Cleveland Indians

I wrote this a few months back so it's not actually my first column, but without further ado, here it is:

This is my first column of what I hope to be many for not only Cleveland sports fans, but sports fans in general, in hopes of entertaining all who stumble upon this. I hope that this column will provoke thoughts, spark memories, and make you laugh.

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Cleveland Indians vs. New York Yankees

Monday June 1, 2009

Jeremy Sowers vs. Joba Chamberlain

Progressive Field

Cleveland, Ohio

The Indians look to go 6-2 on their 8 game home stand, and improve to 4-4 vs. the Yankees this year. We’ll see if Jeremy Sowers can bring some momentum into this start following his great performance in relief last Monday in the year to date’s most exciting game, for the Tribe at least.

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Former Penn State and Cleveland Browns' fullback Tim Manoa played four seasons in the NFL, three with Cleveland and one with the Indianapolis Colts.  Tim was also a member of the 1986 National Champion Penn State Nittany Lions who knocked off the high-powered Miami Hurricanes led then by 1986 Heisman Trophy winner Vinny Testaverde, 14-10 in the Fiesta Bowl.  Tim rushed for 938 career yards on 236 carries with 6 touchdowns and caught 40 passes for 308 yards with 2 touchdowns in his NFL career.

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Tampa Bay Rays @ Cleveland Indians

May 26, 2009

Matt Garza vs. Carl Pavano

Progressive Field

Cleveland, Ohio

Its game two of the series, or better known as the night of Game 4 of the Eastern Conference Finals. The Indians are looking to build momentum after last night’s incredible comeback. I don’t remember ESPN covering even a Tribe playoff game in ‘07 as intently as they did last night’s game. Opposing hitters are only hitting .199 against Matt Garza, which leads the league, and he picked up a victory over the Tribe a little over a week ago. That being said, Carl Pavano has been the best Indians pitcher not named Cliff Lee. I like Cleveland to win their 15th straight at home vs. Tampa Bay 5-2. I also like the Cavs tonight in a tight one 97-94. We will definitely see what the guys not named Lebron are made of tonight.

Continue reading "Carl Pavano and the Indians win the ..."

Unfortunately, but not surprisingly, I missed most of, well a big part of today's game due to Memorial Day activities.  By the time I got home, it was already 9-0 in the 4th, then 10-0 and I just checked the message boards real quick on TheClevelandFan.com, and we all pretty much wrote the Indians their eulogy.  The Indians got two runs in the bottom of the 4th to make it 10-2 after a 2-run home run by Ryan Garko.  At that time I thought to myself, great, he finally hits one when it doesn't matter for shit, big deal.  A couple more innings dragged on, and the game was turning into a documentary about Tampa Bay shortstop Reid Brignac's cousin (if you were watching on STO), apparently a softball player who was 25-0 with a 0.00 ERA.  I don't know if it was in high school or college and personally I don't care, but it seemed to be the focus of Matt Underwood, and quite frankly, I can't say that I blame him.  Time had to be killed and what better way to do so rather than talk about the garbage of a game being witnessed.

Continue reading "Walks, Garko, and the heart of the ..."

Victor Martinez - the leader of the Cleveland Indians, all around great hitter that is just getting better, plays the game the right way, and takes losing personally

35. Jake Peavy - would be higher if not for playing in San Diego, turned down a chance to play in Chicago, not sure why?

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Indians @ Reds Recap Friday May 22, 2009

It looks like Grady read my preview earlier today as he hit a blast to right field in his first at-bat tonight. It’s hard to not type lead off the game. It’s like those first couple documents or checks you have to date on January 1st every new year. Here are some things that caught my “I” today:

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Cleveland Indians @ Cincinnati Reds, Friday May 22, 2009

Reyes (1-1, 6.88) vs. Arroyo (5-3, 6.56)

Interleague play is back. I personally don’t have a problem with it. It’s lost it’s luster for sure, but I don’t mind the change of pace for a handful of series during the year. At the same time if they got rid of it tomorrow, it wouldn’t bother me either. One thing that I’ll never feel different about is that I don’t see the Reds as a rival to the Indians. I would prefer to play the Pirates every year if we must do this interleague thing. This year the Indians do play Pittsburgh, but it’s been the Reds who are the annual National League opponent. Plus, it gives Cleveland fans at least one opportunity to say one of our teams beat a Pittsburgh team. I wish that I could say I was being sarcastic.

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Indians at Royals, May 21, 2009

Carl Pavano vs. Zack Greinke

First off I want to say that in my preview I stated the Indians needed to win today to salvage the season. What I meant was they needed to win today in order to salvage any remaining hope for this season. The Tribe cannot afford to lose anymore series to divisional foes at this point in the season. Game three from the show me state. I’m looking for Carl Pavano to show me something today.

Continue reading "Pavano, Inidans Crown Greinke and the Royals"

I have to make this quick, I had trouble logging in to get to the area where I can post a new entry.  Carl Pavano is quickly becoming my favorite Indian, and they need this series to have any hop

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Indians @ Royals, Wednesday May 20, 2009

Tonight I’m going to try to write as the game is being played, or at least during breaks, we’ll see. For starters, I just want to say in a non-Indians related rant, it pisses me off that Sean Elliott said on The Herd with Colin Cowherd today that he thinks the Magic have a better roster than the Cavs, yes I’m biased but c’mon! Seriously? I guess when you are Sean Elliott you have to say things like that for people to remember who you are. I tried to find if Sean Elliott was doing any NBA analysis for anyone, but came up empty.

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Cleveland Indians (14-26) @ Kansas City Royals (21-18)

Fausto Carmona (2-4, 5.70) vs. Gil Meche (2-4, 4.60)

Can it get much worse for the Indians after last night? I think I should just copy and paste that question to use for the rest of the season. The season may already be lost, but a loss tonight will definitely cement that. This is a crucial game for the Indians tonight, win and stay on life support, lose and it’s sleeping with the fishes and or Washington Nationals and Pittsburgh Pirates of the world.

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Royals 6, Indians 5.

Where do I begin? Can we say epic meltdown? Or is it not so epic when it has happened time and time again this season? Well I was wrong on some of my predictions, but possibly only one. The Indians did score some runs for Cliff Lee and they did score all of them while he was in the game. What I wasn’t wrong about, but looked like I was going to be for oh, say 8 1/3 innings was that the Royals were going to win. I’m thinking I might have been right in predicting Cliff Lee melting down too. Even though we didn’t witness it, my gut tells me while Jensen Lewis is laughing on the inside, Cliff Lee is losing it at the exact same time.

Continue reading "Jensen Lewis is laughing on the inside."

Cleveland Indians (14-25) @ Kansas City Royals (20-18) - May 19, 2009

Cliff Lee (2-5, 3.00 ERA) vs. Brian Bannister (3-1, 1.80)

Pre-game overview and prediction:

With the way the Indians have been going and based off of their first visit to Kauffman Stadium, one would think they probably lose this game. With the run support or lack thereof that Cliff Lee has been getting, one would think they probably lose this game. That being said, I too think they lose this game. The oppositions good pitchers usually out-duel the Indians good pitchers, even though this isn’t an ace vs. ace match-up, you can argue Bannister’s numbers rival one.

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I have one Question for Jhonny Peralta of the Cleveland Indians.. Why do you bother bringing a bat with you when you walk to the plate? you never swing man.. i've seen you strike out LOOKING wi

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With the MLB playoffs set to begin, there is a subtle difference in the air compared to start of any other postseason. In the NHL, fans can potentially look forward to a great Canadians/Bruins series that is not only exciting, but has a historical kick to it. Likewise basketball fans always have the chance to see if the Suns can finally get past the Spurs and football fans love seeing the rivalry of the Eagles Vs the City of Philadelphia when the Eagles so much as get tackled for a loss.

Continue reading "The Ups and Downs of the MLB Playoffs"

A few relatively minor items to cover with the moves made by a few teams recently. What might they mean in the second half? I’ll try and puzzle this out.

Tony Clark, who experienced a career resurgence the day he put on an Arizona Diamondbacks uniform back in 2005, hs returned to the cozy confines of Chase Field. Petco, where hitting a homer is as hard as hitting the lottery, wasn’t as kind to the aging Clark as Chase has been, so he’ll certainly improve on his 2008 line of .239/.374/.307. His 32:19 K:BB ratio, as well as hs 165-point difference between BA and OBP, will tell you his batting eye is fine, and some power should follow.

Continue reading "Roster Tinkering: What's it Mean?"

One of the All-Star Break traditions: Reassessing our predictions from the first half of the season. Some of mine have changed, some have stayed the same—and some were just damn wrong. Living in the West, I will take the contrarian position and roll from west to east in my choices.

Continue reading "Second Half Predictions"

Still playing ketchup here, trying to make up for a four-day absence from the blog, so I want to start with the big trade of last week, the CC Sabathia swap. The usefulness of this deal to the Brewers is a little dubious, as CC is likely to be a half-season rental, but let’s break it down:

Continue reading "NL Central Trade Analysis, Part One"

Since the calendar has turned to July, the MLB Trade deadline is quickly approaching. What teams will be buyers? What teams will be sellers? What big stars are on the block? Who will stay? Who will go?  Those burning questions are running through minds of fans of all teams, including our beloved Chicago Cubs.

Continue reading "Cubs Crave Sabathia"

OK, that title was irresistible, but in fact I'm going to say that Chien-Ming Wang's foot injury should force the Yanks hand in a trade, especially when combined with other injuries this season. Funny how little things can combine to lead to something even larger, accumulating momentum gradually until it becomes irresistible, as it has with the murmurs about a trade for C.C. Sabathia, which is really more the point of this blog.

Continue reading "Off On the Wang Foot"

Though they don't seem as devastating as the Soriano/Pujols loss I wrote about yesterday, two key players have gone down on two other teams today. Cleveland put Victor Martinez on the DL, while Seattle placed its once-reliable closer JJ Putz back on the DL, both with elbow injuries. And unlike Soriano's freak fracture, there were hints at undiagnosed problems with both Martinez and Putz.

Continue reading "Two Big Injuries, Day Two"

Major League, one of the funniest baseball movies around, told the tale of the woeful Cleveland franchise, so mired in mediocrity that their owner sought to cash in on them finishing in the cellar. It seemed like a good bet. The hapless Cleveland franchise hadn't tasted the postseason since 1954, and hadn't won a world title since 1948, one of the longest pennantless streaks in baseball. But ever since that 1989 movie--wherein, of course, the built-to-fail Indians defied their owner's devious plans--their consistent failure hasn't been a good bet. 

Continue reading "Those Amazing Indians"

Much exuberant ink has been spilled over Asdrubal Cabrera's unassisted triple play in yesterday's Indians-Blue Jays game, only the fourteenth in MLB history. That rarity makes it memorable, but I'm not sure there's a ton of athleticism involved--the Unassisted Triple Play (or UTP for short) is more luck of circumstance than anything.

Continue reading "The Not-So-Unassisted Triple Play"

Two weeks into the 2008 season and the Boston Red Sox must be pleased with how the season has gone thus far. Granted they are only two games over .500 at 8 and 6 and have split their last 10 games, but things could be much, much worse. When the Yankees went to Japan to open the season, they proceeded to go 11-19 in the first month of the season before finally snapping out of it and going on to win the division. Boston is only half a game out of first place in the tightly packed American League East which is currently lead by the surprising Baltimore Orioles who do not figure to hang around much longer.

Continue reading "Red Sox Should Feel Good About The Season So Far"

that they aren’t wearing down, energy is not going to be enough for the White Sox in 2008.

Cleveland Indians

Can Fausto Carmona sustain his success from last season?

Cleveland came within one game of a trip to the World Series last season before Boston’s comeback from a 3-1 hole. The Indians made no major changes to last year’s squad and figure again to battle for the top spot in the Central. Pitching will play a key role, especially going head to head with Detroit who will boast the top lineup in the Majors.

Continue reading "MLB 2008 Season Preview: AL Central"

Given the strength of the Tigers and the Cleveland Indians, it is possible there will be only one playoff spot to fight for in the AL East. Though they won't be in the mix, Tampa Bay will s

Continue reading "American League East is a Beast of a Division"

ues.  This comes as particularly disheartening news because it was revealed this week that the Cleveland Indians were one of the teams looking to deal for the A's ace.  Additionally, it seemed that the Tribe was beginning to gain the inside track, as they were able to offer top-line prospects and players with major league experience.

Continue reading "No Dice on Haren in Tribe Uniform"