Sink or Swim: Three Teams That Need to Move or Start Planning Next Year

(Photo by Jonathan Daniel/Getty Images)

As the month of June draws to a close, fans all over the country are beginning to shake the "it's still early" scales from their eyes and are coming to grips with the fact that their team of choice, well, sucks.

The good news is that unless you are a Nats fan, a few key moves could put your favorite team right back into contention. Three of the six divisions have a last place team fewer than 10 games behind the first place team and 19 non-division leaders are trailing by 10 games or fewer.

Not every team has a quick fix, but for some of the most disappointing, their salvation may be nigh.

Here are three teams that can change their fortunes with an easy move or two.

Chicago Cubs (30-31, 4.5 GB)

Solution: Free Jake Fox!

Cubs starters lead baseball with 38 quality starts, lead by Ted Lilly who has posted 10 quality starts out of 13 total. While the bullpen hasn't been the point of strength that the Cubs had hoped it was going to be, they haven't been so bad as to take the blame off of the offense.

38 times the starting pitcher has put the Cubs in a fantastic position to win and no fewer than eight times (and probably many more) the offense has been held to two runs or fewer. For a team projected to score well over 800 runs, that's a big problem.

Once Aramis Ramirez comes back to the lineup, they'll certainly be in better shape, but one player rarely solves a team's woes on his own.

Enter: Jake Fox.

Fox is a minor league masher who raked to the tune of a career OPS of .883 in his seven minor league seasons.

Will that translate directly to the pros? Of course not.

Could adding Fox's bat to the lineup in favor of Alfonso Soriano (OBP: .291) or Kosuke Fukudome (14 strike outs in the last 10 games) on occasion help the Cubs score more runs and win more games? I almost guarantee it.

Fox isn't an everyday starter in my book, but letting Soriano, Fukudome or one of the Cubs' other struggling sluggers ride the pine for a day to clear their head can't be a bad thing.

Cleveland Indians (29-39, 6.5 GB)

Solution: Choose a path and stick with it

The Indians were slated to be sellers this season mere moments after Grady Sizemore hit the DL. Injuries to Sizemore and Halfner as well as early ineffectiveness from the bullpen and starters like Fausto Carmona made the Indians' epitaph an easy one to write in early June.

However, quietly strong seasons from Victor Martinez (sadly for V-mart, he isn't even the best catcher in his own division), Mark DeRosa, and Shin-Soo Choo have put the Indians in a position where, with a few moves and a textbook rehab process by Sizemore, they could be in the hunt in the AL Central.

If they decide that the Central is weak and they have a chance, their first move should be to add starting pitching. Cliff Lee is posting a 33 VORP, sixth best among pitchers, but no one else on the Indians' staff is even above 8.5.

Adding a pitcher like Brad Penny, who likely will become available by late next week, won't solve their problems, but he well could be an improvement over most of the rest of the staff. Plus, Penny will provide consistency the Indians sorely need.

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