig cancelled the remainder of the season, plus the playoffs and World Series. At the time the season was cancelled, the Indians, who hadn’t played in a postseason game in 40 years, were one game behind the first-place White Sox in the American League’s Central Division.

The work stoppage continued into the following spring, much to the consternation of the Indians, who had a loaded roster, bursting at the seams with future Hall of Famers, potential Hall of Famers, plus an insatiable fan base desperate to see the havoc that roster could wreak.

If it wasn’t Cleveland’s best team ever it was certainly its most intimidating.

“That team was tough, young, hungry, big and bad,” said General Manager John Hart. “We hit homers, and we had young players coming out our wazoo.”

The season didn’t start until April 26, and the lineup the Indians unleashed on American League pitchers was frightening. Virtually all the regulars hit over .300, led by one of the greatest outfields in the history of the game: left fielder Albert Belle, center fielder Kenny Lofton, and right fielder Manny Ramirez.

The cantankerous Belle, who should have won the MVP Award, but finished second to the more civil Mo Vaughn, hit .317, with 52 home runs, 50 doubles, 121 runs scored, 126 RBI, with a .401 on-base percentage and 1.091 OPS – in just 143 games. In September alone he belted 17 dingers and had a 1.350 OPS. In August and September, he hit a combined 31 home runs.

Lofton hit .310 and led the league in stolen bases (54) and triples (13), while winning the third of his four career Gold Gloves. Ramirez hit .308 with 31 homers, 107 RBI, a .402 on-base percentage, and .960 OPS. All three outfielders made the all-star team. All three should be in the Hall of Fame, but, for various reasons, none are.

Jim Thome, who IS in the Hall of Fame, was the third baseman on that loaded Indians team. Thome in ’95 hit .314 with 25 homers, 97 walks, 92 runs and a .996 OPS. The second baseman was the .314-hitting, 90-RBI Carlos Baerga. At shortstop, Omar Vizquel stole 29 bases and won the third of his 11 career Gold Gloves. First baseman Paul Sorrento belted 25 home runs – and he was the team’s No.8 hitter! The No. 9 hitter was catcher Sandy Alomar Jr., who hit .300.

Then there was Hall of Famer Eddie Murray, who as a 39-year-old designated hitter, led the team in hitting with a .323 average.

How loaded were the Indians in those years? This loaded: In their careers, Thome and Ramirez hit a combined 1,167 home runs. In 1994, Thome started 38 games hitting eighth in the lineup, and in six more he hit ninth. That same year Ramirez started 12 games hitting either eighth or ninth.

The 1995 Indians had a ferocious lineup that turned several games into routs before many fans had found their seats. In the first inning of a game against Kansas City on May 9 the Indians were leading 8-0 BEFORE THEY MADE THEIR FIRST OUT.

They didn’t just beat their opponents, they bludgeoned them. A sampling of some of their wins: 12-4, 12-2, 14-4, 13-3, 14-5, 11-0, 11-5, 10-5, 10-0 and 11-1. For the season they out-scored their opponents by over 230 runs (840-607).

Their top three starting pitchers were a combined 44-17: Dennis Martinez (12-5), Orel Hershiser (16-6), and Charles Nagy (16-6). Closer Jose Mesa led the league with 46 saves.

As the wins piled up, so did their lead in the AL Central, where they almost lapped the field. On July 2 they led the division by 10 games. On August 29 they led by 20 games. On October 1, in their last game of the year, they beat Kansas City 17-7, finishing the season with a record of 100-44, and winning their division by 30 games, a major league record that may never be broken.

The team’s resume would have been even more impressive if they had played a full 162-game season. The truncated season cost them 18 games of statistical padding that could have pushed their outrageous numbers even farther into the stratosphere.

However, there was not a happy ending to that season for the ages. After sweeping Boston in three games in the Division Series and beating Seattle in six games in the ALCS, what still might be the best Indians team ever lost the World Series to Atlanta in six games.

As the vigil for the start of the 2022 baseball season continues, fans can take solace in the fact that for Indians fans in 1995, the long wait for the start of that season was worth it.

Sort of.