The Cleveland Indians announced today that they have decline to pick up the $9 million option on Grady Sizemore for the 2012 season. The Tribe was hoping to negotiate an incentive-laden deal for the often injured Sizemore, but that didn’t happen so they let him go.

Sizemore was a rising star and an excellent all-around player before he injured his knee. In 2008, Sizemore clubbed 33 home runs and stole 38 bases. But in the last three seasons, he’s only played in 210 games with 28 home runs and 17 steals. This year he didn’t steal a single base, and with all the injuries nobody knows if he can return to his previous form.

The Indians couldn’t afford to take that chance. They desperately need to add some reliable bats to go with their solid pitching staff and Sizemore was too big a risk, particularly since they are stuck with the brittle Travis Hafner for one more season at $13 million.

Sizemore will get plenty of interests from other teams, and the upside is there if he can stay healthy. The big-money teams can more easily absorb the risk.

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.

With the 2009 MLB Draft set to kickoff at 6:00 ET tonight on the MLB Network, SI.com did a cool feature in which they rated how each club has fared over the past 10 years when it comes to the draft.

The Brewers were rated number one and it’s hard to argue with the ranking after looking at the names Milwaukee has drafted over the years: Prince Fielder, Corey Hart, J.J. Hardy, Manny Parra, Rickie Weeks, Ryan Braun and Yovani Gallardo. Amazingly, this club also drafted Hunter Pence (Astros), but couldn’t sign him.

The Red Sox were rated No. 2, with Kevin Youkilis, Jonathan Papelbon, Dustin Pedroia, Jon Lester and Manny Delcarmen leading the way, but the site left off a glaring omission: Jacoby Ellsbury. The Rays actually drafted Ellsbury in the 2002 draft, but never signed him. The Sox then nabbed him with the 23rd overall pick in 2005 and he’s currently their starting centerfielder.

Speaking of the Rays, I wouldn’t be surprised to see the Tampa ranked higher than No. 4 in the next couple of years. Evan Longoria, Carl Crawford, B.J. Upton, James Shields, Andy Sonnanstine and David Price are just some of the names they’ve drafted in the past 10 years. Don’t forget that they were the team that also drafted Josh Hamilton before he got injured and then became the poster child of what not to do when you’re an inspiring ballplayer with loads of free time on your hands.

You look at a club like the Nationals ranked No. 8 and you wonder why they’ve been so awful over the years despite drafting so well. Then you realized they dealt Grady Sizemore, Cliff Lee and Brandon Phillips all in the same trade for Bartolo Colon and it all starts to make sense.

If you’re wondering whom SI had ranked last, it was the Astros; only Hunter Pence was worth noting of the players Houston drafted the past 10 years. The White Sox were second to last, although if Josh Fields, Chris Getz, Clayton Richard and Gordon Beckham develop like the club hopes, I highly doubt Chicago will be ranked that low again if SI does another ranking like this in the next couple of years.

Cleveland Indians all-star outfielder Grady Sizemore has been placed on the 15-day disabled list with left elbow inflammation. The Indians have called up utilityman Chris Gimenez from Triple-A Columbus.

Sizemore had struggled at the plate and not played much in the field recently because of the injury. He went 1 for 4, hitting his team-leading ninth homer Saturday night against the Yankees, but is hitting only .223 overall.

“We couldn’t take it any further,” said manager Eric Wedge, who had tried to keep Sizemore’s normally productive bat in the lineup by using him as a designated hitter.

The two-time Gold Glove center field had played in the field only three times in his past 12 appearances, all in an interleague series in Cincinnati.

“The first couple of days, it looked like Grady was getting better, then it leveled off. We didn’t want to push it and hurt it even more,” Wedge said.

Wedge said an MRI exam showed no structural damage and that Sizemore would not swing a bat or do any throwing for two weeks.

A year ago, Sizemore had career-highs of 33 homers, 90 RBIs and 38 stolen bases.

I find it strange that all these guys who were putting up big numbers last year are not only getting hurt but having poor seasons. On the flip side of that coin, some guys who have been unproductive in past years are having great years but are also getting hurt.

Grady Sizemore, Geovany Soto, and Alexei Ramirez are all having poor to mediocre seasons. Sizemore and Soto have battled nagging injuries and it’s showing. However, Jason Bartlett is having a phenomenal year and has never shown this talent before. Still, he’s young and hurt. I don’t get how these young guys are so easily injured.