Ludwick is back

All you fans of getting value in return for your baseball players, take heart: Ryan Ludwick is back in the Indians organization.
Five days after being designated for assignment, Ludwick cleared waivers today and was assigned to Buffalo. It is an unlikely outcome for a young hitter with power. Most media pundits figured Ludwick gone, since his upside still outweighs his risk factor. When a team designates a player for assignment, they have 10 days to release, trade or get the player through waivers. A player must pass through waivers unclaimed for his own team to keep him.
Perhaps Ludwick's history of knee and hip problems scared some teams off.
Never in the history of Cleveland baseball has there been so much consternation and hand-wringing over the status of a fourth outfielder.
When Ryan Ludwick was designated for assignment Monday to make room for Juan Gonzalez, you'd think the Indians just released Manny Ramirez if you listened to talk radio.
Some of the complaints were justified; after all, Ludwick, a capable right-handed bat with power, was apparently being jettisoned for nothing to make room for a perpetually-injured outfielder who had at best a 50-50 shot of making it through one week without a relapse.
The heat intensified on the Cleveland front office when, sure enough, Gonzalez re-injured his hamstring on his first batted ball of the season. He might miss three months.
With the return of Coco Crisp to action far earlier than expected, Ludwick has been pushed even further down the depth chart. The Indians primary starting outfield is now Jody Gerut, Grady Sizemore and Crisp. Badly struggling Casey Blake will probably fight for playing time as the new fourth outfielder.
Unless someone else gets hurt, Ludwick is probably in for a fairly lengthy stint in Buffalo, considering he is out of options and can't be sent down without being designated for assignment again. But the bottom line is, he's back.
All those cursed-Cleveland nightmares of Ludwick getting claimed by the White Sox and crushing game-winning home runs against the Indians can be put to rest for now.