Indians Confidential

In today’s “State of the Tribe” address, manager Manny Acta pretty much went down a partial list of injured players and told us the updates. Here’s what was said:

Mitch Talbot- is going to the Mahoning Valley Scrappers for a rehab assignment on Monday

Carlos Santana- had successful knee surgery today at the Cleveland Clinic and no other damage was found while the procedure was taking place. He is out 4-6 months and should be ready for spring training.

Anthony Reyes- threw a bullpen session for the Tribe and “looked good”. He might be available to start later this year.

The only other news today is that center fielder Michael Brantley was called up from AAA Columbus Clippers and will be the everyday starter for the rest of the season. This is the third time he has played for the Indians this season and will be batting leadoff. Righty Jensen Lewis was optioned to the Clippers to make room for Brantley on the roster. Earlier today infielder Drew Sutton was added to the Tribe’s 40-man roster.

Indians manager Manny Acta talks with the media prior to the Indians-Yankees 7/28 game at Progressive Field. He talks about the status of injured closer Kerry Wood, the mentality of closer Chris Perez, why Josh Tomlin got the start on Tuesday night, and the comeback of pitcher Anthony Reyes.

Indians today announced RHP ANTHONY REYES underwent right elbow surgery earlier today in Anaheim, CA.

Today Dr. Lewis Yocum performed an ulnar collateral ligament reconstruction on Reyes’ right elbow with a concomitant ulnar nerve transposition in the joint during the 3-hour procedure. A typical rehabilitation period for such a procedure is 12-18 months. Reyes has been on the disabled list since May 23 with right elbow inflammation. In 8 starts in 2009 he went 1-1 w/a 6.57 ERA (38.1IP, 40H, 28ER, 5HR, 23BB, 22K).

The Indians first trip in 2009 to the Queen City on Friday night saw their short lived two-game winning streak snapped, as they fell to the Reds 3-1. The team got a rather crazy outing from starting pitcher Anthony Reyes, who went just three innings, walking a career-high six batters and hitting another and then leaving with an inflamed pitching elbow.

Jensen Lewis did a nice job in long relief, going three innings and allowing just one hit, walking one and striking out two. Aaron Laffey took the loss, as in 1.1 innings he gave up two runs on two hits. Adam Rosales doubled home the go-ahead run in the bottom of the eighth to put the Reds ahead for good.

The Indians on offense were shut down by Bronson Arroyo, who went 8 innings, allowing one run on five hits with two walks and two strikeouts. The only Tribe run was a solo homer in the first from Grady Sizemore (8th), as he hit in the number two hole.

Cleveland now sits at 16-27, and they have the worst winning percentage in the American League. Saturday they will throw David Huff against the Reds at 7:10pm.

Let’s all make sure to welcome Luis Vizcaino as the newest member of the 2009 Indians bullpen from Hell. Yes, the Indians newest off the street thrower for the Indians got a rude welcome from the AL Champion Rays Friday night, giving up the game-winning homer in the 9th in the Indians latest 8-7 setback.

All the Indians did after building a 7-0 lead through 3 and a half innings was allow the Rays to claw back with 3 in the 4th, 2 in the 6th, and single runs each in the 7th, 8th and 9th for the win.

Leave it also to the crappy Indians defense, which allowed two Rays runs to score on throwing errors and a third on a wild pitch before Ben Zobrist led off the bottom of the eighth with a solo homer that made it 7-all.

Then it was B.J. Upton, leading off the ninth with his first homer on a 3-2 pitch from Vizcaino, to end what could go down as the toughest loss to swallow in 2009 so far.

The offense was led by Grady Sizemore, who opened the game with the 19th leadoff home run of his career, breaking a tie with Kenny Lofton for the most in Tribe history. Shin-Soo Choo homered for the second straight game, hitting a two-run shot that made it 7-0 in the fourth.

Then the wheels came off, as Tampa Bay slowly by surly got back in the game with some runs off of starter Anthony Reyes and relievers Tony Sipp, Jensen Lewis and Rafael Betancourt, who escaped a bases-loaded jam in the seventh only to give up Zobrist’s tying homer in the eighth. Typical Betancourt.

So the team now regroups as they try to put this tough loss behind them. They are 14-23, 5 games out from Detroit in the Central.

Pitcher Anthony Reyes said Sunday after the Indians were swept by the Tigers that once the team started playing better, they would be fun to watch. Monday night, while most Cleveland fans were watching the Cavs sweep the Hawks, the Indians did play better, and yes, for the first time in awhile – they were fun to watch.

They hit well, pitched pretty good, and played solid defense, and with it came their first win since Wednesday, a 9-4 beating of the rival Chicago White Sox. The win puts them at 12-21, and while it still seems like we’re in for a long season, 12-21 is better at this point than 11-22.

The offense finally came out of their funk against White Sox starter Gavin Floyd, who could not get first pitch strikes and couldnt’ get his curveball over. They pounded out 13 hits, and four players had two or more hits, led by Jhonny Peralta who was 3-for-5 with three RBI. Peralta, who was sat down for two games by Eric Wedge, is 6-for-9 since being put back in the lineup Sunday.

Shin-Soo Choo also had a pretty good night at the plate, going 2-for-4 with three RBI. The team got off to a good start, scoring two runs in the first and then putting up a nice to see four-spot in the 4th to take a 6-0 lead. That would be all it would take for Carl Pavano to throw his 3rd win of the season. He was solid, not outstanding by any means, but was able to get out of trouble a couple of times.

Pavano went 6.1 innings, allowing four runs on 10 hits with no walks and three strikeouts. Since starting the season 0-3, he’s won three in a row, throwing 7.1 innings in a May 1st win over the Tigers, 6 innings in a win last Wednesday vs the Red Sox, and against the White Sox went into the 7th to gain the win. His ERA has dropped from an 81.00 after his first start to 6.45.

“It finally felt like a real baseball game,” Mark DeRosa said. “Any win right now is big.”

You can say that again. A couple more wins and the team can start thinking about getting back into the race in the AL Central. For now, a win tomorrow and they will win a series – and that’s good news any way you look at it.

Let’s go Cavs!

Oh, sorry, wrong sport.

Well, in any event, it was another futile day at the ballpark for the Indians, as even the sunny skies, the delight of Mother’s Day, and the giveaway of Slider Slippers wasn’t enough for the Indians to pull out a win for the fans, as the Tigers took a three-game sweep with a 5-3 win.

The Indians did make it interesting in the 9th, as they pushed two runs across to make a 5-1 game into a 5-3 game, and they did have the tying run on first but Shin-Soo Choo popped up weakly to right against Tigers reliever Fernando Rodney to end any hope of a dramatic comeback.

The loss puts the team at 11-21, a full 10 games under .500. They have dropped four in a row, and 5 of their last 6. The sweep was the second one of the season, as the Rangers did it against them the first three games of the season.

If you want to put the offense, which has been awful as of late into perspective, go back to the 8th inning of Thursday night in Boston. Since then, they have scored just three runs in the last 28 innings. And if it were not for a wild effort from Rodney, it likely would have been one run in 28 innings before the 9th inning today.

Anthony Reyes got the start, and was unimpressive in five lackluster innings. He allowed five runs on seven hits with four walks, three K’s and a homer. In six outings so far this season, he has gone no more than six innings in any one of them, and lasted just five innings or less in three of them.

While Reyes was bad, the offense again was worse. Rick Porcello, who was 2-3 with a 4.71 ERA entering the contest, again shut the Indians down with what seemed like ease. He only went five innings, but still managed to allow just one run on dive hits with two walks and five strikeouts.

So a team meeting that lasted nearly an hour seemed to do little, as the team just keeps going backwards. Eric Wedge gave somewhat of a plea to the media postgame saying that he loves the playes, the fans and the team, but even as genuine as it may be, things seem about as bad now as they have for sometime.

The homestand will continue on Monday as the White Sox come to town at 7:05. Carl Pavano (2-3, 6.61) goes up against Gavin Floyd (2-2, 6.29).

It has taken Cliff Lee just three weeks into the 2009 season to match his loss total for all of 2008. Wednesday night in his latest loss, it wasn’t his fault. It was the fault of an offense that had been hitting everything in sight over the past couple of days, but against Royals soft throwing righty Brian Bannister, they were no match in a 2-0 setback to Kansas City.

The loss drops the team to 5 games under .500 after 15 outings at 5-10, and drops Lee to 1-3. It took him till September 23rd last season at Boston to drop his third decision of the season. Overall he was 22-3 last season, this season so far after just four starts, he’s 1-3.

But again, you can’t pin the blame for this loss on him. He gave the team every shot to win, allowing the Royals just two runs over eight innings of work. He gave up 9 hits, and knew that he was not the source of the setback. “If you had told me before the game I would pitch eight innings and give up two runs, I would have been happy,” Lee said.

The team was handcuffed by a pitcher who said he watched the Indians a couple of times last week play the Yankees from Omaha, where he was playing for the Royals AAA club. Bannister was recalled from Omaha on Tuesday, and allowed four hits and walked only one against a team that came in leading the majors with 76 bases on balls in 14 games. His getting ahead in the count stopped the Indians all night long from getting much going.

About the best shot the Tribe had was in the 9th, as they had two on with one out against Royals closer Joakim Soria. On the first pitch with runners on, Kelly Shoppach hit a laser that looked like it would either be a homer, or at worst a double. The ball started to tail as it headed for the wall in left, and David DeJesus made a stumbling catch, hanging on to the ball despite his spikes catching in the wet ground. Game over.

The Indians had scored 53 runs in winning four its previous six games, but it was back to finding another way to lose in this latest loss. The team will look though to win the series on Thursday at 12:05pm as Anthony Reyes goes for the Indians.