6/21/2005

pressure too much for young team.

The indians record in interleague play - 11-1.

games out of wild card spot - 2. 5

indians record against their division - 13-19.

bottom line. inconsistency.

The tribe has had the second best ERA in the majors all season long and had been the hottest team in baseball for the last 2 weeks since interleague play began. Sweeping the rockies, the diamondbacks, and the giants while taking 2 out of 3 from a red hot san diego padres team.

Two of these clubs had winning records, two of them were slumping. The winning began after hitting coach Eddie Murray was fired. coincidence? I hope not considering what kind of player Murray was in his day; but You cant argue, however, that something in their confidence had been awakened allowing them to finally start hitting like everyone expected them to. like last years "1-9" lineup.

that is, until monday night.

with a matchup against a very good red sox team; C.C. Sabathia got an early lead retiring the first 7 batters and looked like he was going to cruise. then, completely imploded. giving up 5 straight hits and 2, 3 run home runs to Manny Ramirez and Jason Varitek. C.C. was pulled in favor of Rafael Betancourt who went 2 3rds of an inning giving up 1 run.

The tribe made it interesting by chipping away at the sox lead. a sacrifice fly by martinez scored another run to make it 9-5. then, the bottom of the 8th. With two men on and 1 out, Travis hafner hit a 2 run bomb to dead center with Victor Martinez following with a solo shot to the the left field bleachers. Jacobs field erupted and every fan couldnt help but think back to the mid/late 90's of the miraculous comebacks they witnessed on this exact field. ..this team was for real and werent going to just lay down.

Until the 9th inning. Johnny damon on a 1-2 count took david riskes pitch 403 feet into centerfield to make it 10-8. silence overfell the 30,000 faithful, but with rally cups abroad throughout the stands, no one was giving up.

Jhonny peralta gave his team one last hurrah..with casey blake leading off with a double, Peralta hit a single to left center that rolled to the wall scoring blake to make it a one run game, but that was as close as the indians would get. Grady Sizemore and Coco Crisp both lined out ending the ball game.

Tuesday night was over before the final out. David Ortiz hit 2, 2 run home runs while Ramirez clobbered his 5th home run in as many games. There were no late inning dramatics this game with a final score of 9-2.

Indians have now dropped 2 straight and fall to 4th in the wild card standings. boston, minnesota, and texas have at least a one game lead.

Note: 9 runs is the most surrended by C.C. Sabathia in his 4 year career. His record is now 5-4 on the season with an era of 4.66 and 83 total innings pitched.