Indians Confidential

He was 0-for-18 coming to the plate. None of that mattered. For Victor Martinez and the Indians, it was a night of being a hero, and for at least one night, Martinez got the job done. For the Indians, it was by far their best win of the season, and for a season that appears lost, it was at least one night of happiness at Progressive Field.

Martinez’s two-out, two-strike, single between second and short scored two runs, as the Indians overcame a stunning 10-0 deficit to beat the Tampa Bay Rays 11-10 in front of a spirited crowd at the Prog. The win puts the team at 18-28, still 10 games under .500, but hey, it’s better than 12 games – right?

The Rays built the 10-0 lead off a wild Fausto Carmona, who couldn’t find the plate. He lasted just 1.1 innings, allowing five earned runs on just three hits. He also walked five and struck out three. He ended up throwing 60 pitches, and only got 30 over for strikes. He was pretty bad to say the least, and left the team in a bad hole. They went to Jensen Lewis, who in 1.2 innings allowing another five runs on three hits, with two walks.

The credit from the pitching has to go to Jeremy Sowers, who went five scoreless innings, walking just one and striking out one while the offense finally started getting some hits and some runs. The big inning for the Tribe was the 9th, when down 10-4 entering the inning they piled up 7 runs, mostly again due to walks.

The team sent 11 batters to the plate, drawing five walks, getting just three hits, but pushing 7 runs across. Ryan Garko hit his second homer of the night in the inning, and by the time Martinez got to the plate, the crowd was on their feet waiting for the biggest comeback of the season to be complete.

He delivered.

Off of former Mets thrower Jason Isringhausen, who was making his first all-time relief outing, Ben Francisco walked, Jamey Carroll walked, Grady Sizemore walked to make it 11-10, then Martinez singled to finish off the win with two runs to make it an 11-10 win.

Yes, at least for one night the Indians played like the team we’ve grown to love for their miracle comebacks over the years. The issues remain with Carmona, a leaky bullpen, and an offense that never seems to get runs across when they need them, but the bottom line is this – it was a win, and for this team this year – they will take it.

Indians radio voice Mike Hegan said it best in the Saturday night Tribe 4-0 loss to the Tigers.  “You’ve got offensive execution, defensive exection, and pitching execution – and right now the Indians are doing none of it right.”  And with that, the team now sits at 11-20, and I will make my first formal plea of the season:

It’s time for Eric Wedge to find employment elsewhere.  And you can take Mark Shapiro with you.

One playoff appearance in 7 seasons, and this team looks NOTHING like a playoff team in 2009.  Their starting pitching is really not that good (minus Lee and Carmona), the hitting is weaker than we all thought, and the defense stinks.  It all equals up to a team that to me has the making of a club that is nowhere near being a “championship” club, as they advertised in their marketing campaign this offseason.

Instead, this club has little to offer.  Saturday night against Cy Young, er I mean Edwin Jackson, they simply seemed to take hacks at the plate, made contact a couple of times, but in the end, had 7 hits and for the second straight night went 9 innings without pushing a run across home plate.

You go back to the last game in Boston on Thursday, and they have scored three runs in three games.  For the second straight night, they tried to put together an inning, but couldn’t get a bunt down, and after two tries by David Dellucci with two on and no outs, he hit a line drive to third that ended up doubling up Shin-Soo Choo at second base.

Fausto Carmona went 6.2 innings, allowing two runs on four hits.  He walked six and struck out four, but once again, got no offensive support, so it wouldn’t have really mattered if he would have given up two runs, or 22 runs.  If the Indians did have any hope of coming back, they of course went to the awful bullpen, where Rafael Betancourt allowed two runs on three hits on 1.1 innings.

Other than that, at least the 33,000 were able to walk out of the ballpark with a Cliff Lee Cy Young bobblehead.  Better enjoy it, there won’t be one next year.

Leave it to a former Indian minor league player to end what was yet another awful April for the Tribe. You probably don’t remember Jon Van Early, but he was in the Tribe’s minor league system for a number of years, only to never get a shot. Tonight, he took a shot against his former team, sending a Jensen Lewis pitch 420 feet into centerfield for a game-winning homer that sent the Indians to a 6-5 loss.

The loss hurt in a number of ways. The team blew what seemed to be a safe 5-0 lead entering the 6th. They had a shot in the bottom of the 10th down 6-5 as Mark DeRosa hit a long out to center that could have tied the game, and once again, Lewis couldn’t keep the ball in the park, sending the team to their toughest loss of the season.

Fausto Carmona started and looked great for the Indians. He at one point set down 12 straight Red Sox, but then with a 5-0 lead started to wither away in the 6th, as Boston got two back to make it 5-2. In the 7th, he got the first two outs, but then a single and a walk and he was out of the game.

The Indians got out of that inning, but in the 8th, the Sox made the terrible Tribe bullpen pay once again, this time in the form of Rafael Betancourt, who allowed three runs to cross, which eventually tied the game at five. Lewis saved Bentancourt that inning, but the Indians couldn’t mount a rally, and eventually Lewis gave up the game-winning HR to his former roommate in Van Early.

The game started out great for the Indians, as they looked like they were ready to win a home series, go 5-4 on the homestand, and get out of April with two straight wins. That of course is before the roof caved in on them. DeRosa and Kelly Shoppach each homered for the Indians to help them get to 5-0, but it was all for not.

The Indians outplayed the Red Sox in the three-game set much like they outplayed the Yankees before the homestand started. Just like that series though, the team was unable to pull out some tough wins, that would now have their record look a lot better than 8-14.

So about the only positive is that April is now over. The team cannot start over, but they can start fresh on Friday night in Detroit against the team that is tied for first in the division with the White Sox at 11-10.

If May is as bad as April, it’s going to be quite the long summer for Indians fans.

Twins pitcher Nick Blackburn is one of those pitchers that always seems to give the Indians trouble. In six career starts, he’s 3-0 against them with a 1.71 ERA. Friday night in the series opener vs the Tribe at Progressive Field, the Indians again had their issues vs Blackburn, pushing across just one run in 7 innings as the Twins beat the Indians 5-1.

He allowed six hits, and the biggest thing was he didn’t walk a batter, this after giving up six walks in his first three starts and having command issues. He struck out four, and the Indians lineup provided little pop in their bats against him.

Fausto Carmona in the mind of Eric Wedge pitched an okay game, but he still didn’t seem to be overly commanding against the Twins. He gave up five runs, four earned in 6 innings. He also gave up 8 hits, and while he struck out 8 and walked only one, he still took the loss to fall to 1-3 on the season.

It’s amazing the Indians have even six wins on the season considering their number one and two starters – Cliff Lee and Carmona, are a combined 2-6 through the first three weeks of the 2009 season.

The only Indians real scoring chance came when they pushed their only run of the game across in the third to tie it at one apiece. Asdrubal Cabrera doubled, then Grady Sizemore slammed a sharp single to right that scored Cabrera to make it 1-1.

That tie lasted exactly one pitch into the fourth inning, as Justin Morneau crushed a Carmona pitch for a homerun to right that made it a 2-1 game. A few batters later, Jose Morales singled to score another run to give the Twins a 3-1 lead. With the Indians offense stale, it might as well been 100-1 at that point.

Minnesota added two more in the 7th off of Carmona and Rafael Betancourt to make it 5-1. Other than that, the fireworks postgame were for sure not for the Indians offense on this night.

The loss drops the team to 6-11. Carl Pavano (0-2, 9.69) goes for the Indians vs Kevin Slowey for the now 8-9 Twins.

So I am sitting at the Cavs beating of the Pistons Saturday and I get a text message from a friend: “Indians just scored 14 runs.” What? I thought, didn’t the game just start?! And that was the beauty of it.

There’s nothing better in the world than the beating of the pompous, too good for everyone else, let’s spend as much money as possible and still suck Yankees. And in two of the first three games of the new Yankee Stadium, that’s exactly what happened.

Saturday the Tribe slammed New York every which way but loose with a 22-4 win. “It was just one of those games for the entire team,” said Mark DeRosa, who went 4-for-7 and tied a career high with six RBIs. “Just a lot of guys getting good swings.”

The WHOLE team got good swings it seemed like, and it’s a shame you can’t bank some of these runs for today, or tomorrow, or next week for that matter.

DeRosa and Shin Soo-Choo hit three-run homers, Travis Hafner, Grady Sizemore and Victor Martinez had solo shots for the Indians, who made it a laugher before some idiot Yankee fans could even get in their seats. It was also the 500th win for Eric Wedge, and couldn’t have been any better.

Fausto Carmona got the win to go to 1-2, and went 6 innings allowing four hits, six hits, and two homers. It seems like in three games the new Yankee Stadium is surely going to be a place where some home run records are broken.

So today the team has a shot at now 4-8 to come home on a high note. They have quickly won three of four, and today with a win can take 3 of 4 from the Yankees. How sweet that would be,

Yuck. On a night made more for football than baseball, the Tribe’s first game in KC in 2009 was one to forget. Royals pitcher Zach Greinke was in control from the start, and by the time it was done it the team had put up a goose egg, struck out 9 times, and were behind 4-0.

The team is now 1-6, and while they (like Saturday), made it a game in the 9th with two runs and the tying run on second with no outs, the game came down to KC closer Joakim Soria, who struck out Victor Martinez, got Travis Hafner to hit a weak grounder to the mound, and struck out Jhonny Peralta to end the game. Ugly.

The Royals jumped on Fausto Carmona (0-2) with three runs in the first inning, and needed little after that. Carmona went five innings, allowing four runs on five hits, walking four and striking out four. It would have been a great night for Carmona to rebound from his shaky first start, but it was not to be.

The offense did have their shots, as they put up 10 hits, but Hafner and Peralta going 0-for-8 hurt, and they left 10 men on base and continue to really struggle with runners in scoring position.

The team continues to have their issues with falling behind early. Carmona needed to set a tempo tonight with a good outing, and he couldn’t, and the offense wasted their shots against Greinke and that was all she wrote.

They left five on base in the first three innings, and four of those were in scoring position. Things are bad right now, and it some ways, they only have themselves to blame for it.

Tuesday night again at 8:10pm it will be Carl Pavano against Kyle Davies.

Well, we’re two short games into the season, and the Indians#1 and #2 starting pitchers are 0-2 and both have looked very unimpressive against a Rangers team that is supposed to be middle of the pack in the American League at best.

Fausto Carmona’s 09 season didn’t get off to a good start, as he gave up 6 earned runs on 7 hits in just five innings. He seemed to have little control, and it didn’t take the Rangers much to catch up to his pitches. Carmona is a player the Indians need to return to form from 2007, and while again – it’s just one start, this was ugly from the get-go.

As for the offense, well, at least they put up a few runs. Tom Hamilton said it best though in his 7th inning recap – it all came down to hits with running in scoring position. The team on the night was an amazing 1-for-15 with RISP – yes the dreaded runners in scoring position stat raises its ugly head again.

Today we’ll get to see if the story of Carl Pavano continues, as he had a pretty good spring, and he gives the team their only shot to salvage a game on this trip. As for the opener, they are calling for mid to high 40’s with rain.

Wow. Well, you kind of had that feeling that Cliff Lee was going to have one of those days today after he won 22 games in 2008. No one though probably thought 2009 for Lee and the Tribe would start out as ugly as it did today. The team was shelled by the Texas Rangers, as Lee allowed 7 runs on 10 hits over 5 innings as the team was beat 9-1.

Not that the Indians offenese, as you could tell from the final score, did much better. Kevin Millwood, a one-time Indian, handcuffed the team for one run on five hits over 7 innings. He walked just one batter and struck out five. No on in the Tribe’s lineup managed more than one hit on the day.

Lee’s beating started in the second inning, as he needed just 10 pitches to get out of the first. He allowed four runs, all on two outs in that second inning, and the Rangers hit parade was on from there. Three innings after the Rangers put up a four spot, the game for all intensive purposes was put away when Hank Blalock hit a three-run homer to right in the 5th to make it 7-0.

The only Indians run came on a wild pitch in the 7th by Milwood that scored Travis Hafner. It was that kind of day.

It’s only one game, but let’s hope things get back to normal after a day off on Tuesday, as the team will throw Fausto Carmona on the mound Wednesday night. Carmona needs to get some early confidence, and let’s hope the Rangers got all their runs out of them today.