Indians Confidential

Don’t let it get to your head – but how good does 4th place feel now in the AL Central?

For at least one day, the Indians can celebrate being out of the Central cellar, as thanks to a solid comeback led by a game-winning grand slam from Mark DeRosa in the 7th, the Indians topped te Royals 8-4 to move ahead of them for 4th in the division.

It didn’t look like it would go that way for most of the night, as the Royals built a 4-0 lead off Cliff Lee with two in the 3rd inning, and two more in the 6th to make it look like yet another long night for the Indians. But the offense finally responded and put together a nice comeback to get the win.

The Indians were able to rally to tie it in the 6th with four runs. Shin-Soo Choo reached on a fielder’s choice, scoring Jamey Carroll. Then Travis Hafner got on the same way, scoring Victor Martinez to make it a 4-2 game. Kelly Shoppach hit a sac fly to make it 4-3, and then a Jhonny Peralta fielder’s choice tied it.

The winning rally saw Ben Francisco single, Martinez walk, then Choo was hit by a pitch, loading the bases for DeRosa vs Jamey Wright. The relief pitcher threw a pitch down the middle of the plate on the first pitch, but then DeRosa got the good wood on the second pitch, putting it over the wall in right for the grand slam to make it 8-4.

The Royals got a hit in the 8th, and then a walk in the 9th off of Kerry Wood, but could do no further damage as the door was closed and the Tribe got the win. Rafael Perez got the win in relief to move to 1-1. The win puts the Indians at 26-34, dropping KC to 24-33, losers of 9 of their last 10.

Carl Pavano who is 6-4 goes for the Indians Wednesday against Gil Meche for the Royals (2-5) at 7:05.

On a day when Mother Nature once again did her part to try and stop baseball, the Rays simply seemed to want to get out of town, and for the Indians – they’ll take it. David Huff started for the Indians, threw four shutout innings till the rain, and then three other pitchers held the Rays pretty much in check as the Indians swept the Rays with a 2-1 win at Progressive Field.

The sweep is the first four-game sweep for the Indians since – well, the Rays – last season July 10th through the 13th at Progressive Field. To say that the Indians have the Rays number at home is an understatement. They have won 17 in a row vs Tampa Bay at home, it’s the Rays longest losing streak against one team in their history.

From the Indians standpoint, they finally seem to be playing with a little bit of confidence. Despite some rain delays this homestand vs the Rays, they were able to hit, get some timely pitching, and didn’t make the big defensive mistakes that really put the team behind the 8-ball early in this 09 season.

The only Indians runs came in the 3rd and the 5th, and both came from Victor Martinez. The first was a groundout to score Asdrubal Cabrera to make it 1-0, and the second was a single that allowed Kelly Shoppach to score to give the team a 2-0 advantage.

Tampa Bay’s only run came from Willy Aybar, who homered in the 6th off of Jensen Lewis to make it a 2-1 Tribe lead. From there, the Indians pitching took over. Matt Herges went 1.2 innings, earning the win and allowing just one hit and striking out three.

Rafael Betancourt pitched a scoreless 8th, walking one and striking out two, and Kerry Wood pitched a scoreless 9th to earn his 8th save of the season.

The team is now 21-28, 11-11 at home, where they will stay for four more games as they welcome the Yankees starting on Friday night.

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.

The Indians had a golden shot to move to 15-22 on Friday night, but blew it with their usual crappy bullpen. Saturday they played flat in Tampa Bay, as they were shut down by Rays starter Matt Garza and eventually fell 4-2. Garza went 6 innings, going allowing two runs on five hits with four walks and three strikeouts.

There was little offense for the Indians, they went down 1-2-3 in the first two innings, then had two baserunners on walks in the third and Asdrubal Cabrera flied out to end that inning. In the 4th they had two hits and two on with two outs, and Kelly Shoppach grounded out to end that threat.

They fell behind 3-0 after five innings, and while they did rally to make it 3-2 in the 6th, the Rays rallied for a big run off Aaron Laffey to ice the game at 4-2. Carl Pavano went 5 innings, allowing three runs on six hits. He falls to 3-4 on the season, his ERA now sits at 6.33.

Laffey pitched three innings, allowing the Rays 4th run, he gave up two hits, walked two and struck out three. Three Rays relievers shut down the Indians on just one hit and five strikeouts. The team still whiffs way too much and way too often in big spots.

One positive is Victor Martinez, who has to be an All-Star in July. He is hitting .409 after a 3-for-4 day at the plate. Now at 14-24, the team is back to 6.5 out of first in the AL Central. They will battle the Rays again on Sunday.

It’s been awhile since Cliff Lee has been able to gain a victory, but it hasn’t been his fault for the most part.  Lee has been having issues with the Indians offense, but Wednesday in the finale of a 6-game homestand, Lee was on like last season, quickly and with great success shutting down the White Sox as the Indians wrapped up the homstand with a 4-0 victory.

Friday Lee got no runs at all, and lost 1-0 to the Tigers.  While he’s just 2-5, he had not won a game since the opener in Yankee Stadium back on April 16th.  It had to be pretty frustrating for him, as he has a 1.70 ERA in his last five starts, but was getting litte run support.  The teams four runs today doubled its output in Lee’s previous four starts combined.

So it was nice to see Victor Martinez hit a solo homer in the first inning off of Mark Buehrle to give Lee a little support.  It was even better when the team got a two-run shot from Ryan Garko to make it 3-0 in the 4th, and then another run crossed to make it 4-0 in the 5th.

Not like beating Buehrle was an easy task.  The Indians were the first team in 2009 to do it, as entering Wednesday he was 5-0.  Matched up against Lee, those four runs were more than enough.  Lee went 7 innings, allowing six hits with 1 walk and 9 strikeouts.

“He’s been about as good as we’ve seen him. He’s been very consistent,” Eric Wedge said. “He’s gone through a stretch here where we haven’t scored any runs for him, but he hasn’t given in to that.”

Maybe the most important numbers were 2-1, which is what the Indians win to loss total the last three days vs Chicago, meaning they have won a series.  It was just their 2nd series win over the season, the first was against KC back April 21st to 23rd at Progressive Field.

It was also the Tribe’s first shutout of 09, last season with at one point Lee and C.C. Sabathia on the roster, the team ended the season with 13 shutouts.  The team now sits at 13-22, and will head out on their longest road trip of the season, starting with a game Thursday night in Tampa Bay.

For at least one night, the moves the Indians trying to fix the pitching woes actually worked. Carl Pavano pitched six pretty good innings, and Aaron Laffey coming out of the pen threw three solid innings without allowing the Red Sox back in the game at the Indians beat the Red Sox in Fenway 9-2.

The Tribe made a couple of moves on Wednesday trying to do whatever they can to help a bullpen that seems to give up leads as easy as any team in baseball history. They dumped Rafael Perez to Columbus (finally), and moved Laffey to the pen and called up Jeremy Sowers to start tomorrow night in the road trip finale.

It was so important for the club to rebound after the nightmare in Toronto on Tuesday, and they did an excellent job of doing just that. The offense again played well, getting some big hits, putting up 9 runs and 13 hits. Mark DeRosa and Victor Martinez each homered, and four players each had three hits.

The offense on this road trip finally seems to be coming around. Asdrubal Cabrera, who had three hits, is now hitting .333. David Dellucci is hitting .412, and Victor is still hitting well, going 3-for-5 with four RBI and is hitting .398.

Pavano allowed two runs on six hits in six innings. He walked three and struck out four, and seems to finally be settling in as the pitcher that the Indians thought they were getting after a pretty solid spring. Laffey allowed two hits and didn’t walk a batter. He struck out one, and got a double play ball to end the game and earn his first Major League save.

The team can actually go 4-3 on this 7-game road trip with a win Thursday night. They are now 11-17 on the season, and maybe if they can just stop the bleeding from a bullpen that has been beat up all season, they can finally start playing more consistant.

Thursday Sowers will go for the Tribe against Tim Wakefield, who shut down the Indians last week at Progressive Field.

It’s almost comical at this point.

The Indians bullpen could be the worst I have ever seen. Yes, I know that I am maybe being somewhat dramatic when I say that, but how could you deny that simple fact after watching Tuesday’s meltdown in Toronto that resulted in the teams latest loss – 10-6?

The bullpen allowed 7 runs in the 7th inning to the Jays, taking what seemed like a rather nice 6-3 Indians lead and simply giving it right back to the Jays. Considering the bullpen has a 6.49 ERA this season, it’s amazing that the team has even 10 wins against 17 losses this season.

“What’s happening here right now is unacceptable,” Eric Wedge said after the game. If Wedge isn’t careful, like it or not, a head is going to roll pretty soon when Progressive Field looks like a ghost town this summer, and it’s going to be his. This is simply not working anymore, and it just maybe time to shake things up – in a big way.

Today’s joke of a pen saw the following:

Rafael Perez allowing two runs on two hits in 0.1 innings.
Vinnie Chulk allowing two runs on one hit in 0.0 innings
Jensen Lewis allowed 1 run on one hit in 0.1 innings.
Tony Sipp allowed two runs on two hits in 0.1 innings.

In other words – game, set, match.

The Indians trailed 3-2 entering the 7th, then they put up four runs to take the 6-3 lead. Victor Martinez had an RBI single, Asdrubal Cabrera scored on a wild pitch, and Jhonny Peralta singled to drive in Martinez.

The offense, one day after putting up 15 hits, put up another 13 hits, and while they are still struggling with runners in scoring position, there’s no denying that they are off the hook for the last two days of pitching breakdowns.

So what does the team do from here? I guess start the train from Columbus to Cleveland more with pitching, as right now, this is painful to watch, and this team is digging a hole that they are not going to be able to get out of.