Indians call up Jose Ramirez, option T.J. House to Columbus

The Indians have called up infielder Jose Ramirez from Triple-A, and optioned starting T.J. House back to Columbus in order to make room on the 25-man roster. Ramirez is starting at shortstop this afternoon, and batting 2nd.

Both sides of this move are somewhat significant.

Ramirez, a 21-year-old switch hitter, has already spent a little time with the Tribe, both earlier this season and at the end of 2013. In 39 plate appearances he had only 6 hits and 1 walk, but he's got a line of .302/.360/.441 in Triple-A this season, so while I don't expect he'll be able to quite match Asdrubal Cabrera's league-average bat, he ought to be passable. Meanwhile, he's got better speed and plays better defense than Cabrera.

Speaking of Cabrera, Terry Francona says he doesn't expect Asdrubal to need a stint on the DL for the back spasms that knocked him out of Monday's game. That could mean Ramirez is only up for two or three days, until the Tribe need to call up a pitcher to start one of this weekend's games. (Though if they want to DFA Ryan Raburn and keep Ramirez up, I'd be cool with that.)

As for House being sent down, I think it means we'll be seeing Danny Salazar pitch again on Sunday in Kansas City. Justin Masterson will be making one more rehab start (probably on Friday), which means between House and Salazar, one of them would need to stay in the rotation for at least one more turn. Clearly now that won't be House.

Trevor Bauer will start today, Corey Kluber tomorrow, and Josh Tomlin on Friday. Zach McAllister will almost certainly be called back up for Saturday's game, with Salazar going Sunday. At that point, Masterson should be ready to come back, and so for Tomlin, McAllister, and Salazar, their next start is an audition of sorts, with whoever does the worst maybe getting sent back to Columbus again.