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The calendar says it's only June 5, and the Indians are a mere 5.5 games behind the White Sox, but is it already time to declare their season over, and perhaps even trade C.C. Sabathia? For the team that many picked to be just one game better this year, in other words make it all the way to the World Series, it's been a frustrating season of horrible hitting, bad bullpen pitching, and an increasing injury count that is putting their envious starting pitching depth to an extreme test.

The lack of hitting, both for average and power, has scouts around the league scratching their collective heads and wondering what in the name of Pronk has happened. Although the past few games against a very bad Texas Rangers staff has helped lift the team batting average to just above a historic low, they need to show significant improvement against real major league pitching to even have a chance of winning the Central division. And if either the White Sox or Twins turn out to be for real instead of barely above .500 pretenders, the likelihood of the Tribe playing in October drops lower than the chances of Hillary Clinton running the White House next year.

So is all doom and gloom for the Indians at this point? Not so fast naysayers. Sometime this month Carmona and Westbrook will return to the rotation, and it's possible (an optimist would say likely) that with the weather finally warming up the Tribe's bats will as well. Do you really think Victor Martinez will finish the year with no home runs or that Travis Hafner will end up batting .212?

It won't take much of an improvement in the offense to change many of those 3-2 and 3-1 losses into 4-3 victories. As well, it's a pretty safe bet that either the White Sox or the Twins will fall back, leaving Cleveland with only one of those teams to contend with (sorry Tiger fan, I think your team is out of it for good this year).

So sit back and pay close attention the next few weeks and see how it plays out for the Tribe. If they can end June only 2 or 3 games back, or perhaps even be in first by then, I think you'll see Mark Shapiro pull off a big trade to bring in another bat or two, and then perhaps October baseball in Cleveland won't look as distant as it does now.

Tags: cc sabathia, cleveland indians, daily take, travis hafner