Indians come home just in time to face red-hot Minnesota pitcher, Francisco Liriano.
View full sizeFrancisco Liriano is putting his 21-inning scoreless streak on the line against the Tribe tonight at Progressive Field.Thursday night, rookie Josh Tomlin was cruisin' along, making that sub-2.00 ERA look like it was not a fluke. Then came the grand salami from Adrian Beltre, turning a 1-0 Indians lead into a 4-1 Red Sox lead that eventually became a 6-2 Red Sox win.
What's the secret of comedy?
Timing.
And now? Well, tonight, the Tribe has escaped unfriendly Fenway and is back home . . . just in time to face the ace of the Minnesota Twins, Francisco Liriano. Who, btw, has owned the Tribe. That is also called timing. Bad timing.
An analysis on the oddsmaking site sportschatplace.com painted that picture so clearly that even an umpire could see it:
Coming into this series opener, the Twins are playing excellent baseball as a team. The Indians have been playing some decent baseball as of late but their record doesn't reflect that.
On Friday night, the Twins will send ace Francisco Liriano to the mound to take a stronghold on the series. Liriano has won four straight games and hasn't surrendered a run in his last three starts pitching 21 innings and striking out 25 batters while only giving up 11 hits. Liriano is having his best stretch of the season at this point and plans to continue it against the Indians. His last start against Cleveland came in the form of his second win during his current four game win streak. In Liriano's career he is 5-3 with a 3.15 era against the Indians.
. . . The Indians will be sending Jeanmar Gomez to the mound who has a 2-0 record while posting a 1.50 era on the season. Gomez, a 22-year-old Venezuelan will look to continue his early success this season in his third start against the Twins. So far this season Gomez has allowed only two earned runs in his 12 innings of work. In his one home start Gomez went seven shut-out innings against the Tigers giving up five hits and one walk in the win. With only three walks in his first two major league starts, Gomez looks to not be letting the big league atmosphere faze him, however he will have a tall order trying to hold down the Twins offense. . . . Not being able to help out their pitchers with runs has been a major problem for the sub .500 Indians and it may continue against Liriano.
Of course, there is some karma about all this: The Twins are trailing Chicago by 1 1/2 games in the battle for the AL Central title, and the White Sox are at Baltimore to play what is statistically the worst team in baseball, so the odds are that even if they win tonight, Minnesota will still be trailing Chicago by 1 1/2 games when the Twins awaken Saturday morning.
Wingin' it
First baseman Matt McBride, who was promoted from Class AA Columbus to Class AAA Columbus just as July ended, was named Eastern League player of the month for July. As an Aero, he hit .364 and led the league in homers (11), RBI (29), slugging percentage (.852), OPS (1.271) and total bases (75) during the month.
Meanwhile, at Class A Lake County, outfielder Delvi Cid took the lead in stolen bases over all of minor league baseball. He's swiped 56 and only has been caught 13 times. His teammate, infielder Adam Abraham, has been named batter of the week for July 26-Aug. 1.
Also, outfielder Michael Brantley is back in Cleveland, his third trek north from Columbus.
What's with all this minor league stuff? Well, Starting Blocks figures if the Tribe is gonna field a minor league team . . .
From The Plain Dealer
Beat writer Paul Hoynes watched events unfold in Boston Thursday night, and noted that even though Tomlin surrendered Beltre's grand slam, the rookie responded well to that little bit of adversity:
Tomlin recovered nicely. He held the Red Sox to one hit in the fifth, sixth and seventh innings. For the night, he allowed four runs on four hits in seven innings. He struck out five and walked two.
"I'll tell you what, the kid can pitch," said (pitching coach Tim) Belcher. "He's got great focus. You give up a grand slam in Fenway Park and go back out there and pitch as well as he did, that's pretty impressive.
"That's just moxie. He's mentally tough. That's what it takes to stay here and pitch well. I look forward to seeing him do that."
Hoynsie also noted in his Indians Insider column that even though rookie catcher Carlos Santana is lost for the year after the injury to his left knee by a sliding Ryan Kalish, it's not all that bad: Tribe medical officials didn't expect to have to use a transplanted ligament to repair his strained lateral cruciate ligament. That means recovery time will be much less, say four to six months or so.
Or, as we like to say in Starting Blocks, given past history, in plenty of time for the 2011 trade deadline.