Road Rage
After last night's W at the big Naranja, ESPN noted their continued road success: and other fun facts: "The Indians have won eight straight road games and 10 of their last 11 since July 28. ... Cleveland is 43-2 when scoring six or more runs. ... In the Indians' last 24 games, they have hit 31 home runs and scored 141 runs (5.875 per game)."
From Buster Olney's weblog (8/23):
Surging Indians in Familiar Spot
The Cleveland Indians made a run toward the top of the standings last year, too. After slogging along at 42-46, the Indians won 21 of their next 30, hitting like crazy, doing everything right. On Aug. 14, Jake Westbrook shut down Minnesota, allowing only one run in seven innings, and Cleveland pulled to within a game of the first-place Twins.
And then the Indians utterly collapsed, plummeting into a precipitous losing streak which wrecked all the work they had done the previous month. "We just fell off," Westbrook said Monday. "Nine in a row."
The Indians are making another run now: They've moved into a first-place tie for the wild-card lead, and like mile runners who hear the bell for the final lap, they are elbow to elbow with the Yankees and the Athletics. Westbrook believes the knowledge gained last year will help them. "We realize we can't slack off, that we have to be more consistent," said Westbrook.
Peralta is now leading all MLB SS's in OPS. He's ahead of Tejada by .023 and over Michael Young (both '05 All-Stars) by a whopping .054. That;s pretty solid company....and to think people were calling out Shapiro just a few months ago for letting go of Omar.
Willy Taveras
I was curious as to why the Tribe let the speedster (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/columns/story?columnist=stark_jayson&id=2137637) go back in '03. I was intruiged by an OF of Sizemore, Crisp, and Taveras, though not short on speed definitely lacking power. A nice rebuttal and background on the trade by Jay Catalano, Indians guru:
Well, that was a pretty abysmal deal (the one for jeriome (with an "i")robertson) - but i think Taveras is very average. You can't win anymorewith a slap-hitting center-fielder, not that I'm down on everybody'sfavorite marlin, juan pierre........but I am. I don't think the tribecould win with the outfield you mention, albainy. you've got to have somewhack at all three spots. grady and coco give you like "half-whack", soyou need the third outfielder to have big whack, not no whack a la Willy.That outfield could maybe work in the NL in a big park (like ours) providedyour infield dropped serious bombs, but the tribe's in the AL, and theirinfield is pretty mediocre with the bat other the Jah-hanny.unfortunately, the one criticism of an otherwise strong tribe farm systemis bearing itself out this year - that being, that there really is no30-homer masher. gutierrez was supposed to be but he's having a crap year.if you dropped Manny Ramirez circa 1995 into the Tribe's lineup this year,they'd take the Wild Card easy - but those guys don't grow on trees.
Other notes:
Former Indian and current Brave Julio Franco turned 47 today.
Brian Tallet was recalled from Triple-A Buffalo on Tuesday by the Cleveland Indians, who are in a virtual tie for first place in the AL wild-card race....Andrew Brown was sent back to Buffalo.
From Buster Olney's weblog (8/23):
Surging Indians in Familiar Spot
The Cleveland Indians made a run toward the top of the standings last year, too. After slogging along at 42-46, the Indians won 21 of their next 30, hitting like crazy, doing everything right. On Aug. 14, Jake Westbrook shut down Minnesota, allowing only one run in seven innings, and Cleveland pulled to within a game of the first-place Twins.
And then the Indians utterly collapsed, plummeting into a precipitous losing streak which wrecked all the work they had done the previous month. "We just fell off," Westbrook said Monday. "Nine in a row."
The Indians are making another run now: They've moved into a first-place tie for the wild-card lead, and like mile runners who hear the bell for the final lap, they are elbow to elbow with the Yankees and the Athletics. Westbrook believes the knowledge gained last year will help them. "We realize we can't slack off, that we have to be more consistent," said Westbrook.
Peralta is now leading all MLB SS's in OPS. He's ahead of Tejada by .023 and over Michael Young (both '05 All-Stars) by a whopping .054. That;s pretty solid company....and to think people were calling out Shapiro just a few months ago for letting go of Omar.
Willy Taveras
I was curious as to why the Tribe let the speedster (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/columns/story?columnist=stark_jayson&id=2137637) go back in '03. I was intruiged by an OF of Sizemore, Crisp, and Taveras, though not short on speed definitely lacking power. A nice rebuttal and background on the trade by Jay Catalano, Indians guru:
Well, that was a pretty abysmal deal (the one for jeriome (with an "i")robertson) - but i think Taveras is very average. You can't win anymorewith a slap-hitting center-fielder, not that I'm down on everybody'sfavorite marlin, juan pierre........but I am. I don't think the tribecould win with the outfield you mention, albainy. you've got to have somewhack at all three spots. grady and coco give you like "half-whack", soyou need the third outfielder to have big whack, not no whack a la Willy.That outfield could maybe work in the NL in a big park (like ours) providedyour infield dropped serious bombs, but the tribe's in the AL, and theirinfield is pretty mediocre with the bat other the Jah-hanny.unfortunately, the one criticism of an otherwise strong tribe farm systemis bearing itself out this year - that being, that there really is no30-homer masher. gutierrez was supposed to be but he's having a crap year.if you dropped Manny Ramirez circa 1995 into the Tribe's lineup this year,they'd take the Wild Card easy - but those guys don't grow on trees.
Other notes:
Former Indian and current Brave Julio Franco turned 47 today.
Brian Tallet was recalled from Triple-A Buffalo on Tuesday by the Cleveland Indians, who are in a virtual tie for first place in the AL wild-card race....Andrew Brown was sent back to Buffalo.
posted by ApolloMike | 2:47 PM
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