Browns expectations and Buckeye QBs: While We’re Waiting…
September 1, 2015Indians to add Chris Johnson, Gavin Floyd, and Shawn Armstrong back to active roster
September 1, 2015The atmosphere along with the game itself would have felt right at home in October. Both the Toronto Blue Jays and Cleveland Indians were fully engaged from the first pitch through the last out, and so was the extraordinarily loud Rogers Centre. There was great pitching, awesome defensive plays, clutch performances, and, most importantly, a 4-2 Indians win.
With the win, the Tribe moved within four games of the AL Wild Card-leading Texas Rangers. Despite having three other teams that the Indians need to jump as well, it is possible that after Tuesday night only the Minnesota Twins and those Rangers could be impediments in the standings as both the Los Angeles Angels and Tampa Bay Rays sit a mere half-game ahead. Of all of those teams, the Indians hold the best run differential on the season thanks to a plus-35 in the month of August.
While the odds are still long1, and the record needed to get there still high, the fact remains that it is now September and the Indians have found themselves smack dab in the middle of the hunt for the playoffs. And, in that hunt, they just swept one of their opponents and, on Monday, took down the favorites to win the American League. So, yes, I am saying that there is a chance.
Keys of the Game
Playoff Intensity: There is no doubt that both teams treated this game with some extra importance. The Blue Jays already had won a franchise record 21 games in August. However, they were seeking their 22nd win of August, which would have tied them for the third best winning percentage in a month in MLB history. The stakes were a bit more self-evident for the Indians as they simply need to keep winning to have any shot at gaining on the Wild Card positioning to even be invited to play in October.
With a win tonight, Blue Jays would tie the 3rd-best single month win pct in the last 60 years (via @EliasSports) pic.twitter.com/LNWIWCl539
— ESPN Stats & Info (@ESPNStatsInfo) August 31, 2015
Adding to the playoff atmosphere was a packed house in Toronto. 46,643 fans filled the Rogers Centre in order to see David Price pitch against the team from which they were stealing their new team president, Mark Shapiro. And, those fans were loud throughout the contest as they look to fully enjoy what should be Toronto’s first playoff team in the last 22 years. Amongst the fans, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper was even in attendance.
Defense: Both teams showed up defensively in this game. Early, it appeared that the Indians might be able to sneak out with an early big inning against the usually dominant David Price (4-0, 1.98 ERA for Toronto entering Monday). However, with runners on the corners and no outs, Ryan Goins grabbed a Michael Brantley ground ball, made the tag on Francisco Lindor and made the throw to get Brantley for the second out. Jason Kipnis scored on the play, but the inning petered out.
In the second inning, it was the Indians turn to demonstrate what they could do defensively. Lindor made one of his most spectacular plays in MLB thus far when he fully outstretched to dive to his right to grab a Russell Martin hard ground ball that should have been into left field. Instead, Lindor popped up to his feet and made a perfect throw to record the out. And, he was not done making the nearly impossible look routine on the night.
Monday was apparently Ryan Goins night to impress the new boss (Shapiro). In the fourth inning with two outs, Raburn made awkward contact with a pitch that somehow squirted past the mound on the right side. It appeared that it was going to be one of those accidental hits. However, Goins was running full speed at this softly hit ball and used his glove to flip it over to Chris Colabello at first base to end the inning.
In the bottom of the sixth, the Blue Jays had just taken the lead an inning prior and looked to take command of the game. Troy Tulowitzki was at the plate and he ripped another hard hit ground ball to Lindor’s right. On this play, Lindor merely sprinted laterally to backhand the ball and throw it to Kipnis in one motion (The most amazing part of the play was how effortless it appeared). Kipnis completed the double play despite Edwin Encarnacion’s best attempts to slide into him, and the Blue Jays threat was thwarted.
Next up, Carlos Santana wanted to flash some leather. The situation was not daunting in the seventh inning (none on, two outs), but Goins was attempting to change it. He hit the ball hard down the first base line and Santana needed to dive into foul territory to make the stop. Make the stop he did and flipped it to Danny Salazar for the last out of Salazar’s night.
Finally, the pitchers got into the act in the eighth inning. Lindor attempted to catch Toronto off-guard with a bunt for a hit attempt to lead off the eighth inning. However, Brett Cecil dipped into the Goins bag of tricks by using his glove to flick the ball over to first base and nab Lindor by a full step.
Starter Strong: Danny Salazar was coming off of his worst performance of the second half, missed a start after losing nearly six pounds with an illness, and had to face a daunting Blue Jays lineup. It was not an ideal scenario for any pitcher. However, Salazar started the game off well by striking out three in the first inning. With some help from the defense, Salazar would continue to cruise through the Toronto lineup until the fifth inning.
It was in the fifth with two outs that the Blue Jays found some measure of success against Salazar. Goins started the rally with a single into center field. Ben Revere managed to keep the inning going with an infield single in front of Jason Kipnis. That left Josh Donaldson to be the hero. And, hero he was. Josh Donaldson drove a hard long line drive to deep right center field. Almonte almost came up with one of his over-the-shoulder catches, but he slowed up just enough as he got to the wall that it stayed above his glove. Jerry Sands threw it in, but Donaldson was hustling out of the box and got all the way to third base and had momentarily given the Blue Jays the lead.
As mentioned above, David Price has been exceptional since joining the Toronto Blue Jays. In his five starts before Monday, he averaged over seven innings, and eight strikeouts per outing, while maintaining that 4-0 record and 1.98 ERA. After a somewhat shaky first inning, Price settled down and an Indians runner did not advance to second base from the second through sixth innings.
Finally, in the seventh, the Indians found some offense. Much like against the Angels, it was some unlikely heroes that came through when needed. After a Santana walk, Ryan Raburn doubled into right field (and he obtained third base on the throw) to tie the game at two runs. Then, with two outs, Jerry Sands punched a single into left field that was aided by the fast track fielding surface. Raburn scored and the Indians had a lead that they would never relinquish.
Bullpen Battle: With the Indians leading in the eighth inning, Bryan Shaw made his customary trot from the bullpen to the mound to face the top of the Blue Jays lineup. After inducing a couple of outs, he gave up a single to Jose Bautista. Terry Francona decided that he did not want to risk Shaw facing Encarnacion and Tulo, so in came Cody Allen for another potential four out save.
Well, things did not work according to plan as Encarnacion moved Bautista over to third base and took second himself as the defense was more worried about halting Bautista’s advance. Tulo was intentionally walked loading the bases with two outs in the eighth inning of a one-run game with Justin Smoak at the plate. Allen got ahead with two quick strikes, but the count quickly evened. Then, Allen threw a nasty pitch that was unhittable (and a ball), but Smoak was so amped up to be the hero that he took a mighty swing at it anyway. The bat missed the ball and the game went onto the ninth inning.
LaTroy Hawkins did his job for the Blue Jays in the ninth inning. He recorded two outs on the first two batters. But, after a Gomes single, disaster finally struck defensively for Toronto. Chisenhall hit a ball that required Encarnacion to range wide to his left to retrieve and Gomes saw that third base would likely be open, so he ran for it. Well, that did not sit well with the Blue Jays third baseman and he attempted to make a Lindor-esque throw to the bag. However, he is not Lindor, and the ball went sailing into the Blue Jays dugout giving the Indians an insurance run.
The Blue Jays kept the pressure on in the ninth, but Cody Allen was up to the task. With runners on first and second and only one out, the top of the lineup once again came up. Ben Revere would foul out on the third base line before Cody Allen would strike out the mighty Josh Donaldson to end the game.
The Numbers
There are some good things and some bad things that came out of this game, here they are in numerical format
Toronto Strikeouts
Out of 131 games, only five times did a team strike out the Blue Jays more than the 12 strikeouts that the Indians managed on Monday. Each of those five other instances (ranging from 13-15 strikeouts) were before the trade deadline that brought the Blue Jays Tulowitzki.
In addition, of those games, only the May 11 game against the Baltimore Orioles had as few as the two walks that the Indians pitchers gave up on the night.
Toronto Home Runs
Toronto had hit a home run in eleven of the past twelve games entering Monday where the Indians pitching staff left them without a free walk around the bases. In fact, the Blue Jays were coming off a three-game series against the Tigers where they hit at least three home runs in each game.
The Blue Jays did extend their extra base hit streak to 43 games though with a double and a triple (last time they had a game without an extra base hit was July 9).
Indians pitchers also limited the Blue Jays to two runs for just the fourth time in August with some help from stranding the second most Blue Jay runners on base in August (nine on Monday, 10 was the most during a 8-5 Toronto win on August 18 against the Philadelphia Phillies).
Double-digits
The Indians ended their overall double-digit hit streak at five games as they ended Monday with eight. That streak is still alive at home though where the Indians have 12 straight double-digit hit games.
Danny Salazar recorded double-digit strikeouts in an outing for the first time since June 6 against the Orioles. He had partially credited his ability to go deeper into games on having less focus on strikeouts in the second half, but, for a night, he demonstrated that he could still dip into the strikeout well when it was needed.
- An 18.9 percent chance at a postseason berth according to MLB.com, up from 2 percent on August 19 [↩]
46 Comments
So… we are 18-31 against the central and our remaining schedule is:
7 vs Twins
6 vs Chisox
7 vs Tigers
7 vs Royals
3 vs Bosox
Time to man right the hell up if you want to make it interesting.
Feel me once, shame on you. Fool me twice? You won’t get fooled again.
It might amount to nothing in the end, but they’ve certainly got my interest. It’s been a fun couple of weeks, and I hope it stays interesting until the end.
Fool! I meant fool….
Cmon nj0, dip that toe in the water. Perfect temperature right now.
http://lovelace-media.imgix.net/uploads/647/03005c00-91fe-0132-1df9-0a2c89e5f2f5.gif?
No thanks. This year nearly broke me. (Or maybe it did?)
The Indians are like a good friend battling addiction. I’m done lending them money and letting them crash at my house. I’m tired of my sound system not being there in the morning. The only way I’m giving them another chance is rehab, a.k.a. the playoffs. And one and done rehab doesn’t count. Check yourself into a best of five clinic and then we’ll talk.
I hate you Tribe…
http://i.imgur.com/wk62xv3.gif
I don’t know. It’s awfully fun in here. We even added a volleyball net to the pool.
http://i.giphy.com/3o85xtjGaRU4NkhzIQ.gif
When I was stopping by earlier in the summer, the pool was nothing but algae, the bocci ball court was flooded, and the sauna was filled with burning tires.
https://cdn1.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/VyS9zBzfuWD8ib-U5REK0bHbvss=/cdn0.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/3672020/MichaelBournIsConfused.0.gif
Oh, well…we evicted the unwanted houseguests and hired a maid.
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-NjniT-6mjUA/UewcSNL81-I/AAAAAAAArh8/lVgEMHp7lSw/s1600/tumblr_lmls0kHJxA1qczmt2o1_500.gif
BTW: That was the most tense ending to a ballgame I’ve seen out of the Tribe this year.
The 8th inning alone…
It was very odd to see us score on that overthrow into the dugout. I had to double check to see who was in the field at the time because previously that move would’ve been a Cleveland Indians Defensive trademark.
Too bad we don’t have reliable back-end bullpen guys other than Cody. Shaw is not the set-up man he once was.
Petition to ban April baseball. Maybe even May.
Great win over the Shapiro Blue Jays! Beat Price and withstood the MVP bat of Donaldson and crew. Credit Danny Salazar he looked like a pitcher not a thrower the way he used his off speed pitches.
The problem is once the season ends it has to start all over and it begins with an offseason that I predict won’t amount to much of anything.
She missed a spot:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TPxiXGr9nFM
Damn u Shapiro!
Still only 2.0 stars on Tripadvisor.
I’ll check back next spring, after renovations are complete.
Nooo, nooo right handed power bat.
It always has to end and start over. That’s not a reason to not enjoy the ride. And I’d argue they have a little more flexibility this coming offseason than they did last year, but honestly they’re never going to be that team who signs the big name free agent. That doesn’t mean they can’t get better.
You rang?
https://waitingfornextyear.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/Yan-Gomes-140626.gif
Manship should take his job at this point. Shaw has been shaky.
But, I actually was surprised he was given home. He was sliding into third on the throw, so it is umpire’s discretion whether or not to award the corresponding base. When is the last time a discretion call went that far in our favor?
I wondered if he wasn’t swayed a little by the fact that Raburn was a little tangled up with the guy covering 3rd and couldn’t quickly get up and run, but I would say he reached the base before the ball went into the dugout, sliding or not. I’m not sure what the official wording on the rule is.
I wish I knew who started the counter argument of not signing the biggest name free agent as a defense to basically doing nothing because they are brilliant. It’s almost like saying a guy in the NBA who averages 10.1 PTs and 8.4 REB is worth $18M.
Nobody expects the Cleveland Indians to sign a big name free agent as we have all seen that doesn’t mean anything. But that also doesn’t mean you just sign a few relievers. Regardless the Indians future is the same future as most of the teams in Cleveland and it starts with drafting. It’s more important to the Indians because of baseball and the inequality of dollars. The Browns can’t draft but at least have deeper pockets to spend. The Cavs have the deepest pockets and well this https://waitingfornextyear.com/2015/09/gif-why-tristan-thompson-could-be-dan-gilberts-worst-nightmare/ covers them.
Less games! I laughed too.
They need to beat those damn Twins!
Go ahead and take a bite out of it to make sure it’s what you think it is.
I don’t eat candy my body is my temple and the ladies would not be happy!
Speaking of fallacies, while the Browns were winning 4-5 games per year, they were also spending among the lowest against the cap in the NFL. Yet, somehow they do not get raked over the coals.
The Indians have spent, on their own guys. These core guys that are really good are all locked up for the forseeable future. It is a good thing.
Great point no clue can I just go with it’s a football town in their defense?
And the Indians have spent to retain their own players but that’s like me saying I improved my house because I had to repaint it. That’s a lateral move all be it an important one but I don’t see many teams winning the World Series by simply retaining their own players. Well not unless you are St. Louis or San Francisco anyways. But they made some moves. More importantly they drafted and developed.
So, the umpires discretion was to award based on advancement, which means that they felt Chisenhall was already safe at first when the throw happened. And, the runners get two bases (it matters because if Chis was not at first, then Gomes gets 2 bases from where he started and he started at first base).
But, it is based on the time of the throw, not when it lands.
——————————
(g) Two bases when, with no spectators on the playing field, a thrown ball goes into the stands, or into a bench (whether or not the ball rebounds into the field), or over or under or through a field fence, or on a slanting part of the screen above the backstop, or remains in the meshes of a wire screen protecting spectators. The ball is dead. When such wild throw is the first play by an infielder, the umpire, in awarding such bases, shall be governed by the position of the runners at the time the ball was pitched;
APPROVED RULING: If all runners, including the batter-runner, have advanced at least one base when an infielder makes a wild throw on the first play after the pitch, the award shall be governed by the position of the runners when the wild throw was made.
not unless you are St. Louis or San Francisco
4 our of the last 5 WS champions.
http://i211.photobucket.com/albums/bb26/oldboy12/Bioshock/wer.gif
And Chris Johnson slugged .553 vs lefties last year…
https://youtu.be/fw5pKF83v_E
Mighty impressed with Salazar lately. He’s really figured out some stuff.
Got it, thanks!
That’s why I said it thank you.
No problem, I had it wrong too. It wasn’t Gomes advancement that mattered there but Lonnie’s. Good thing he was hustling.
Well in fairness they got plenty of criticism for the constant turnover and rebooting, which is ultimately why the spending never ratcheted up. (always turning over the roster with new players means not paying those big 2nd contracts, and no point in signing a big time FA when you’re not a contender)
As I have mentioned before, I am quite optimistic going forward. We have a solid, young staff that is signed for the next few years. Our defense has improved, and LIndor is figuring it out with the bat. Chisenhall has surprised me with how good his defense in in the OF, and he is starting to hit. All we need is solid hitters at 1B and DH and we are in contention. With 3 top draft choices that at playing CF in the minors, it seems the hitting is on the way.
Not arguing they should do nothing, just that they can get better without going out and getting a big time guy. People always talk about how they should have gotten this or that without acknowledging that it may not have been available without spending $20M/yr.
I always called out the Browns for that crap. If you won’t spend on free agents then you should spend on locking up you own talent. (See Alex Mack).
And, if you do neither and also trade present draft picks for future draft picks, then you probably shouldn’t fire your first year head coach over it.
It’s the same old Indians speak regurgitated and repeated. Just be up front. Instead of proclaiming that when you contend management will spend and finally when you do contend and you don’t add talent you say “we count keeping our own players as spending” or having to sell a tv network to get extra $$$ to spend on the team. Compound that by going out and getting Swisher and Bourn who both flopped more then succeeded and there’s a problem. Now go back. Search the WFNY history and if you do you will see a lot of people starting with moi who said they were insane to go after Swisher. I was fooled by Bourn. I was more optimistic about him but I should have realized when he was left rotting on the vine in free agency (yes mgbode I realize the draft pick compensation thing and I realize how important that was for a team like the Indians who draft like the Tampa Bay Rays) there was more of a reason. A reason like he was a shadow of his former self.
So in essence when Shapiro leaves I hope he takes his verbal salesmanship/word voodoo with him. The real problem is Paul Dolan probably won’t name a new President so he can save the salary but also have Antonetti report directly to him like most MLB teams. The other problem is Chris Antonetti will be for all intensive purposes the sole man in charge.
The long and short of it is pretty simple though. As long as the Indians can draft and develop then they can find ways to improve in the future through trades. They can subsidize that by occasionally dipping their toes in free agency with low-mid level signings. This is how the Indians have to compete and it starts with drafting.
Speaking of drafting. Go back over the tenure of Mark Shapiro before he was named President and take a look at the Indians drafts. Go back to when he was promoted to replace John Hart and when you do you’ll get the answer to why only twice in 14 years the Indians made the playoffs twice and one of those was a one game home shutout. But even before then other then 2005 and 2007 there wasn’t a lot to put on a resume. So yes it’s 14 years but in actuality it’s more like 18-20. Shapiro was with the Indians for all of those years. Yea, wow. He must have done one helluva job these past years as President working on the “baseball side” to make up for downfalls on the opposite side.
I saw a stat on TV during the game that said that the Tribe has the #4 defense in the AL this year. Tell me you were expecting THAT!
I was expecting league average, but even that is 6-10 in the AL.
When they put out their best defensive lineup it is quite the sight (Gomes, Santana, Kipnis, Lindor, Urshela, Brantley, Almonte, Chisenhall).