Helpin' Out

Everybody's helpin' everybody!

First off, Fausto Carmona tried to help himself by getting a hit in the second inning. Except first base was so. far. away. leading to a catastrophic failure of his legs to carry him across the base and falling over like ... well, like I probably would have done being overweight and not having played baseball in 20 years. It was all bad news and Fausto wasn't able to continue on and he left the game to be replaced by JOSH TOMLIN as a PINCH RUNNER!

Fausto did end up leaving us with some good news since he did technically get on base, and the batter after him, Michael Brantley, was all like "Slump? Rly?" and knocked everyone in with a 3-run blast to the Tribe bullpen.

The rest of the game was pretty much like the last time we faced Homer Bailey. We won that game 2-1 off a 2-run homer, albeit in the 7th inning. This time it was 3-1 off a 3-run homer in the 2nd.

Today guys were peppering hits all over the place for a total of 8, but there was only one walk and Bailey sent us packing with 10 strikeouts.

Orlando did continue to be hot, with 2 more hits, raising his average up to .263 which isn't much lower than Brantley's.

Unless there is some sort of miracle, I don't think Brantley's going to reach .300 by the break like I thought he would. Asdrubal looks promising, though!

Back to pitching.

After Tomlin came in to run for Carmona, Frank Hermann came in to pitch. Hermann hasn't seen work in 12 days. I think just yesterday someone mentioned he was our longest-sitting pitcher. But today was his big chance! We really haven't had a need for any sort of long relief, but if there is going to be some long relief, bring out the Harvard Heat [The Professor] [The Pride of Harvard]! Anything less would be uncivilized.

Hermann did great, going 3 long innings and only giving up one hit and striking out two. No meltdowns, no craziness, just good long relief.

But it wasn't too long, because Manny started playing lefty-righty games and alternating pitchers every inning starting in the 6th.

Raffy Perez had a scoreless inning, then Joe Smith came in and LOADED THEM UP! And then shut them down! Heart stopper, Smith! Guess what his ERA is right now? Joe Smith's ERA is .99. Woah!

Tony Sipp got himself into a little jammy-jam, and gave up a homer to Votto, but his friend Chad Durbin made an unusual late-game appearance in the 8th and helped him out by getting the next two guys. Thanks, Chad Durbin!

Chris Perez is still out and we didn't need Josh Judy to come in (oddly enough his first and last appearance was against the Reds in May in Cleveland) and instead Vinne Pestano helped out by MOWING 'EM DOWN with 3 strikeouts in the 9th. Done and done! Overheard on Twitter: "My Closer Vinnie."

Ah, I bet there were big big hugs all around in that exhausted bullpen tonight! Actually, they were all Tweeting props to each other.

Tomorrow is our last interleague game before we can come home and sic Travis Hafner back on the world.

Tomorrow's game is Mitch Talbot versus Mike Leake and neither of them have been so hot lately. But our bats are hot and if they continue to be hot we should be ok. Game starts at 1:05 PM - see you there!

Radio Chatter:
"This is why having American League teams have to do this is idiotic. Having the pitchers bat, all that is going to happen is your pitcher gets hurt."
- Tom Hamilton DOES NOT LIKE when AL teams have to bat their pitcher

"In most years in the American league if you have an ERA under 4.0 you're leading the league."
- Tom Hamilton on the Indians' team ERA of 3.65