The Old Bit Department: Tribe Offense Fails in loss to Red Sox

How much more of this are we supposed to take in a one month period? Once again, on a night where their starting pitcher went eight scoreless, the toothless offense failed to show and the Indians lost yet another heart breaker, 3-1 against the Boston Red Sox, now winners of 11 straight.  Last night was just another example of why this team is a mediocre outfit.

It’s been said many times already this year, but the sign of a bad team is one that can’t put it all together on the same night. Last night was the “we can pitch, but we can’t hit” version of the ’09 Tribe. While Cliff Lee was putting up zero after zero on the board during his eight innings of work, the Indian attack couldn’t touch old man Tim Wakefield, who’s knuckle-ball was tying them up in knots. The 42- year old gave up just one hit, a Victor Martinez single in the first. Yep, that’s right, the Wahoo offense spent the next six innings flailing away at the knuckler to the tune of ZERO hits. Even with the four walks, they couldn’t get that one big hit to drive home a run.

The between a vintage lack of clutch hitting and CB Bucknor’s ever expanding strike zone, it seemed only a matter of time before the Red Sox would wait out Lee, get into the Cleveland bullpen, and pull out a W. That is exactly what happened in the ninth.

With a scoreless tie score heading to the ninth, interim manager Jeff Datz (Eric Wedge was tossed earlier in the game – we will get to that in a minute) called for closer Kerry Wood to face the top of the order. Lee had thrown 106 pitches and the move du jour in these situations is to go to your closer these days. Like so many things with this year’s Indians so far, it didn’t work.

It was doomed from the start. Wood walked Dustin Pedroia to lead off the ninth. Then, in another move that is sweeping baseball these days, the Indians were in “no-doubles defense” when David Ortiz sent a soft pop fly to Center. Grady Sizemore, who seemingly was positioned at the fence, couldn’t get to it and it dropped for a single. Jason Bay, who hit a two-out, two-run homer in the ninth off of Mariano Rivera Friday night, crushed a Wood 97 MPH fastball to the left-field bleachers to give the Red Sox a 3-0 lead.

“The guy throws like 100 miles an hour,” Bay said. “You have to put it your mind to try and hit a mistake. I got a fastball up over the plate, and I didn’t miss it.”

Said Wood: “It doesn’t matter how hard you throw if you miss your spot. I put it over the plate, and he whacked it.”

Naturally, in the bottom of the ninth, the Red, White, and Blue did their best to tease us. Shin-Soo Choo and Ryan Garko started the inning with back to back singles off of closer Jonathan Papelbon – two more hits than they had over the first eight innings against Wakefield and Manny Delcarmen. Jhonny Peralta, he of the 1-24 slump, struck out looking on three pitches. Mark DeRosa, another ice-cold Indian bat, singled home Choo to pull the Indians to 3-1. Now they had two shots with the tying runs on base.

Guess what happened next?

Kelly Shoppach K’d (and looked awful doing so, swinging at two pitches way out of the zone), and Benny Francisco (looking more and more like a fourth OF) popped out weakly to first. Game over.

So to recap – no offense, failed bullpen, refusal to come up with the clutch hit. Seems to sum up the entire season thus far, doesn’t it?

Back to Wedge. He was ejected after two calls on successive pitches went the Red Sox way in the fourth. With Mike Lowell down 1-2 in the count, Lee looked as though he K’d him to end the inning. First base umpire Mike Everitt overruled Bucknor and said the ball hit the ground. On the next pitch, Lowell hit a grounder to third which DeRosa fielded and stepped on third to end the inning. Or so we thought. Bucknor was overruled Third base umpire Brian Gorman, saying the ball was foul. Wedge had enough. He got right in Bucknor’s face, seemingly looking to be tossed. He was. On the next pitch, Cliff got Lowell looking.

“It was just a bad call,” said Wedge. “Cliff’s out there working his tail off and he’s got to get the same guy out twice at the very least.”

I give Wedge credit for trying to light a fire under his sleep-walking ballclub, but again, it’s on him that this team is off to another poor start. They sit at 7-13 and haven’t won more than two games in a row. For the sixth time in seven years under Wedge, the Indians will enter May with a losing record.

Anthony Reyes (1-0, 4.76) tries to right the ship tonight against the Red Sox Brad Penny (2-0, 7.80).