Thursday, August 25, 2005

Keeping Pace

Big win tonight as the Tribe keeps pace to stay tied at the top of the Wild Card Standings. Tonight's game was indicative of how crazy baseball can be, losing 13-3 one night and winning 12-4 the next. The ability to put a bad loss behind them is a sign that this team is maturing, in stark comparison to the 9 game slide of 2004 after the tough Minnesota loss.

Cliff Lee looked great again tonight to run his record to 14-4 and has actually been mentioned in some articles as a Cy Young candidate, in only his second full year! Is he ace material? I'm not sure, but you can't argue with his record over the past 2 years (28-12). The only certainty about Clifton is that he should be getting his best pen ready to sign the contract that will be offered by the Tribe this offseason. Westbrook's deal, signed this past offseason, is probably a good barometer of what the Tribe will offer Lee (maybe 3-4 years for $12-$16 million).

Nice to see Wedgie give a couple of days off to Peralta and Grady the past few nights as young players do tend to wear down over the course of the 162 game grind. It is amazing how much better the lineup looks with both 23 year olds on the card.

The goal posted here (on August 7) was to end August with a 75-59 record to remain relevant in the Wild Card. After tonight, they're 71-57 with games against Toronto and Detroit, hoping to close the month out strong. If they can take both series, they'll hit that goal with the opportunity to take advantage of a Toronto team that took a couple on the chin in Gotham and a Tiger team minus Rondell White.

Tomorrow night's Browns exhibition and Tribe game happening at the same time is the reason that TiVo was invented.

2 comments:

Baltimoran said...

grady, again leading by example. ESPN is saying the yanks pitching is stabilized and their ready for a run but i think chachachacon is due to get roughed up and Jared Wright is no sure thing...athough he's probably having a field day with the women in New York as he did in Cleveland with his sparkly shirt at shooters...douchbag

Rockdawg said...

Did anyone see the interview with Wedgie on "The Pulse" on ESPNNews the other day. I've never seen someone simply not answer the questions posed to him. They asked him who the best manager he ever played for or managed against was, and he said he couldn't say because he didn't want to leave anyone out. Then they asked him who is going to win the AL Cy Young and he said he really didn't know. Then they asked him who he would intentionally walk with the bases loaded and the Indians up by two. Wedgie said he wasn't really sure. One question he did manage to answer was, "If the Indians make the playoffs, who is your number one starter?" Without hesitation, The Atomic responded "Kevin Millwood"

You'ld think he would want to score more than one run in your first playoff game.