Sunday, September 18, 2011

Sloppy Sweep

Aaah...sweet, sweet day today. Got to hang out at my niece's 2nd birthday party and eat delicious Elmo cake, then watch the Browns win then watch the Tribe win and come home and listen to the excitement on the radio.

Then I come home to see an awesome comment from reader Allie who totally gets what I'm trying to do with the blog here. Another Tribe fan who understands the importance of Cleveland baseball first, winning baseball second. Holla, Allie!

The Tribe had a surprisingly hard time winning this one, considering the ease of our last two wins. But we also won on big innings the last 2...I assured my dad when we were losing 3-0 not to worry, there will be a big inning. I was right.

Poor Masterson. He actually got some run support today but not until the 7th inning. To add insult to injury, the team behind him committed 4 errors for 2 unearned runs. Masterson did go 6 and while he only struck out 3, he did induce 3 double plays.

Smith had a flawless 7th (with 3 assists!), and then Sipp came in for the 8th and struggled mightily. In a weird twist of fate, the guy who usually lets other guys' runners score (Sipp) had two of his runners score courtesy of Vinne Pestano. That scenario was pretty unbelieveable...I guess just everyone was looking sloppy today in this sloppy weather. Pestano walked in two runs, just like the Twins did. Unreal.

Chris Perez came in and didn't give up any runs but a hit. He got the Save (34) and Masterson got the Win (12).

Fukudome got back on the hitting horse today going 1 for 4 with a walk. Sad because his average is slipping below .270. Oh no!

Asdrubal was out today, which is ok because Kipnis didn't do anything exciting (remember, I think he gets inspired by the guy who bats ahead of him). Well, Kipnis did have a super fantastic at-bat in the 7th and walked in a run. Then there was a pitching change and Santana walked in a run! Woah, nelly!

Then Thome was up with the bases loaded and everyone chewing their fingernails. Then he did the weirdest thing you'll ever see modern Jim Thome do - he got a broken bat single that never left the infield grass. It was seriously in slow motion because nobody (NOBODY!) expects Jim Thome to not hit the ball out of the infield when not striking out. Wowee!

So 3 of our first 4 runs that brought us into the lead came on an error, a single, three walks and an extremely short single. Messy as all get out!

Who's got two thumbs and drove in our first, 5th and 6th (winning) runs today?

This guy!
Yeah that joke didn't quite work with that picture but I love that picture! You're probably going to start to hate it because it's coming out probably every time Shelley plays for the rest of the season.

Shelley Duncan, by the way, got 2 hits (homer and double), 3 RBI and scored a run today. Because he's awesome.

LouMar did not have a good day at all in the field today. One error and one passed ball. What up, Sweet Lou?

Next time, champ.
He DID go 2 for 4 today but he didn't even steal a base, which as it turns out, is a thing he likes to try to do these days.

Anyway, after all that weirdness and nonsense and rain, we won. Not only won but SWEPT!!! When was the last time that happened?? (June 19, Pirates)

As promised, while I didn't have my sad little foam broom with me today...
It's very small.

...I did talk about it to several people. I was with my family so they had to listen.

Tomorrow is a one-off weird 4:05 start makeup game versus Seattle. It's supposed to rain so I sent my aunt & uncle to Wal Mart to get us some Emergency Rain Ponchos for the game, because we'll be there. I'm kind of nervous because the seats I ended up getting are right down there behind the 3rd base tarp. Which is where foul balls go to break faces. Eep! I can't for the life of me find my glove. Have any of you seen it? It's a Wilson softball glove and it has "JB" written on the side in black Sharpie, and the thumb adjustment string is really great to suck on when you're bored out of your mind playing right field.

Oh well...my uncle's friend Rick is going with us. I'll put him in charge of putting his face in front of foul balls.

So yeah, tomorrow at 4:05 for a WIN because we're obviously very good against last-place teams.

See you there!

Radio Chatter:
"Manny Acta loves the fact that Kipnis swings the bat with power, the other way."
- Tom Hamilton

"Good lord, it's ugly out here. Can't believe these folks are sitting through this."
- Tom Hamilton on the cold, rainy day

"This is going to be a 5-out inning, the way the Indians have kicked the ball around."
- Tom Hamilton at the end of the 6th inning

"The play today has matched the weather - sloppy."
- Tom Hamilton

"Boy is he unhappy with himself. Kipnis had a pitch that he knew he could hit to Bloomington."
- Tom Hamilton on Kipnis' at-bat in the 7th

"A hearty group of fans has stuck it out. They wanted an open-air stadium, now they have it."
- Tom Hamilton

"Here the Indians are trying to give up an out to advance a runner and the Twins pitcher isn't able to throw a strike."
- Tom Hamilton on Marson trying to bunt in the 8th

"What you hope is that nobody is at today's game seeing a major league game for the first time in their life - and they never come back."
- Tom Hamilton

"It's almost as if Mike Everett has said 'We're going to make this strike zone juuuust a bit bigger.'"
- Tom Hamilton thinks the umpire is tired of this game

1 comment:

  1. Holla back atcha! BTW I love the Duncan picture, you can post it as much as you want, his face is priceless!

    ReplyDelete