Rolling Over the Royals

As I was watching the game tonight (yeah, watching! On TV...) I thought "wow, this was once us. This coulda been us this year, too." I remember just last week when the Royals were a threat to us, with their good pitching, good fielding and good hitting. I said we just needed to win with our bullpen and I was wrong. They got us 2 out of 4 and got pretty close to us in first place.

Just a week later it appears that the Royals are falling apart (I don't follow the Royals well enough to know if this is true) and that's the sort of thing Indians fans are used to with our club. One week we're unstoppable and the next we can't get the bat on the ball, or can't get a guy out. The team that was shaking at the site of us is hitting our starters out of the park and all over the grass.

Instead of us being that team that gets beaten up by surprise, we are that team that comes back from a so-so road trip and whoops on anyone who crosses our threshold.

Last night it was homers and tonight there wasn't a homer in sight (for the Good Guys, at least) but we still managed to score 7 runs and it was beau-ti-ful!

You know who got a hit? EVERYBODY got a hit! Woohoo! I should start a "thing" where maybe I put up an "icon" for every time the entire team hits. That might be fun. Just more things to do...

Shelley Duncan was in for LaPorta at first today instead of Santana, and Marson was catching. Hmmm...did Manny finally decide that Santana wasn't working out as our cleanup guy just now? Just so you know, Duncan batted 4th and Hafner batted 5th. L-O-L GO SHELLY DUNCAN YOU BEAUTIFUL OAF! I shouldn't call him an oaf...Jhonny was an oaf. But look how he wears his batting helmet. I don't know why I think he's like one of the kids from "Ed, Edd and Eddy" (the one with the hat). Actually dude got some AIR tonight over at first, hopping up to rob someone of a single. Yeah buddy!

Once again I'll say how NICE it is to have a productive bench. One guy not doing so well? No prob, we've got a Band-Aid for him.

Smacked a lot of doubles tonight. Not only did Duncan get one but so did Orlando (a 3-run double, at that!), Sizemore and CHOOOO. Man, Sizemore has SEVEN doubles now and only 30-some at bats.

Choo picked up a stolen base and so did our man-of-the-week, Jack Hannahan.

Say, how about that Josh Tomlin? He gave up two solo homers but that wasn't until after we'd scored 6 runs for him in the first. So maybe he was trying out some new special sauce and it didn't work out for him. But no worries - he got win number 4 and broke his own record of being the only pitcher in team history to pitch 5+ innings in his first (now) 17 starts. He also led us to our 9th straight win at home. It's maybe also the 30th day he's gone without washing his socks or something...lots of streaks there.

My brother pointed me to the Facebook page of the "Defend Cleveland Show" which is a sports talk show on WRUW, Monday mornings (more info on the Facebook page!) Anyway, I just Liked them, myself. You should too. Lots of positive stuff to say about the Tribe. Apparently the guy, Mike, works at the Beachland if you'd ever like to avoid a show by talking Cleveland sports.

Anyway, Mike had this to say about Josh Tomlin earlier this month:

"How is it possible to not love and root for Josh Tomlin? He's like a summation of John Hughes-ian characters, it's like he's both Anthony Michael Hall and Emilio Esetevez in "Breakfast Club" Sure, he was the jock, but no one ever thought he was going to win anything since he wasn't the best on the team and was so busy studying from taking all honors classes."

Ha!

Raffi Perez still has an 0.00 ERA. We won't talk about Joe Smith and Chad Durbin because this is a positive blog. Well I will say this - it was nice that we had a 5-run lead so Joe Smith and Chad Durbin could get a chance to pitch. End.

So what do you think about tomorrow? Fausto versus Kyle Davies. Both dudes had bad last outings. Similar ERAs and W/L. I say Tribe, hands down.

OH, speaking of SWEEP...I got an email back from the Indians (promptly, I might add) about brooms at the stadium. They are forbidden but you can bring a broom head or buy a foam broom. So I'm glad I didn't lug a whole broom out there with me. You might want to invest in a foam broom this season, really, because we might be sweeping a lot at home.

Another thing...There are signs on the back of the bathroom stalls sponsored by the Sewer District and they are headlined "Thank You For Your Business" with a cheeky-looking water droplet beneath. Get it? I found it funny every time I visited after drinking my half gallon of Diet Dr Pepper but I kept forgetting to tell people. Now you know.

And, speaking of cheeky...why can't I come up with a good Royals-Royal Wedding joke for tomorrow's headline? Somebody...help!

I didn't hear any WTAM at all tonight so I don't have one bit of Radio Chatter at all. Sorry!