Let's Go Tribe

Game 45: White Sox 9, Indians 3

2012-05-26T04:39:45Z

Jeanmar Gomez was shaky all evening, and finally the White Sox broke the game open as he tired. The bullpen didn't help matters, either.

Gomez struggled last time he faced Chicago, giving up eight runs in 6.2 innings (most of it coming in the early innings). This time it was largely the same, though Gomez kept the damage relatively contained. It took him roughly 55 pitches to get through the first two innings, and although he gave up three runs on two home runs, it could have been much worse. Gomez was taken deep by Adam Dunn in the first inning for a two-run shot and in the second by A. J. Pierzynksi for a solo homer. Instead of his normal quick at-bats, Gomez struggled to put batters away, his control not nearly up his usual standards. In Dunn's case, the pitch wasn't that bad, but he allowed him swinging room; on the Pierzynski homer, he missed badly, putting the pitch down and over the plate.

After the second homer (which opened the second inning), he allowed two of the three next batters to reach, but retired the next two batters, leaving Adam Dunn on-deck as the inning ended. After that he settled down, retiring the White Sox in order in the third and fourth innings and getting through the fifth without much trouble. He retired the first two batters in the sixth, but then walked the next two; that was his and Indians' undoing. Alexei Ramirez singled in a run, and he was pulled in favor of Jairo Asencio, who made a bad situation by walking the first batter he faced and allowing a two-run single. By the time the sixth inning ended the Indians were down 6-2.

With the Indians already down 4 and the back end of the bullpen used heavily in the Detriot series, Asencio was brought back for another inning, and allowed another three runs to put the game completely out of reach.

The offense managed just two runs off first-time starter Jose Quintana, who went six innings, allowing four hits and three walks while striking out four. The lineup looked a lot different, with Travis Hafner back in Cleveland dealing with a leg injury and Michael Brantley getting the night off. Before the game was over, both Asdrubal Cabrera (hamstring) and Carlos Santana (head) was out of the lineup, both pulled for precautionary reasons. Juan Diaz, who replaced Cabrera in the seventh, made his major-league debut. Diaz was recalled for the weekend series to give the Indians some infield depth, and it turned out he was needed right away.

Source: FanGraphs

Game Thread: May 25, 2012

2012-05-25T23:45:06Z

Current Series

3 game series vs White Sox @ U.S. Cellular Field

Cleveland Indians Let's Go Tribe @ Chicago White Sox South Side Sox Friday, May 25, 2012, 8:10 PM EDT U.S. Cellular Field Jeanmar Gomez vs Jose Quintana Mostly clear. Winds blowing from left to right field at 5-10 m.p.h. Game time temperature around 70. Complete Coverage >
Sat 05/26		4:10 PM EDT
Sun 05/27		2:10 PM EDT

McAllister optioned, Tomlin coming back, Diaz gets a weekend in Chicago

2012-05-25T18:02:54Z

The Indians optioned Zach McAllister to AAA, clearing the way for Josh Tomlin to make his return to the rotation on Monday against Kansas City. Tomlin will not be activated till Monday, giving the team an extra roster spot for the weekend series against the White Sox. With Jack Hannahan still nursing a sore back and Jose Lopez somewhat defensively compromised in the role of utility infielder, the Indians have recalled Juan Diaz from AA Akron for the weekend. Diaz, hitting just .232/.280/.348 for the Aeros, is no threat to stick around, but was apparently added to the roster for just this sort of situation. The bigger story is that McAllister probably secured his role as the 6th starter and first rotation replacement by pitching quite well in his four starts.

Keeping track of the little things

2012-05-25T10:44:00Z

Game 44: Indians 2, Tigers 1

2012-05-24T18:54:56Z

Concede nothing. That was the message delivered emphatically by Shin Soo Choo on the third pitch of Justin Verlander's afternoon. On what might have been the worst pitch ever thrown by a reigning Cy Young winner, Choo deposited the 84-mph changeup into the second deck in right field. The 454-foot shot was the longest home run ever surrendered by Verlander, and it offered an instant jolt to fans who kept declaring that a win against Verlander would be "a bonus" because the team was "playing with house money" after taking the first two games of the series.

Verlander offered very few openings in what became a complete-game effort, but that home run from Choo came to represent this remarkable three-game sweep: Winning teams take advantage of small openings. Under-achieving teams flail like a fat shortstop, unaware that the book is slider down-and-away, and the book has always been slider down-and-away. The Tribe passed each small-yet-significant test this series while the Tigers politely declined a pile of opportunities. You can only complain so much about strike zones and non-balks and Jacobs Field guest buffets when you simply can't hit.

The seventh inning would prove decisive. Justin Masterson had put together a performance not all that different from the job turned in on Tuesday by Ubaldo Jimenenz. Masterson's fifth walk of the game inexplicably came to the inning's leadoff hitter, someone called Danny Worth. The fill-in second sacker came in with no extra base hits on the season and a grand total of three singles in 19 at bats. Masterson was never really close to the plate against him. Then, a strange borderline play presented the Tigers the chance they needed to salvage the game and turn the tenor of the series into something entirely different. On a sacrifice bunt, Masterson flipped the ball into the jersey of Quintin Berry. The runner could have been called out, with Berry very close to being in the field of play, but the umpire made no motion.

However, this is 2012, and in 2012, the Tigers look like a fundamentally corrupt, foot-shooting squad. Andy Dirks failed badly to get a bunt down, then was frozen by a beautiful slider for strike three. With Manny Acta on the way to the mound, Joe Smith headed out onto the field; after all, when the manager emerges, it's a pitching change, right? But Smith had to turn around and jog back to the pen after the coterie on the mound agreed to stick with the Indians' ace. Masterson rewarded that decision by coaxing a lazy flyball from Miguel Cabrera, then making a stab of Prince Fielder's groundball after Fielder salivated over a Masterson meatball.

And how about the pen? Pestano and Perez pitched in all three games in this series. They combined to provide six innings, yielding four hits, one walk, and striking out seven. Each threw 67% strikes over the sweep. Pestano's club record streak of consecutive outings with a strikeout ended this afternoon, but you don't really care about that, do you? In the end, that's just window dressing on what might be a championship clubhouse. Perez, meanwhile, is leading with 94-mph black-painting stuff, and his mechanical issues that occasionally saw his shoulder fly open seem to have quieted.

Masterson and Jimenez, meanwhile, put together 13 innings and walked 11. They each picked up victories, but they will need to make much more progress if this team wants to even entertain playoff fantasies. The leadoff slot is wonderfully stable, but the middle of the order continues to struggle. A catatonic week has dragged Carlos Santana's slugging percentage below .400.

This was a finale that had a variety of strangeness on the way to victory: Rick Manning making an Amber Alert joke; a first base coach getting tossed over a balk that wasn't called; a reliever running out of the bullpen, then back into it; and Katie Witham astutely predicting during the first inning that Verlander would be much more difficult to handle late in the game than the beginning.

Concede nothing, Tribe fans. Yours is a first-place club. A long and fascinating summer beckons.

Game Thread: May 24, 2012

2012-05-24T15:45:01Z

Current Series

Indians lead the series 2-0

Tue 05/22	WP: Ubaldo Jimenez (5 - 3) SV: Chris Perez LP: Rick Porcello (3 - 4)	5 - 3 win
Wed 05/23	WP: Vinnie Pestano (2 - 0) SV: Chris Perez LP: Phil Coke (1 - 1)	4 - 2 win
Detroit Tigers Bless You Boys @ Cleveland Indians Let's Go Tribe Thursday, May 24, 2012, 12:05 PM EDT Progressive Field Justin Verlander vs Justin Masterson Sunny. Winds blowing out to left field at 5-10 m.p.h. Game time temperature around 85. Complete Coverage >

Game 43: Indians 4, Tigers 2

2012-05-24T01:59:07Z

The Tigers loaded the bases with nobody out in the eighth inning in a tie game. What happened next determined the outcome of the game and perhaps the series.

Josh Tomlin looks like he'll be ready to come off the Disabled List soon, but the way Zach McAllister has pitched in his absence, it's going to be tough to send the tall right-hander down to AAA. McAllister passed another difficult test, allowing 2 runs on eight hits, and those two runs were tainted. The Tigers scored their two runs in the sixth thanks to two plays that should have been outs. First, Quentin Berry hit a bunt double (not a typo); the bunt was a humpback lined that landed under Jason Kipnis' glove and bounded towards the right field line. Because both Kipnis and first baseman Casey Kotchman charged on the play, there was no one to retrieve the ball, and Berry ended up on second base. Then Andy Dirks hit a rising line drive that Shin-Soo Choo misjudged; the ball shot over Choo's glove and the to the wall, the Tigers had a run home with a runner at second with nobody out. There should have been two outs and no runs in. After a Miguel Cabrera fly out (on which Dirks went to third), Prince Fielder came to the plate with the infield drawn in. Fielder hit a sharp grounder that Asdrubal Cabrera made a fine diving stop on, but the throw came too late to nab Dirks at home. McAllister, to his credit, retired the next two batters to end the inning, keeping the game within reach.

The Detroit lead didn't last long, for Travis Hafner reached out and tagged a Doug Fister changeup over the right field wall with a runner on in the bottom of the sixth. Hafner earlier had seemed to hobble around the bases when going from first to third on an Asdrubal Cabrera double, but this time he could take his time matriculating around the bases. To this point Fister had been doing his usual dazzling act, blanking the Indians on three hits, so that two-run deficit seemed rather large. But not large enough for a home run not to fix it.

That takes us back to the top of the eighth inning. Tony Sipp started the inning with one mission in mind: get Prince Fielder out. He made the right pitch to Fielder, and Prince hit the ball directly into the shift, straight to Jason Kipnis, who was playing a Beliardesque second base. But Kipnis hurried his throw when he didn't need to, and the ball sailed high. That was all for Sipp; Vinnie Pestano was summoned, the fifth pitcher of the past two innings. Delmon Young hit a slice single down the right field line to put runners at first and second, and after a very good at-bat Andy Dirks hit the only solid ball of the inning, a line drive single through the left side of the infield. Fielder was held at third, leaving the bases loaded with nobody out.

I don't know about you, but even though Pestano was in the toughest of jams, I was still somewhat confident that somehow he'd get out of it. And he did get out it, and with little BABIP luck involved. He dispatched Jhonny Peralta via a swinging strike out on a ball in the other batter's box, then jammed Young; Kotchman fielded the ball and forced Fielder at home. Then Pestano faced pinch-hitter Alex Avila with two outs and the bases still loaded.

The announced crowd was a little over 22,000, but it sounded much louder than any of the larger weekend crowds. There were 6500 people that walked up to the game tonight, one of the biggest totals in Jacobs/Progressive Field history, and the atmosphere, even through the television, seemed if not playoff-like, then the notch just below it. Perhaps Chris Perez's answer on Sunday helped to drive it, or perhaps it was the combination of good weather, a division rival, and a first place club, but regardless of the reason, that crowd by the time Pestano faced Avila was standing en masse, and making enough noise that you'd think it was a sellout urging the third out of the inning. When Pestano threw a perfect fastball on the payoff pitch to strike out Avila, you felt through the crowd that the Indians had this one.

The Indians broke through immediately. After Choo was retired by southpaw Phil Coke, Jason Kipnis hit a dribbler that Coke couldn't handle. Then Asdrubal Cabrera tomahwked a double off the left field wall, putting runners at second and third with one out. The Tigers brought the infield in, and Hafner a grounder towards Fielder, in a play very much like what happened in the top of the inning. But this time the first baseman made a poor throw, and Kipnis was able to score on the fielder's choice. Now there was a run in, runners at first and third, and still one out. Carlos Santana hit a sacrifice fly to bring home an insurance run, and things were set for the ninth inning.

Perez would face the 1-2-3 hitters in the lineup. He retired Berry with ease, but Dirks, as earlier put up a very good at-bat. Up two runs, Perez certainly didn't want to walk him to bring the tying run to the plate in the form of Miguel Cabrera, so he continually pound the outer half of the strikezone with fastball, which were fought off by Dirks. Finally, with the count full, he threw a fastball on the inner half of the plate; Dirks jumped back as if the ball was aimed right as his hip, and was flabbergasted when he was rung up. It was an easy strike. Now with Cabrera up with the tying run on deck, Perez went after the Tiger third baseman, and jammed him with a high fastball, which fell harmlessly into Michael Brantley's glove to end the game.

Now that the Indians have already won the series, facing Justin Verlander tomorrow feels like playing with house money.

Source: FanGraphs

Game Thread: May 23, 2012

2012-05-23T22:45:05Z

Current Series

Indians lead the series 1-0

Tue 05/22	WP: Ubaldo Jimenez (5 - 3) SV: Chris Perez LP: Rick Porcello (3 - 4)	5 - 3 win
Detroit Tigers Bless You Boys @ Cleveland Indians Let's Go Tribe Wednesday, May 23, 2012, 7:05 PM EDT Progressive Field Doug Fister vs Zach McAllister Mostly clear. Winds blowing in from center field at 5-10 m.p.h. Game time temperature around 75. Complete Coverage >
Thu 05/24		12:05 PM EDT