Indians Confidential

Last season Kerry Wood had a couple of meltdowns in Chicago against his former team the Chicago Cubs. Wednesday night was another meltdown to a National League team, this time though it was a one-pitch meltdown that sent the Indians home losers for the 4th straight time.

Wood gave up a meatball homer to former NL MVP Jimmy Rollins in the bottom of the ninth as the Philadelphia Phillies rallied for a 7-6 comeback win over the Indians at Citizens Bank Park.

The homer was Rollins’ first career walk off dinger, and came after the other Indians pitchers had held him in check as he was 0-for-4 going into the at-bat.

“Pretty deflating, even when we didn’t execute, we still got into the 9th with a lead,” Indians manager Manny Acta said. “They had the bottom of the order up, the leadoff walk killed us. We got to the bottom of the 9th with a lead, and we blew it.”

The shame of this latest loss is that the Indians fought hard to take that one-run lead in the 9th when with runners on first and third with one out Carlos Santana hit a shot to short, and Rollins tried to go home, but the throw was off and Trevor Crowe scored to make it 6-5.

The Indians though, as has been the case throughout the 2010 season, could not get that all important 7th run home, as Russell Branyan hit a liner to first that was caught and Austin Kearns, who had walked, was doubled up to end the inning and set up Rollins’ heroics.

The loss also ruined a good night for Shin-Soo Choo, who continues to make his case for the All-Star game. He was 2-for-4 with home runs 9 and 10, both no doubters that gave the Indians leads each time.

“He’s been good for us the whole year,” Acta said. “This is a ballpark for a guy like him that hits the ball to all fields it suits him perfect. He did that, he was one of the guys that really executed today.”

Jake Westbrook was shaky all night though, going just 5 innings, allowing four runs on 7 hits with a walk and two K’s. He threw just 75 pitches, but clearly didn’t have his best stuff.

The team though did what they had to do from an offensive standpoint, that is get the lead and give the ball to their closer. It was Wood who couldn’t put Philly to bed.

“It’s frustrating when you walk the first guy, obviously,” Wood said in the postgame. “It’s not worse though than giving up a two-run homer to lose the game, if you make pitches you can get around the walk.”

The Indians have lost the first two games of the series by one-run each game, losing to Jamie Moyer 2-1 Tuesday night, and now losing in a shootout 7-6.

They have lost four in a row and drop to 18 games under .500, their low point of the season. They close out the series at 1:05pm Thursday in Philly before heading to play the Reds in Cincy over the weekend.

Just imagine if the Indians played the rival White Sox 162 times a year. They could find themselves in a race for the AL Title. Instead, the Tribe only gets 18 shots at Chicago, but again on Saturday night they made the most of it, beating the Chicago team from the South side for the 8th time in a solid 3-1 win.

The victory puts Cleveland at 8-3 against Chicago this season, and much of it was due to another strong outing from starter Mitch Talbot. The starter earned his 7th win of the year, and went 7 innings allowing one run on six hits. He walked three and struck out five to move to 7-4 on the season.

The bullpen also did their job, as Chris Perez allowed a single to start the 8th, but got out of it with a double play, and then Kerry Wood pitched a 1-2-3 ninth to earn his 4th save of the year.

Sox starter and former Cy Young award winner Jake Peavy (4-5) breezed through the first three innings, not allowing a base runner for the Indians, and making those in the stadium press box start to wonder if this was going to be another near perfect game like last Wednesday in Detroit.

That though quickly went away in the fourth, when Trevor Crowe lined a single to left, then on the next pitch Shin-Soo Choo blasted a single to left-center. Austin Kearns then singled in Crowe, and after Russell Branyan walked, Peavy was called for a balk that gave the Tribe their second run.

They added an extra run in the 8th when Branyan drove in a run to make it a 3-1 game.

The two teams wrap up their series on Sunday, and the Indians have a shot with a win to go .500 on the 10-game road trip. They come home for four vs the Red Sox starting on Monday night.

Once again the pitching is starting to catch up to the awful hitting, as Thursday afternoon in Detroit the team allowed 12 runs in losing to the Tigers 12-6. The throwers for the Indians allowed 12 runs on 17 hits, and while David Huff was pretty bad, Tony Sipp was worse.

The offense did its job for once, as they took a 5-1 deficit and turned it around with 5 runs in the 4th inning to build a 6-5 lead. Shin-Soo Choo was a big piece of the rally, as he had two doubles on the day and 2 RBI. The team also took advantage of some Tigers errors.

It meant next to nothing though as the Indians staff allowed the Tigers to score for the next three innings to go ahead 12-6. Huff allowed 5 runs on 6 hits in three innings in his first game after being hit in the lead with a line drive from Alex Rodriguez Saturday in New York.

Sipp was really bad, and it may be time to think about throwing him back to AAA Columbus. He gave up 5 runs on three hits, walking two and allowing two homers in only being able to retire two batters. It’s the second straight outing he has really struggled, and right now the Indians cannot hide his lack of getting batters out.

The team now heads to Chicago with a mark of 19-33. They have a three-game set starting with the White Sox Friday night.

Tuesday night in Detroit Jake Westbrook got back to .500 and the offense got some big hits when needed as the Indians topped the Tigers 3-2 to move to 19-31 on the season. Westbrook is now 3-3 on the season, he threw 7.2 innings, allowing a run on five hits. He was effective all night, and seems to be throwing as well as he has all year.

Russell Branyan and Shin-Soo Choo both hit solo homers, and Mark Grudzielanek hit a key RBI single in the 8th to give the Indians a 3-1 advantage going into the 9th. With Kerry Wood in for the save, Branyan booted a ball looking like Bill Buckner in 86 at first with two outs, but Wood got Ramon Santiago to fly out to end the threat.

Chris Perez also had a big hand in the win, as the same fastball that cost him on Monday in New York got Magglio Ordonez to pop up with two outs in the 8th with two on to end the frame with no damage. It was good to see the same pen that was terrible all weekend in NYC come back to earn a save for Westbrook.

The Indians offense didn’t do much off Tiger starter Jeremy Bonderman for the first five innings, but got things going with the Branyan homer, and then in the 6th Choo broke his 0-for-19 slump with a homer that gave the Indians the lead for good.

The team was 9-18 in May with an ERA of 5.47, which was worst in the American League, but so far June has gotten off to a better start. We’ll see if it stays that way Wednesday night at Comerica Park when the same two teams meet again.

The Indians will look for a split vs the Yankees today in the Bronx, and they will do it without maybe their All-Star, as Shin-Soo Choo will get the day off vs lefty Andy Pettitte. The Indians have owned Pettitte when playing in New York, as the Yanks thrower is 0-4 with a 6.50 ERA in his last six starts in the Bronx against the Indians, including one postseason outing.

A couple Indians that hit well against Pettitte include Austin Kearns (6 for 13) and Jhonny Peralta (5 for 13 with two homers).

The Yankees (30-20), though, have won eight of Pettitte’s nine starts this year. He allowed two runs over eight innings Wednesday to earn a 3-2 victory over Minnesota. As for Choo, he is sitting since he doesn’t hit lefties well, and is in an 0-for-17 slump right now. He’ll get three right handed pitchers when the Tribe heads to Detroit this week.

It would be nice to see Peralta, who is 1 for 11 in this series get on track against Pettitte.

The Indians will counter the Yanks lefty with Mitch Talbot (6-3, 3.73), who is 3-0 with a 1.33 ERA in his last three road starts. The Tribe is 18-30 right now, and are 11 games back in the AL Central.

In an effort to get more at-bats for their best power hitter, Manny Acta has moved Shin-Soo Choo up to two in the lineup for Friday’s game, hitting behind young Trevor Crowe. “We have to shake things up, and we felt he’s the best candidate for (No. 2),” Acta said. “At minimum, it will ensure that one of our best hitters will have a few extra at-bats in a certain amount of games.”

Acta also said he didn’t want two youngsters (Crowe and newly called up Jason Donald) to be one and two in the lineup, which is understandable considering they are kids that don’t have much time at the Major League level. Choo is hitting .288 on the season with four homers and 21 RBI.

It’s only the second time in his career he has hit second in the lineup, doing it last season in the month of April.

Sometimes you have to wonder what is going through Manny Acta’s head when he’s watching the Indians lifeless offense. Saturday night I’m sure he was once again frustrated, only then to get a brief moment of pure joy as the Indians somehow came out of nowhere to score 8 runs in the 9th inning to top the Orioles in Baltimore 8-2.

Till the 9th, the offense had done little for the manager to think they would come out of their spell. They had no runs and 7 hits off of four O’s pitchers, and Baltimore’s closer – Alfredo Simon, was coming in to try and close it out.

Then though, the bats came alive, as Austin Kearns hit a go-ahead, three-run homer off Simon to put the Tribe ahead for good. Starting in the 9th with one out and Baltimore ahead 2-0, Simon allowed a single by Asdrubal Cabrera and walked Mark Grudzielanek. Shin-Soo Choo followed with an RBI single before Kearns slammed an 0-2 changeup to left for his third homer.

Mike Redmond added a two-run double off Cla Meredith before Trevor Crowe, just called up from the minors, capped the Indians’ biggest inning of the year with a two-run homer. It was well needed. The team, which did next to nothing in a 8-1 loss Friday night, seemed well on their way to another shutout, which would have been the fourth time already in 10 they had accomplished the feat.

But patience paid off finally for the offense and good things happened, helping the team get to 14-20 on the season. Mitch Talbot was very good once again, going 8 innings allowing just two solo homers to the O’s Ty Wigginton to give Baltimore a 2-0 lead. Other than that, he was great, allowing just five hits, walking two, striking out three and lowering his already solid ERA to 3.23.

Talbot with the win improves to 5-2 on the season. The Indians and O’s wrap up the three-game set on Sunday afternoon.

RF Shin-Soo Choo has been named Bank of America Presents the American League Player of the Week for the period ending April 18th. Bank of America, the Official Bank of Major League Baseball, is the presenting sponsor of the American League and National League Player of the Week Awards, which reflect Bank of America’s long-standing tradition of promoting and recognizing higher standards of accomplishment.

In six games last week, Shin-Soo hit .579 (11-19) and collected 11 RBI, both Major League bests, while also notching three doubles, five runs scored, three home runs and tying the Major League lead with 23 total bases. Choo also led the Majors with a 1.211 slugging percentage and a .680 on-base percentage. On April 15th, the 27-year-old knocked a three-run homer in the eighth inning to give Cleveland the 3-2 win over the Texas Rangers. Two days later, on April 17th, Choo drove in a go-ahead run on an eighth inning double to break a tie and give the Tribe the victory over the A.L. Central-rival Chicago White Sox.

On Sunday, in the final game of a three-game series against the White Sox, the left-handed slugger took a 1-0 pitch deep for his fourth home run of the season and his second career grand slam. The native of South Korea collected five RBI in yesterday’s contest, and with his third game-changing hit in four days, extended his personal hit streak to seven games and brought the Indians win streak to four. This marks Shin-Soo’s first career weekly award.