Emergency game log post.
Fausto Carmona (3-10, 6.48)
vs
Scott Baker (13-8, 4.33)
Another Gardy hates defense game.
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 sean  September 15, 2009, at 7:25 pm  212 LTEs - (Sorry, but the time to add LTEs has expired)  Cleveland Indians, Minnesota Twins spookymilk September 14, 2009, at 6:14 pm 274 LTEs - (Sorry, but the time to add LTEs has expired) Carl Pavano, Cleveland Indians, Guest Writers, Jeremy Sowers, Minnesota Twins, playoff hopes, spookymilk Jeremy (yes, an actual Jeremy) Sowers 6-9, 4.78 ERA, 5.72 xFIP, 107.1 IP, 44 K, 43 BB Tonight, Carl Pavano looks to make the Indians pay as he faces off with Jeremy Sowers who, with a 44-43 K-BB rate, is more than likely a whipping boy on Indians blogs much like our own. If the Twins were to go 19-0 for the rest of the season, they'd still need the Tigers to lose 6 of their last 20. Honestly, the way the Tigers have been playing, I wouldn't bet on it. So, yeah, this is over. But, since I have nothing better to do and I paid for the MLB.tv Premium Package, I'm unlikely to miss any remaining games unless I have to. So what else is going on? The Patriot-Bills game has started, so hey, something semi-meaningful is going on out there. Perhaps we can talk about the Foot and Ball Guys league and the impact of the game on our little fantasy thing. Perhaps we can talk about beer or women or something. It's a long offseason...you might as well hang out for a couple more weeks, eh? sean September 4, 2009, at 5:00 pm 68 LTEs - (Sorry, but the time to add LTEs has expired) Cleveland Indians, Minnesota Twins Time: 6:05 CDT Starters Fun fact: Jason "absolutely awful in the field" Kubel has done better in the field than either Cuddyer or Young this year. Only 180 innings of course, but I'll take it. Go Twins! sean August 14, 2009, at 6:00 pm 164 LTEs - (Sorry, but the time to add LTEs has expired) Cleveland Indians, Justin Masterson, M&M watch, Minnesota Twins Time: 7:10 CDT Starters: The Twins have faced Masterson only once, earlier this year. He pitched 2.1 innings in relief giving up two hits and walking one. Primarily a starter in the minors, he was a swing-man for the Red Sox. He started 2008 as a starter before moving to the bullpen and being their setup guy, often pitching more than one inning. Same role in 2009 with some spot starts in April and May as a replacement for a pitcher on the DL I presume. He was traded to the Indians along with Nick Hagadone and Bryan Price for Victor Martinez. The Indians placed him back in the rotation after a three inning relief appearance and are in the process of stretching him out. Threw 61 pitches last time out and is scheduled for 75-80 today. He's a groundball pitcher with a 53.0% GB%. His K/9 has rebounded from last year to a solid 8.54 K/9. His career minor league K/9 was 7.5, but that includes a 5.3 in 95.2 innings in A+. He posted a 9.4 in A- (31.2 innings) and a 9.0 in AA (96.1 innings) with a 7.7 in 9.1 innings in AAA. Likewise, he lopped off exactly one walk per nine from last year, for a 3.08 BB/9 to close in on his 2.3 mark from the minors. brianS August 6, 2009, at 10:05 am 160 LTEs - (Sorry, but the time to add LTEs has expired) Cleveland Indians, Expired Bargains with the Devil, Fausto Carmona, Nick Blackburn, Vortex of Suck A clear illustration of the Twins' season to date. Note the giant vortex of suck at the center. It only seems like a shining light at the end of the tunnel. In fact, that is the glow of horrific screams of energy being thrown off as historically superior seasons by Twins' stars are thrown down the bottomless pit of a black hole. Hubble just thinks this is a picture of NGC-1097. Now that I've established the tone, here is today's matchup. OH MY FREAKING GOD! THIS IS A MORNING GAME. EARLY MORNING. First pitch is scheduled for 11:05 a.m. Central, 9:05 a.m. Pacific. I guess Seligula wants to get this one over with before anyone notices it is being played. Probables: Good lord. Hide the women and children. In his last start against the Twins (June 4), Carmona gave up 7 runs on 5 hits (2 HR) and 3 BBs in all of two innings. How did the Injuns ever decide to bring Fausto back from AAA this year? Granted, he racked up a 27:6 K:BB ratio in 33 innings there, along with a slightly-better-than-league-average 4.31 tRA. But he has been gawd-awful with the big club. If he has a bright side, he still is a ground ball-inducing machine (55 pct of batted balls). To be fair, which I am not, today marks just his second appearance in the Majors since June 4 (the first being last friday's 5 inning, 101-pitch outing -- 4 hits, 4 walks, 2 runs), as the Hostiles sent him down to "work on his mechanics," by which I think they meant "learn how to do oil changes." But -13.2 pRAA!!!! His season makes Grady Sizemore's fall from SI-fellated grace (230/328/439) seem MVP-worthy by comparison. His season has been so bad, it almost makes me forget about Nick Blackburn!! Did you know that Darling Nicky has managed all of SEVEN strikeouts in his last four starts (106 PA) combined? Sorry, ubes. I didn't mean to start you swearing so early in the morning. Seriously, seven Ks combined in four starts. It's probably no coinkadink that he's only managed 22.3 innings while giving up 40 hits and 21 runs in that stretch. Opponents accumulated a ridiculous 392/396/618 line against him (11 doubles and 4 HRs). Needless to say, I'll be in meetings all morning. Have fun storming the castle. FirstTimeLongTime August 4, 2009, at 5:05 pm 149 LTEs - (Sorry, but the time to add LTEs has expired) Cleveland Indians, David Huff, Scott Baker versus Aren't you glad that Cliff Lee isn't on the Indians anymore? Yeah, me neither. Considering I have to leave work two hours early to drive to Rochester and watch the Buffalo Bills practice there is little time left for a game log tonight. Sorry folks, here are some games notes... of note.
*get it? He hasn't updated yet! brianS June 4, 2009, at 11:09 am 237 LTEs - (Sorry, but the time to add LTEs has expired) Cleveland Indians, Fausto Carmona, Pitch F/X, Scott Baker I could get real tired of writing about how "last night's game sucked" every week. Thankfully, the Twins didn't play yesterday. The Indians did, but not the Twins.
ahh, cr@p. I just lost 30 minutes of edits because I forgot to save the draft before uploading an image. It was gold, I tell you. so you are getting the abbreviated version instead. Start time: 12:10 CDT. Pitching matchup There's a shred of hope in that xFIP figure for Baker. Inspecting his peripherals, there's nothing really that sticks out to explain why his performance has suffered so much this year compared to 2007 (3.94 FIP, 4.45 xFIP) and 2008 (3.85 FIP, 4.25 xFIP). Basically, he's been getting punished by the long ball on his fastball. Josh Kalk's pitch f/x data tool indicates that Baker's fastball has averaged a little over 90 mph, but is responsible for all of the HRs he's allowed this season (8 in the pitch f/x data, 19.4 pct of fly balls according to Hardball Times, 11.8 pct of Balls in Air according to Statcorner, the source of the tRA stats). I don't have prior year pitch f/x data handy to know whether Baker has lost either (incoming) velocity or movement off of his fastball, but his outgoing velocity and movement have been...unfortunate. Over the last two seasons, he gave up HRs on 4.8 pct and 5.8 pct of BIA, respectively, so he's either suffering from a run of bad luck or his very average fastball has suddenly begun to suffer from Delmon Young Syndrome ("placement" issues). Perhaps when Man Muscles Mauer escaped from the Phantom Zone, he accidentally pulled a little somethin' somethin' extra along, which has attached to Scottie? On the other side of the ledger sits the immensity that is Fausto Carmona. I thought this guy was going to be a superstar the way he ate up the league in 2007 as a 23-year old: 19-8, 3.06 ERA, 4.08 tRA, 137:61 K:BB and 64 pct GB on the strength of a devastating, 93-MPH sinker. But last year was a disaster for the kid (5.44 ERA, 5.04 tRA, 5.25 xFIP, 58:70 K:BB in 120 2/3 innings). This weekend, Fangraphs' Dave Golebiewski sang Where Have You Gone, Fausto? Where indeed?
It appears that Mr. Carmona's deal with the devil has expired. If pitch f/x's classification of pitches is to be believed, he has all but lost control of his sinker, even while cranking up the heat (pitch f/x says it has averaged 95-MPH this year). Carmona's outcomes are still GB-heavy (56 pct), but more of his pitches are ending up in the air and more are flying over the fence, even while fewer are being put into play (as his ball pct has risen from 35 pct to 38 pct to 42 pct so far this year). So, today would be a good day for _elm_n to sit on the bench (ok, ok, that's every day) and the Twins' hitters to be patient. I'm expecting Baby J to go 6-for-6 with 4 HRs and 12 RBIs in the first three innings today. FirstTimeLongTime June 2, 2009, at 6:02 pm 285 LTEs - (Sorry, but the time to add LTEs has expired) Cleveland Indians, David Huff, Kevin Slowey versus Kevin Slowey faces off against, Tribe rookie, David Huff tonight at the Metrodome. This will be Huff's third career Major League start so it almost seems a little bit silly to take any of his big league stats as anything more than a small sample size. So, let's take a look at his numbers from the minors. And guess what? It just so happens that David Huff pitched for the Buffalo Bisons last season! After being selected as a supplemental 1st round selection in 2006 (39th overall), Huff flew his way up the minor league ladder starting only 25 games before making his way to AAA Buffalo in 2008. While pitching for my hometown 9 , Huff started 16 games averaging 5 innings per start, striking out a batter an inning and allowing 1.7 BB/9. For his minor league career Huff has an impressive 1.11 WHIP. Coming into 2009 he was ranked as the 8th best prospect in the Indians organization by Baseball America. In its prospect mine earlier this season, Fangraphs wrote of Huff
This season (SSS) Huff's fastball has been averaging 89.2 mph and he has been throwing it nearly 65% of the time. He mixes his "heater" up with a change up that he throws 20% of the time and has been clocking in around 81mph. It seems that he has lost confidence in some of his breaking stuff since coming to the Bigs, as his slider and curve ball are thrown less than 15% of the time combined. For those of your worried about the Twins lefty heavy lineup against a "soft tossing" southpaw, left handers are OPS'ing 1.186 against the Rookie this season. It is only three starts, I know, but c'mon that might be enough to keep _elm_n out of the line up, right? Big Mak June 2, 2009, at 8:00 am 6 LTEs - (Sorry, but the time to add LTEs has expired) Cleveland Indians, Minnesota Twins, Series Preview in Blog My word is this team bad on the road. Just think if the Twins had an experience like the Yankees in Cleveland and got kicked out of their hotel. Half the team probably wouldn't even make it to the ballpark. Gardy would have to send Justin, Jason, and the three Joes to rescue all the lost utility infielders. At least we don't have to worry about that for this series as the Indians come to Minnesota for three games. The Indians are at 22-31, 8 games behind Detroit, in last place in the AL Central. They are 10-17 on the road, only winning one road series all season (v. the Royals two weeks ago). The Twins are a different team at home, going 10-3 in their last four home series. First off, blog entries concerning the Indians were few and far between recently. Apparently the city's focus was on some basketball tournament. I'm not sure if the Cavaliers exit from the NBA playoffs is responsible for the general malaise evident on some sites, or I guess it could just be the default setting for Cleveland sports fans, watching teams go down in flames, just to see them burn, but it doesn't seem like anyone is too excited by the team on the field (but Rick Vaughn bobblehead night will always bring a crowd). That's partly due to the fact that the guys who are supposed to be carrying this team aren't on the field (the Indians disabled list is starting to read like Robot Santa's naughty list). twayn April 25, 2009, at 5:00 pm 126 LTEs - (Sorry, but the time to add LTEs has expired) Add new tag, Cleveland Indians, Kevin Slowey, Minnesota Twins Game Time: 6:05 p.m. CT Media: TRN, FS-N, MLB.tv Probable Starters: Kevin Slowey, RHP (2-0, 5.89) Slowey has managed to notch two wins with just one good performance on the mound in his first three starts this season. That good performance came in his last start against the Angels, when he gave up just two runs on a Torii Hunter homer in the 2nd inning. Slowey then cruised through his final five innings, retiring 14 of 16 batters faced. Slowey apparently spotted a flaw in his mechanics after his first two starts and made some corrections. He also says that he was throwing too many strikes in his first outing, and that he's learning the value of throwing pitches outside of the strike zone from time to time. Carl Pavano, RHP (0-2, 9.69) Pavano's last start was a six inning, 1-run, 4-hit dandy against his former Yankees teammates at the new Yankee Stadium. Unfortunately, the Cleveland bullpen blew the Indians' lead and saddles Pavano with a no-decision. After the game, Pavano said he didn't feel he had his best fastball, but he was able to throw his slider and changeup for strikes. It was Pavano's best start in the short season to date, much better than his first outing against Texas, when he was tagged for 9 runs one-plus innings of work in his Tribe debut. Notes:
sean April 24, 2009, at 5:00 pm 173 LTEs - (Sorry, but the time to add LTEs has expired) Cleveland Indians, Fausto Carmona, Minnesota Twins Game time: 6:05 CDT Probables: Carmona won his first game of the year last week against the Yankees. Though, who couldn't. It was an otherwise mediocre start with 4 ER, 4 BB, 1 SO, and 2 HR. Carmona had a breakout year in 2007 and decent 2008 until he injured his hip on May 24. Wasn't quite the same afterwards.
His FIP so far this year is 7.55.
So, he drops his slider (a groundball-type pitch) for his changeup (a flyball-type pitch). Carmona lives on his sinker and control to get outs and when he overly relies on one and loses the other, this unsurprisingly hasn't gone so well. I wonder if his lack of control is related to his injury last year. His career BB/9 in the minors is 1.7 with only a 2.0 in AAA and AA, so the outliers here would be recent performance. However, his control suffered before the injury as well, so I could just be making up stuff. Conclusion? Be patient and let Carmona do his part in funding the fight against breast cancer. SBG April 24, 2009, at 5:35 am 9 LTEs - (Sorry, but the time to add LTEs has expired) Cleveland Indians, Six Word Team Evaluations I'll have to admit that I was thinking yesterday that the Twins were going to play the Baltimore Orioles tonight. I've been thinking about a six word phrase for the Orioles, I looked up the Oriole wikipedia page (did you know that the Orioles started in Milwaukee?). Then, I woke up this morning and I thought, hey, I had better check the schedule. Wouldn't you know it -- I've been operating under a mistaken belief. The Indians won the World Series in 1920. The dynasty continued with a second World Championship in 1948. The Indians narrowly lost the 1954 World Series to the New York Giants 4-0 after winning 111 games during the regular season. After that, though, things were a little quiet. In 25 years of play in the American League East, the Indians never finished higher than fourth. Starting in 1995, the Indians played in the AL Central and have won the Central seven times, twice losing in the World Series. This is another season where the Indians have been favored to win the Central, but they've been off to a little bit of a slow start. All in lall, though, the Indians have had a long and generally unsuccessful history. So, here's my six word evaluation of the Indians:
Add up to three of your own. Be sure to vote on the Boston evaluations in the right hand column. Rhubarb_Runner February 5, 2009, at 5:30 am 6 LTEs - (Sorry, but the time to add LTEs has expired) 2008 Documentary, baseball cards, Cleveland Indians, Joe Nathan
Card #3051/MIN103 Rhubarb_Runner January 26, 2009, at 5:30 am 15 LTEs - (Sorry, but the time to add LTEs has expired) 2008 Documentary, baseball cards, Cleveland Indians, Cliff Lee
Card #387/CLE17 ubelmann December 11, 2008, at 3:14 am 2 LTEs - (Sorry, but the time to add LTEs has expired) Cleveland Indians, Free Agent Signing, Joe Nathan, Kerry Wood At least unless he fails his physical, which seems rather improbable even given his injury history. $20M/2yr. I'm not really sure what the chances are of Wood breaking, but since moving to the bullpen, he had a 2.78 FIP last year and a 2.21 FIP this year. Ratewise, that's better than Joe Nathan(!) without adjusting for park factors(!). I think it's fair to call it a high-risk, high-reward contract. I'm certainly more afraid of Cleveland now than I was yesterday. |
 Lucy and I went for a walk last night and I pushed Miss SBG out in the stroller. It was a little cool, cool enough for a blanket for Miss SBG. But, wow, did the spring air feel good. |
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