Cleveland’s Ugliness Continues

Written by: Michael Taylor on 10th April 2009

Cleveland’s Ugliness Continues | read this item

It was to be a grand day at the corner of Carnegie and Ontario. The Indians were at home ready to kick off another summer of baseball at Progressive Field as they were playing the Toronto Blue Jays in front of a pumped sell-out crowd of 42,473.

And it looked like that was going to be the case after the Indians jumped on the Blue Jays starter Scott Richmond with two quick runs in the first inning on a Travis Hafner laser beam double off of the right field fence. And for added measure Hafner again hit a bomb off of Richmond in the third inning into the Jays bullpen to give the Indians a 3-0 lead. The Indians looked comfortable, and like a different team than the one who was swept by the Rangers in Texas, but that did not last long.

Indians rookie pitcher Scott Lewis after cruising through the first three innings ran into some trouble in the fourth inning when he gave up four straight hits, including a two-run home run by the hot-hitting Adam Lind, and an RBI single by first baseman Kevin Millar. The quick glimpse of hope that the Indians would finally get a quality start from one of their starting pitchers was gone, and what followed was a long night of frustration in a near seven and a half hour ballgame that included a 229 minute rain delay and a 13-7 Indians loss.

The Indians bullpen, which on paper is supposed to be a team strength, again failed them – which when you think of how bad the starters have been too, it is quite amazing how poorly this team has pitched. Each of the four relievers who entered the game gave up at least one run, which makes it very hard for an offense to try and claim a lead.

Despite the Blue Jays tacking on runs consistently, the Indians were able to keep it a close ballgame by continuing to hit the ball out of the park. Shin-Soo Choo and Victor Martinez both homered in the sixth and seventh innings, respectively, to guide the Indians back to a 7-7 tie game headed into the eighth inning with the Tribe’s best reliever on the hill.

But he was not their best this evening. Rafael Perez promptly suffered through one of the worst outings of his career, allowing five very critical runs. Not that it was all his fault however. The Indians botched an infield grounder hit by Millar that Peralta tried to get the force at second without luck, and the relay to first couldn’t even get a slow Millar who tripped over running out of the batters box. It was that kind of an inning.

The Blue Jays would stay aggressive by sacrificing over the runners to second and third, which then the Indians intentionally walked Michael Barrett to load the bases to set up a shot at an inning ending double play. But with the white-hot top of the lineup stepping to the plate, Marco Scutaro would bloop in a single between three defenders behind first base to score another Toronto run, but an overrun of the ball by Shin-Soo Choo cost the Indians another run on the play as John McDonald scored from third on the error.

After that it was all over. The bubble was burst and the Blue Jays scored four more runs on two two-run doubles. One was from Lind…again, and the other from right fielder Alex Rios. By the time Perez and then Masa Kobayashi had completed the inning, six runs had scored and the Indians were on their way to the 13-7 defeat.

Reliever Brandon League, who pitched a third of an inning and blew a save opportunity by hitting a batter with the bases loaded in the seventh inning, actually “earns” the win in this one to go to 1-0. Rafael Perez and his nightmarish inning give him the loss (0-1). There was no save in the game.

Same two teams tomorrow afternoon at 1:05 ET. A pair of Cy Young award winners take the hill. The Indians will send Cliff Lee (0-1, 12.60 ERA) to face off against the Blue Jays Roy Halladay (1-0, 6.43).

Topics: Adam Lind, Scott Lewis, Travis Hafner, Victor Martinez