Indians Confidential

Yeah, this is yet another one that hurts.

The Indians looked like they were in cruise control Friday afternoon at Wrigley Field, building a nice 7-0 lead vs a Cubs team that wasn’t exactly an offensive powerhouse. Instead with ace Cliff Lee on the mound, the club (as they have done oh so often this year) allowed the Cubs to come back, and with a Derek Lee homer in the 9th to tie it off Kerry Wood, the Tribe eventually lost in 10 to the Cubs 8-7.

There was plenty of talk in Cleveland on Thursday during the off day about Eric Wedge being shown the door, and nothing that took place on Friday afternoon in the Windy City is going to change that. The team is now 11 games under .500, and they have no answers whatsoever to solve all the issues that are making this one long summer of baseball.

After a rain dealy, the Tribe built a 6-0 lead with two three-run homers from Luis Valbuena and Victor Martinez. They went up 7-0 in the 4th, and from there it was all Cubs, as they chipped away with runs in the 5th and 6th to make it 7-2. Lee left the game after the 7th up 7-2, and it was disaster from there with the bullpen from hell.

Joe Smith allowed three runs, one earned in 0.2 in the 8th, and then Wood allowed the solo homer to Lee in the 9th to tie the game at 7. Luis Vizcaino was the loser, as he got to two outs in the bottom of the 10th, but then allowed a bad-hop single to Ryan Theriot to score the winning run.

There isn’t much you can say right now, other than the Wedge Watch is hotter than ever, and the team is simply going to be forced to make a change sooner rather than later. “It’s hard, but you can’t give in to it,” Indians manager Eric Wedge said. “Obviously, our bullpen has really been struggling on and off all year. When you have games like this, it’s about as bad as it can get.”

He’s right, it’s hard to believe this can get any worse. But then again, there’s always tomorrow.