Indians Confidential

The Indians road trip got off to a good start Friday night, as after falling behind 4-1 in the 4th inning, the team rallied for four runs between the 5th and the 6th innings to walk away with a 5-4 win.  What may have been even more impressive than the comeback on offense was the way the bullpen responded, as they pitched three scoreless innings in relief of Cliff Lee to notch the teams 25th win against 29 losses.

The offense was sparked by Grady Sizemore, who led the game off with a homer, and then hit another in the 5th to put the Indians back within striking distance.  He was 2-for-4 with two homers and three RBI.  Jhonny Peralta was 2-for-3 with a run scored and a walk.  The team had eight hits, three homers, and six total extra base hits.

Casey Blake’s 6th inning homer that scored he and Peralta was the difference, as his 4th homer of the season off of Brett Tomko ended up being the difference.  Rafael Betancourt, two days after a postgame tounge lashing from Eric Wedge about throwing more inside, pitched a scoreless two outs in the sixth.  Rafael Perez pitched 1.1 innings, allowing one hit and striking out one, and Joe Borowski gave up a double in the 9th, but got out of it for his 4th save.

Lee was okay at best, but good enough to notch his 8th win against one loss.  He went six innings, allowing four runs on 10 hits.  He walked one and struck out three.  His ERA sits at 1.88.  He allowed a pair of runs in each of the 2nd and 4th innings, but was good enough otherwise to get the win and then turn it over to the pen.

Saturday is game two of the series as C.C. Sabathia will take the mound for the Indians vs Kyle Davies at 7:10pm.