Shin-Soo Choo comes up big in Seattle against his former team.
View full sizeRight fielder Shin-Soo Choo delivers the three-run double that gave the Indians a win over his former team, the Mariners, in Seattle Thursday night.Cleveland is in last place in the AL Central. Seattle is in last place in the AL West. And believe it or not, the Mariners have a worse record than the Indians.
Clearly, when these two baseball juggernauts get together, anything can happen. And by anything, we mean miracles. Even a Cleveland win.
Guess what? Miracles do happen. The Indians took a 6-3 victory in Safeco Field. What's really interesting about this battle of the titans is that the Mariners beat the Mariners, so to speak.
Confused? Let's let Geoff Baker of the Seattle Times explain:
(Seattle pitcher Doug) Fister at least knows who hit him -- Shin-Soo Choo, the onetime Mariners outfielder who drove home three runs with a double in that sixth to tie the score. Choo then sealed Seattle's 6-3 loss to the Cleveland Indians with a two-run homer in the ninth to cap his night at five runs batted in.
Choo, Asdrubal Cabrera and Luis Valbuena -- all former Mariners -- delivered hits in a four-run sixth that saw Fister allow four runs on hits to six of the seven batters he faced. Before that inning, he had given up just one single and retired 15 in a row.
You realize what this means, don't you? Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, children of all ages, meet the newest member of the 2011 Tribe starting rotation: Doug Fister. Oh, it hasn't happened yet, but hard luck like that Fister experienced is a true Tribe trademark. Call it destiny.
Choo delivers
Say, we can see the way out of the cellar from our front porch with Shin-Soo Choo in the lineup. Does that mean we're about to go a looooooooong way for a really bad pun?
Choo betcha.
CBSsports.com is pretty high on the Indians' right fielder. The praise was triggered by his game against the Mariners Thursday night, but it's a lot more effusive than what you get for one good outing.
The Mariners (52-82) signed Choo as an amateur free agent out of South Korea in 2000, but he went 2 for 29 in 14 games for Seattle before he was traded to Cleveland for Ben Broussard on July 26, 2006.
Choo has since developed into a standout for the last-place Indians (54-80), leading the team in several key categories - including batting average, home runs, stolen bases and outfield assists.
He helped Cleveland end a four-game losing streak in the opener of this four-game series, going 2 for 5 with a homer and five RBIs in Thursday's 6-3 victory.
"He's a stud," Indians manager Manny Acta said. "He hits good pitching. He hits right, left, he has good at-bats, he plays hard every day. I basically have to pull him off the field to give him a day off.
"He's a legit complete player. Those words five-tool player are used a lot but he's a legit five-tool guy. He can do it all on the field."
And the news here is? Someone was nuts enough to trade for Ben Broussard. Who, happily, because all joking aside, is a nice guy is now making a living as a musician, not a ballplayer.
From The Plain DealerThe game didn't end in time for beat writer Paul Hoynes' game story to make print, but being SB-on-the-spot, we've got a link to it here. Hoynsie, too, talks about Choo's success, but he also delves into the job pitcher Josh Tomlin has done.
Tomlin allowed three runs, all coming in the third, in six innings. He struck out five and retired 10 of the last 11 batters he faced. If not for Jayson Nix's error in the fourth -- he has six in 20 games at third base -- Tomlin would have gone 11-for-11.
Hoynsie's Indians Insider column does what Cleveland fans have become far too experienced at doing: Looking ahead to next year. This time, Hoynsie takes a gander at the permutations for the 2011 Tribe pitching rotation.
The slim right-hander caught the Indians' eye this year by going 8-4 with a 2.68 ERA at Class AAA Columbus. He made three appearances out of the bullpen before joining the rotation. He's thrown 148 2/3 innings between Cleveland and Columbus.
Manager Manny Acta said before the game that he's probably not seeing Tomlin at his best because of the number of innings he's thrown this year. Still, he likes that Tomlin throws strikes (63 strikes in 94 pitches Thursday) and fields his position.
"We feel that if he doesn't start for us up here, he could at the very least be a middle reliever," Acta said.