Last night (8/17/11) the Indians faced Mark Buehrle. This also was the first time they had faced a left handed starter since I wrote about the importance of having at least one more right handed presence in the lineup. Because of this, I was excited to watch the game and see how the five lefties fared against someone who went something like 18 straight starts without giving up more than three earned runs.
Before I dissect what happened last night I want to start with the 14 inning affair from the night before. Gavin Floyd started out on fire, striking out 7 of the first 9 hitters. He looked untouchable, as many pitchers have against the Tribe this year. I'm not sure if that's due to the teams tendency to stand in the box with the bat on their shoulders until there are two strikes or if we've truly bring out the best of every opposing pitcher. Either way, I thought we were going to get no hit again and with Gavin's curveball looking how it did, I thought the strikeout record for a single game was in jeopardy. After the first three innings, we managed to knock him a round for five runs through 5 2/3 total, although the bullpen gave up the final run via walk. Through the end of the eleventh the Indians faced 4 1/3 worth of left handed relievers. This did not go so well. In fact, the Indians left handed hitters went a combined 1-7 (.143) against Will Ohman, Chris Sale and Matt Thornton (who? who? and I think I've heard of him). The only hit came from the bat of Jack Hannahan who is somehow batting .300 versus lefties this year. Chisenhall went 0-1, Fukudome 0-1 and both Brantley and Choo went 0-2. And while I'm much more and advocate of OBP versus average, because OBP is a measure of how often you're not making an out, the lefties managed just one walk. Not good, to say the least. After the game, I had hoped that Antonetti and staff would have realized this (or read my blog) and done something to fix it, i.e. getting a righty. Although, I knew that wasn't happening after one game and with a lefty pitching the next day, the Indians front office would have the luxury of watching the lefties struggle against one of the best left handed pitchers in the leagues (his ERA was 3.06 entering last night's game).
That didn't happen. The Indians put together 12 hits against Buehrle and scored four runs off him which hasn't happened since something like April. Lefties did well, as every left handed hitting starter got at least one hit with Choo leading the way with three and Kosuke on his heels with two. Beyond the stats, the Indians looked infinitely better last night than they did the prior against the lefties. They had better approaches at the plate and didn't look as foolish as often. Hafner still made me chuckle with his helicopter swing that he makes when he gets fooled and Kosuke and Choo still had one or two bailouts where they swing and run toward first. It's similar to what Ichiro made famous; however, Ichiro did it when he made contact, not when he misses the ball by a foot. All in all, last night was obviously a success and a large amount of credit needs to be given to the left handed hitters. For now, it looks like Carlos Lee is nothing more than a pipe dream for myself.
In other news, Fausto Carmona looked like the '07 Fausto after the first inning and that one pitch to Alexei Ramirez in the second. His pitches had velocity, 93-94 consistently and movement. Lots and lots of movement. He got the double play ball when he needed it and has showed composure in his last two outings reminiscent of the (gnats or fruitflies or whatever they were) game. Remember, he's the guy that separated Carlos Santana and Asdrubal when they were arguing in the dugout after Santana's drop at first base. After that, he looked like he was going to unravel and held the Indians together and gave them a chance to win against Verlander. Last night he was in total control pretty much the entire game. If he can continue pitching the way he has since he's returned from the disabled list, the Indians starting rotation will be most formidable down the stretch and for a five game series and two seven game series.
No comments:
Post a Comment