ESPN’s Buster Olney is reporting that the Atlanta Braves have traded Derek Lowe to the Cleveland Indians. WKNR in Cleveland is reporting that the Indians parted with minor-league pitcher Chris Jones.

This is a salary dump by the Braves. Olney reports that the Braves will cover $10 million of Lowe’s 2012 salary of $15 million. So the Indians get an experienced starter for the bargain price of $5 million for next season.

Lowe didn’t have a great 2011 season in Atlanta as he went 9-17 with a 5.05 ERA. He’s also 38 years old. Yet Lowe eats up innings and his stats from 2005-2010 we excellent and then solid. The Indians have a strong pitching staff led by Justin Masterson and Ubaldo Jimenez, with Josh Tomlin and Fausto Carmona as well (the Tribe picked up Carmona’s 2012 option today for $7 million). But injuries have hurt their depth in the rotation, and Lowe gives them an experienced starter to add to the mix.

It was a great night at Progressive Field for Indians fans last night, as the Tribe thumped the Detroit Tigers 10-3 behind a 5-5 night from Jason Kipnis and a stellar home debut by Ubaldo Jimenez. Jimenez looks dominating when you see him in person as I did last night.

The Indians took a real gamble by sending two #1 picks to Colorado for Jimenez, but so far he looks like the real deal. With Justin Masterson, the Indians now have two front-line starters at the top of the rotation, with a very capable Josh Tomlin as the #3 starter. Then you have an inconsistent but sometimes dominating Fausto Carmona and several young starters like Carlos Carrasco and David Huff.

The offense is also starting to heat up, with young players like Kipnis providing a spark. Kipnis reminds me of a young Lenny Dykstra. The Indians are now within two games of the Tigers after taking the first two games of this series. Shin-Soo Choo should be back soon, and possibly Grady Sizemore as well. They definitely need Choo to come back strong and Sizemore would be a bonus.

Believe it or not, there was a time (three years ago for those keeping score at home) when Indians’ starter Fausto Carmona was considered to be one of the better young arms in baseball. He was supposed to make Tribe fans forget about CC Sabathia and if he couldn’t do that, at least be a nice complement to Cliff Lee in Cleveland’s starting rotation.

But something happened from the time he posted a 19-8 record in 2007 to where we are now present day, where he’s currently fighting to remain in the rotation.

According to a report by the Cleveland Plain Dealer, Carmona could be facing a demotion to Triple-A after allowing seven runs in just two innings in his latest start on Thursday night. In 12 starts this season, Carmona is 2-6 with a whopping 7.42 ERA and 1.81 WHIP. He’s struck out just 36 batters and has walked 41.

The Indians don’t have the healthiest starting rotation right now, but sending Carmona down to Triple-A might not only benefit him, but the team as well. The fact of the matter is that he’s a complete mess and when he pitches, there’s a huge possibility that Cleveland will be chalking up an L in the standings before the lights shut off at the ball yard.

And really, sending him down to Triple-A might not even be good enough. The Tigers sent Dontrelle Willis down to A-ball when he struggled earlier this year with a variety of issues (both physical and mental), and Carmona could benefit from the same treatment. His control is the biggest problem mechanically, but his confidence appears shot to hell, too. Baseball is as much of a mental game as it is physical and Carmona’s problems seem to lie between the ears just as much as they do with his stride, his arm release and his command.

By no means is Carmona a lost cause. He still has the stuff that made him a 19-game winner in 2007, but his control issues are mind-boggling. The Tribe should send him down, although not just to Triple-A, but to A-ball. They should allow him to work his way back up through the minors, gaining confidence and control along the way until he’s ready to face major league hitters again. Think of the situation as not only hitting the reset button your PS3, but actually pulling the plug completely out of the wall and taking a deep breath before plugging it back in.

In the meantime, the Indians could call up pitching prospect Hector Rondon. Is he ready? Probably not, but Cleveland is running out of choices right now and Rondon gives the Tribe just as much of a chance to win as Carmona does. (If not better.)

With their 11-10 win over the Rays on Monday night, the Indians became the first team to win a game after trailing by 10 runs since the Rangers rallied to beat the Tigers in 2004.

Thanks to another brutal performance by Fausto Carmona in which he walked the first four men he faced in the second inning on 20 pitches and gave up five runs while getting only one out, the Tribe fell behind 5-0 after only two innings. Cleveland then surrendered five more runs to fall behind 10-0 after three and a half innings before scratching across two runs in the fourth and two more in the eighth to make it 10-4 Rays.

The massive rally in the ninth started when Grady Sizemore walked, Victor Martinez popped out to third, Jhonny Peralta singled to left and then a throwing error on a ground ball by Shin-Soo Choo allowed Sizemore to score and Peralta to get to third. Mark DeRosa then lined out for the second out of the inning, but Ryan Garko belted a three-run dinger to cut Tampa’s lead down to 10-8. After Asdrubal Cabrera, Ben Francisco and Jamey Carroll all walked, Rays’ reliever Jason Isringhausen then walked Sizemore to force a run home to make the game 10-9. The final dagger for Tampa came when Martinez singled home Francisco and Carroll to give the Indians an improbable 11-10 win.

It’s amazing how games can turn in the blink of an eye. Had Rays’ shortstop Reid Brignac not made a throwing error on Choo’s grounder, Tampa probably would have turned a double play and the game would have been over. But one thing leads to the next and before you know it, your team loses. (Of course, the 67 walks in the ninth didn’t help the Rays either.)

Despite the win, Carmona once again had major control issues. It’s amazing to think that he was viewed as one of the better young arms in baseball just two years ago and now he’s on a crash course to baseball purgatory. Also, top pitching prospect David Price failed to get out of the fourth inning in his debut, although he did strike out six. Like Carmona, Price had major issues with his control and threw 100 pitches to record just 10 outs. He walked five in total.