Sorry but you're going to have to wait.

As previously mentioned, I'm in Cleveland for the evening to see a Tribe game live - imagine that. Unfortunately that, combined with the fact that I couldn't plan ahead, means there probably won't be a Tribe recap until the end of the Rangers series.

Sure, I could have written the White Sox recap before the first pitch. It would have gone something like this: The starter did a good job and the Tribe might have even been up 1-0 for a while, but then the other team scored 2 or 3 runs and the game was essentially over. One tidbit is that Ben Francisco scored again yesterday making the last three runs scored over the last two games two by Francisco and one by Aubrey.

One final thing is I'm writing this on Andy's Apple, with its colorful gui and Andy's left-handed mouse, so you can only imagine the testicular fortitude that it's taking me to not go all feminine surrounded by all this white. Call me old fashioned, but back in my day computers were black and baseball players were on steroids and the Indians won games on hitting.

Go Tribe!

TRIBE WEEKEND!!!

Hey, is that title gaudy enough for you? How about:

TRIBE WEEKEND!!!!!!!!&^@*&^YEAH!!*&@^*!!!!

That's right, with the Indians coming off a road trip so disastrous that I refuse to properly update our Tribe sidebar, three-fourths of the FCF crew along with some special guests will be rocking Cleveland and Progressive Field to the tune of all three games against the Texas Rangers this Memorial Day weekend. Nick and Andy, along with loyal reader Bucko, will be at all three games; JHH and his lovely wife will attend tonight, and Milkey will be on hand tonight and Saturday. Check us out if you're there. I'm crunked.

Expect photos (assuming someone provides a camera), drunken stories, and my patented sub-standard baseball analysis. Last year was the first official incarnation of this rich tradition, though we did have unofficial versions like the game where we went to see them lose to the Rangers in 2002 (the Kenny Rogers-Joel Skinner game) and lose to the Twins early in 2004 for Milkey's bachelor party.

Anyway, last year was a tremendous success, resulting in some great times and two Tribe wins over Tampa Bay, including Ben Francisco's game-winning shot to the Your Car Company Here Home Run Porch. The only real disappointment was not getting my pro-Paul-Byrd text messages to appear on the JumboTron. I expect no less from the club this year, especially since I went to all this trouble to relocate myself less than a mile from the stadium for just these kinds of events.

A few miscellaneous bonuses here:

- Tonight will break my string of five straight Tribe games attended with CC Sabathia pitching (4-1). Nothing against the big fellow (especially since he threw a complete game shutout the last time I went), but I like a little diversity, you know? Check the pitchers we get to see in action: Fausto Carmona, Cliff Lee, and CC. That's tight.

- On the other side, who the hell are these guys for the Rangers? I know our team OPS is like .467, but maybe we can break through against these pretend major leaguers.

- In Spanish, the Rangers are "Los Vigilantes," which is at least 500 times cooler than the English version. Why not just get it over with and change it, maybe capture the Latino market? And why don't the Indians have an official spanish-language site? Hell, the White Socks (Los Medias Blancas) do. Maybe I'll start translating my Indians posts.

- Am I going to drink a little bit of beer this weekend? You'd better believe it. There are still quite a few places nearby I haven't checked out, and this seems like an ideal time to explore Gateway a little more fully. By that I mean: hang out in the bar in my apartment building and try to catch lobsters.

- Weather looks awesome - 60's and sunny all three days. Let's hope the Baseball Gods are as benevolent as the Weather Gods.

- We got a variety of seating locations to keep things interesting. Tonight are view boxes, which are like somewhere between the upper deck and field level behind home plate. Tomorrow: the bleachers, even though I was too dumb to use the Pepsi bleacher ticket offer. Oh well. Sunday, I got Nick and I intentionally bad seats ($8) with the idea that we won't actually sit in them. There are plenty of ballpark locations where one can check out the game.

- I'm still working on what gear I'm going to sport to the games, as we all know how strongly that impacts the team's performance. I own three Indians jerseys, one having been stolen from my sister Lance, and three Indians hats. I may try to pick up some wristbands as well. As for the hats - one is a free Progressive Field trucker hat and one is a winter hat, so we'll be going with my prized year 2000 vintage Chief Wahoo blue cap/red bill for all three games. It ain't even a question. Jersey-wise, I'm torn. Much of my vaunted live winning streak was constructed wearing my dark blue/red jersey, and the sole loss I've attended over the past four seasons was in my new home white one (I also posted an Opening Day win in said jersey). I think I'll go with blue for one game and white for one game, though I haven't decided who gets Friday and who gets Sunday. My blue looks a lot like JHH's, so maybe I'll save that for Sunday.

What about Saturday? I'm going with the Penguins jersey, that's what. That's right, Stanley Cup Finals, Game 1. I've gotta show some support, plus Wahoo will still be on the hat.

As always, Go Tribe!

New lows in offensive baseball-playing

For some weeks now, the Tribe has been excelling at, when they have runners on base, managing to keep those runners on the bases they're occupying whle increasing their out total. For example, they could begin with this situation:

Runner on 2nd, 0 out

and produce this situation:

Runner on 2nd, 1 out


But tonight, they've stepped up their game! They just went from:

Runner on 2nd, 0 out

to:

Runner on 1st, 1 out

Yep, now we're going backwards on the basepaths while we make outs! This is exciting baseball. Following that, the Tribe found themselves unable to record out #2 while having their man on first go backwards one base and then stand on home plate while the next hitter tries to bat. Someday. For now they've settled for transforming that previous scenario into:

Runner on 1st, 2 out

And now, even with Chicago spotting the Tribe an extra baserunner just for fun via an error, Cleveland has recorded the familiar:

No runners on, no runs, 3 outs ljdsvlnvksdjnvkbsdgvjy2g3or78t23BASEBALLlekghewwfeouwfgewiyfgewifubegwifugeifugewifugweikbgu

NBA Playoffs Non-Analysis: Conference Finals

Just so you know, it kills me not to be able to label this article with the "Cavs" tag, but such is life as a sports fan. I'm still happy I got to see the Cavs post another solid year, send Washington packing once again, and take the team with the NBA's best record to the very brink of elimination.

The good news: until the Boston-Detroit series ends and the East title is awarded for 2008, the Cavaliers remain the Eastern Conference Champions!

So, here's to next year. But first,


Eastern Conference Finals

(1)Celtics vs. (2)Pistons
I think most of us figured these would be the last teams standing here, and it should provide for an entertaining series. Sure, I picked the Cavs to knock off the C's in 6, and had they pulled out Game 1 or 5 in Boston they might have done just that, but that was clearly a bit of a vanity pick. It's easy to say now that it's over, but a non-Cavs-fan Andy would have picked the Celtics in 7.

As for this series, you may remember that I picked Detroit as my champion at the front of my first-round analysis, and can't think of a reason to change that. OK, two reasons: the domination that home teams enjoyed in the second round (22-3), and that split that Chauncey Billups did on-court during the Magic series. If he's healthy, I expect him to control Rajon Rondo and lead the Pistons to their third Finals in six years. If not, things could be tougher for Dee-troit, but even with home-court in Boston's...court, how can I pick a team that hasn't won a road game yet against the East's 8 and 4 seeds? I can't and I won't.
Pistons in 6


Western Conference Finals

(1)Lakers vs (3)Spurs
I selected LA as my West champion at the outset, and have no plans to change that now after two convincing series wins to start the playoffs. The battle-tested Spurs should offer more of a challenge than the Nuggets or Yazz did, but I still like LA to advance, leading to a rematch of the Finals from '04. On the other side of the coin, I have picked the Spurs to lose both of their series so far and they have done nothing but fail me and collectively whine about foul calls even more than Doc Rivers. (Incidentally, Doc, give it a rest. You guys got whipped three times in Cleveland and it had nothing to do with officiating. Did you notice how Mike Brown didn't hang everything on the zebras when his team lost? It's called class.)

Like the Cavs, picking the Hornets to topple the defending champs went against my better judgment, and I said as much when I did it. But I'm going to keep picking against San Antonio (less foolishly this time), because I'm tired of them winning, I'm tired of Tim Duncan's eyes popping out of his head every time someone calls a foul on him, tired of Ginobili and Parker flying to the basket and hoping for bailout calls, tired of those cheap light-bulb rodeo graphics in the upper end zone of their arena, and especially weary of Robert "Cheap Shot Bob" Horry. Plus, they only win in odd-numbered years.
Lakers in 7

Let us never speak of this weekend, again

After finishing my 26.2 mile race, my wife and mother (my father was in attendance but nowhere to be found) congratulated me and the first thing I said to them was "Let us never speak of the marathon again." That's kind of how I feel writing this post.

So to help with the forgetting of this weekend I've supplied no picture - hopefully that helps. That and I didn't really want to look through the AP photo offerings of happy Reds and head-hung Indians.

How do beat writers do it? Is just finding the little gems that went right, like Ben Francisco (I can't yet just call him by only his last name), or Michael Aubrey finally getting to the majors and hitting a homerun in his first start? Or do they detach themselves from what is still just a meaningless kids' game played by adults making sometimes outrageous amounts of money? Either way. let's get down to my quick series summary so we can get back to what we do best: looking forward and hoping for the best.

OK, to say the least, things didn't go well. First sweep by the Reds over the Indians - not cool. Pitching not stellar except for Carmona, who had no walks. As I've mentioned over at my other blog, my wife was flipping through the channels and I got to enjoy the final two pitches of Saturday's game - again not cool. Did you see Jorge Julio got to pitch? Man, Wedge must have been drunk or something.

I've talked about the disappointing offense before and now it's time to switch gears. What the hell is up with our bullpen? A bad bullpen, I feel, is a more emotional problem, because you're ahead and then some guy whose job is to get three outs comes in and blows it. In that situation you feel justified in singling out one guy on the team for failure, which has its benefits. That and coming at the end of a game makes it that more memorable. Now the offensive struggles, on the other hand, can usually be spread out over at least four or more players and is built up over more than just a inning or game. That and we have all these stats that tell us what these players' averages were their entire career so we always have hope that a long season will allow everyone to rise to at least their median.

So I ask you dear readers (Andy, Nick): what concerns you more right now about the Tribe? The bullpen, the hitting, C.C.'s impending free agency, or the fact that onion will continue to dominate the hot dog race?

Finally moving forward, the Tribe is off today. Thank god I know I needed this day off so I can only imagine this team needed it as well. After playing thirteen games in as many days (one doubleheader allowed for a quasi-break), the Tribe will have a nine-game streak starting tomorrow in Chicago with a three-game series at Swirling Garbage Field. Following Chicago is a weekend series at Progressive Field against some team once run by our current President, and then the White Socks again in Cleveland for three games. Pitching matchups are:

Game 1: C.C. Sabathia, LHP (3-5, 5.47) vs. Jose Contreras, RHP (4-3, 3.35)
Game 2: Paul Byrd, RHP (2-3, 3.61) vs. Javier Vazquez, RHP (4-3, 3.53)
Game 3: Aaron Laffey, LHP (2-2, 1.35) vs. Mark Buehrle, LHP (2-5, 5.27)

Game 2 begs the question of: what kind of Paul Byrd outing will this be? Game 3 is being held on what mlb.com tells me is Indiana Jones Day. Just to make you possibly feel old the movie Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) is a good four years older than starter Aaron Laffey (1985). It will be interesting to see how much playing time Aubrey gets before being sent down.

One final note: 2007 AL Cy Young Winner CC Sabathia is on the mound this Tuesday as the Tribe Battles the Chicago White Sox. For every strikeout made by any Indians pitcher on Tuesday, May 20 in Chicago, fans can receive $1 off lower reserved, upper box, mezzanine or bleacher tickets for the June 10 Dollar Dog Night game vs. the Minnesota Twins. Tickets can be purchased on indians.com from 10 minutes after the conclusion of Tuesday’s game through Midnight, Sunday, May 25 simply by visiting Indians.com and entering the password STRIKEOUT. (Minimum Ticket Price: $1) Andy's note: I like that they're at least getting that out of you; they don't want CC notching 17 K's and having fans pick up bleacher tix for (-$1).

Let the Hype Begin:

Given the current rotation the writer of this post and the two founders of the FCF blog will be in attendance for Fridays game against the Walker Texas Rangers with one Fausto Carmona on the mound.

Go Tribe!

Cavs fall short, Boston advances

The whole series had come down to one game. One game in Boston to decide who would move on to face the Detroit Pistons in the Eastern Finals. In the 2004 film Miracle, Kurt Russell's Herb Brooks states that "Great moments are born from great opportunity." That's exactly what the Cavs had: an opportunity to steal a series from a team with far more firepower. Unfortunately it was not to be.



Quarterly Analysis

First Quarter
The remnants of pregame pyrotechnics made TD Banknorth Arena look more like the site of a bonfire than an NBA arena, but as the smoke cleared Boston sprinted to a 12-4 lead. The Cavaliers looked sluggish; they were having trouble getting anything established inside, and they weren't able to keep Boston off of the offensive boards.

Although the Cavs shot a gut-wrenching 27.8 percent in the first quarter, they were able to weather the early storm by holding the Celtics to just 38.1 percent shooting. LeBron James was finally able to free himself a bit to drive inside and get to the free throw line, and at quarter's end the Cavaliers trailed by just five, 18-13.


Second Quarter
Sloppy turnovers and a sharp shooting Paul Pierce bothered the Cavaliers early in the second quarter, and Boston opened a nine-point lead. The Cavs valiantly battled back, but whether it was officiating or lucky bounces (a certain Paul Pierce three comes to mind), everything was going Boston's way early in the second. With 6:05 to play in the half, the Celtics had increased their lead to 12, 35-23.

Mike Brown went to a smaller lineup for the last few minutes of the half and the Cavs experienced some success. With that small lineup, the Cavaliers were able to slow Boston's momentum and cut into the Celtics' lead. At the half, the Cavs trailed by 10, 50-40.

Frankly, the Cavs were lucky to be down just 10 at the break; Boston was beating them on the offensive glass (5 to 4), in turnovers (4 to 8), shooting percentage (47.1 to 38.9 percent), free throw attempts (14/20 to 11/15), and 3-point shooting (4/8 to 1/6). Other than LeBron James (23 points), no Cleveland player had more than four points, and Paul Pierce led all scorers with 26 points. In spite of the Celtics seemingly receiving every break in the first half, the Cavaliers were still very much alive, trailing by only 10.


Third Quarter
The Cavs came out of the locker room determined to whittle away at the Boston lead, but instead of chipping away at the lead, they almost eradicated it by way of a 9-2 run. During half time, Mike Brown apparently remembered that the Cavs have a 7' 3" Lithuanian center who is a pretty solid scorer, because the Cavaliers were made a concerted effort to get Zydrunas Ilgauskas the basketball in the third quarter.

Boston answered, but the Cavs stayed hot, and with a tad under 6:00 left in the period the Celtics led by just three. Just as the Cavs had no answer for Paul Pierce (33 points midway through the third), the Celtics had no answer for LeBron James (30 points).

The Celtics made a push, but the Cavs hung on, and by the end of the quarter the deficit was five points (73-68). On the road, the Cavaliers had to like their chances; down just five points with the best fourth quarter player in basketball on their side.


Fourth Quarter
The teams traded points as the quarter began, and three minutes in, the score was 77-72, Boston. Watching this game, you had to appreciate how evenly-matched the two teams were. Each time one team scored a crucial basket, the other answered to kill that momentum.

With 3:07 to play, the Cavs found themselves down three points. Boston got a bucket from PJ Brown, and Cleveland got a pair of free throws from Zydrunas Ilgauskas after he was fouled high and hard by PJ Brown (a Flagrant I, in my opinion).

The Cavs were close, and King James got them closer. James picked Paul Pierce's pocket, and exploded down the floor for a thunderous dunk, cutting the Boston lead to slimmest of margins. With just 2:20 remaining, the table was set for a fantastic finish.

After the teams traded misses, PJ Brown drained an impressive 20-footer to restore Boston's 3-point lead. Delonte West missed a wide open three for the Cavaliers, and although Boston gathered the rebound, Zydrunas Ilgauskas was able to tie up James Posey to force a jump ball. The Cavs had to like their odds with that matchup, but Paul Pierce was able to grab the loose ball and call a quick timeout.

Boston had possession with 58.1 to play. Paul Pierce dribbled the shot clock away and passed off to Kevin Garnett, who missed a long jump shot. The Cavs pushed the ball down the floor, but instead of taking an open three-pointer in rhythm, LeBron James drove inside for a short, off balance jump shot. James' jumper didn't fall, and although LeBron drew a great deal of contact the refs kept their whistles in their pockets.

The Cavaliers were forced to foul to extend the game, and Boston took care of business at the charity stripe. Sasha Pavlovic drained a clutch three, but it wasn't enough. Final: Boston 97, Cleveland 92.


Quick Hits

Just like the old days. It is a little ironic that the more the game progressed, the more it felt like one of the old duels that LeBron James and Paul Pierce used to have prior to the arrival of Ray Allen and Kevin Garnett. James dropped 45 points, and Pierce countered with 41. James and Pierce also covered each other defensively all series , which is probably one of the reasons why the two scorers struggled mightily at different junctures throughout the series.

Where's that tall guy? Zydrunas Ilgauskas is the Cavaliers' second best offensive player, and is usually their second option on offense. Apparently the Cavs lost track of the Lanky Lithuanian, who scored eight points on only eight shots.

The Cavs tried to establish Ilgauskas at the onset of the third quarter, then promptly forgot about him again. Four Cavaliers took as many or more shots than Ilgauskas, which is unacceptable. Ilgauskas is an efficient and consistent scoring option, and the only Cleveland player who should take more shots than Z is LeBron James.

Give credit where it's due. If Mike Brown's detractors needed proof that talk of firing Brown was both ridiculous and premature, this series should be more than sufficient. It's an overly simplistic perspective, but the Celtics have three All-Stars (Allen, Garnett, Pierce), whereas the Cavs have just one (James). Boston had home court advantage, they are thus far undefeated at TD Banknorth Garden in the playoffs, and they were the best home team during the regular season. Both teams have deep benches, but the Cavs dealt with significant turnover at the trading deadline and key injuries, and were not at full strength for the decisive seventh game (injury to Daniel Gibson).

When you look at things that way, you have to wonder how the Cavs even won a game against Boston, let alone three (and they almost stole games one and seven). To say it plainly, there's no way the Cavs could have had the success that they did if Coach Brown puts them at the large disadvantage that his critics claim. The guy isn't perfect, but he gets results; the worst the Cavs have ever finished a season under Brown is the seventh game of the Eastern Semifinals. In spite of that, many Cavs fans still refuse to cut Mike Brown any slack, and it doesn't make much sense. Maybe some people are just stubborn.

I said he wasn't perfect. Mike Brown made some questionable decisions regarding the rotation in this final game. A largely ineffective Sasha Pavlovic played more than 35 minutes, reserve big men Anderson Varejao (11 minutes) and Joe Smith (16 minutes) were under-utilized, and once again Devon Brown didn't take off his warmups. There must be something goofy going on behind the scenes with Devon Brown, because guys don't go from the starting rotation to zero minutes overnight.

It wasn't the free throws. Much has been made of the fact that home teams are 22-2 in the semifinals of these playoffs. Some have suggested that officials have favored the home teams, and some questionable fouls calls in the Lakers/Yazz (flute) series have been cited as evidence. By contrast, the officiating in the Cavs/Celtics series has been nothing if not consistent.

In Boston, the Cavs and Celtics attempted 32.25 and 28.25 free throws per game, respectively. In Cleveland, the Cavs and Celtics took 25.33 and 21 free throws per game, respectively. The disparity, in favor of the Cavaliers in both instances, is about four attempts per game. This suggests that the Cavaliers averaged more trips to the line because they have a player in LeBron James who draws more fouls than any other player in the series. There appears to be no "home team bias." Whether or not all of the foul calls were correct, they were very uniform in their frequency.

Too much of a good thing. When Boston's pregame fireworks have become so excessive that they're giving Ben Wallace vertigo prior to game two, something's wrong. When Boston's pregame fireworks produce so much residual smoke that it's difficult for fans to see the court on television, something's wrong. If you want a perfect example of the law of diminishing marginal utility in action, this is it. David Stern has alluded to limiting such displays in the future.

The Jerk Store called, and they're running out of Boston Fans. As if the front-runners walking around the country wearing Red Socks hats weren't enough, Cleveland fans had to tolerate even more Boston fans for home games at The Q, and watch them on television for road games. The fans at TD Banknorth Garden jeered LeBron James when he appeared to be injured at least twice during the series, and they chanted "bull-s***" in response to perfectly legitimate foul calls. Good to see that they're keeping things classy up in Beantown.

Someone turn Van Gundy's mic off. Jeff Van Gundy has commentated during a few Cavs games this season, and during that handful of games (this is just off the top of my head, mind you), he's called for the NBA to abolish their foul limit (six per player), claimed that players should carry razor blades to cut themselves (in order to stop the game when advantageous to their team) and has tried (and failed miserably) to quote Jack Nicholson in A Few Good Men. "Hey Jeff, what's your favorite planet? Mine's the sun!"

That's a wrap, folks. For Cavs fans, it's been a year that has been equal parts fun and frustration. We had to deal with holdouts, injuries, and a tough playoff loss. By the same token, we no longer have to watch Larry Hughes beat up on the rims at The Q, the Cavs knocked off walking punch line DeShawn Stevenson and the Washington Wizards in the first round, and it looks like the Cavs should be in a good position to upgrade the roster in the off-season. Thanks for reading, and as always, be sure to check out TheClevelandFan and FCF for news and notes on the Cavs during the summer!


(AP Photo/ Winslow Townson)

Re-evaluating Brown

After reading Nick's article evaluating Cavaliers Coach Mike Brown (actually while reading it in draft format), I had a few things I'd like to add. In particular, while our friend makes many good points, I think Nick grades out Brown's offensive coaching too harshly.

I found some interesting numbers on ESPN's site from John Hollinger. What we find is not as great a disparity between offensive and defensive performance as one might think, using the metric of points scored or allowed per 100 possessions. We see that during this past regular season, the Cavs placed 19th in offensive efficiency and 11th in defensive efficiency. They're not a top-level scoring club, but not embarrassing themselves either.

In the playoffs, the Cavs are 11th of the 16 qualifying clubs offensively, putting them at basically the same percentile as regular season. Defensively they rank second, trailing only Boston. Make no mistake how this Cavalier club makes its money in the postseason.

Back to the offense. When you factor in that, as Nick says, they don't really have a whole lot of offensive weapons other then LeBron, and considering that they don't get too many easy points off of fast breaks (how much of that Brown is responsible for is another debate), Coach Brown must be doing at least an adequate job on offense. I would bump the grade up to C-, maybe C.


The other point I'd like to make in Coach Brown's favor falls under the "intangibles" section, which I might have re-headed "in-game strategy." Before that, let me say that I fully agree with Nick's points about Devin Brown and Damon Jones being nailed to the bench instead of nailing shots this series. I thought Brown (the player) gave the Cavs good minutes all season and contributed quick scoring on a number of occasions where the club was struggling to find baskets, and I'm surprised they haven't taken advantage of that in the playoffs. Likewise with Damon Jones and his 3-point marksmanship.

The other thing I wanted to mention was that (Coach) Brown typically does a good job identifying his best late-game lineups. The Cavs have recently been one of the best 4th-quarter clubs in the NBA, leading the league in come-from-behind wins this past season, and part of that is having the right guys on the floor at the end. I first noticed this matchup strength in the 2006 playoffs, when the Cavs weren't really even that good, but Brown put them in a position to win by finding an effective closing crew in LBJ, Marshall, Varejao (then largely unproven), Eric Snow (then still alive), and Damon Jones/Flip Murray. Since that time, Coach Brown has proven adept at making in-game adjustments to find the right mix of players to secure wins.

Let's hope he finds a winning combination for Games 6 and 7.

Tribe Sweep & Off To The Nati

As you may have heard, the consecutive scoreless streak by the Tribe is over at forty four and a third innings. However, the Tribe did win today's day game 4-2 over the Oakland A's. Aaron Laffey picked up the win having pitched seven innings without giving up a run but did have an error that resulted in an unearned run, kind of.

The highlight of this series has to be the amazing pitching, especially from the starters. Following the back-to-back nine-inning shutouts from Lee and Carmona, from the last series with Toronto, Paul Byrd had his finest performance of the year going seven and a third and striking out seven without giving up a run in a 4-0 Tribe win. The gem of this series and maybe this homestand came from C.C. going nine scoreless innings and striking out eleven on the way to a 2-0 Tribe victory. Laffey's performance today lowers his ERA to 1.25 and evens his record at 2-2.

The good news for Laffey is that Jason Tyner was sent down today to make room for Jeremy Sowers to pitch tomorrow. That looks to give Laffey at least one more start before Jake Westbrook returns. What do you do with a guy like Laffey at this point? I can only imagine the Indians front office will send him to AAA to continue to start every 5th game. Other options include putting Byrd in the bullpen, but how do you do that after Tuesday's performance?

The offense hasn't looked as bad these last few games, but that is kind of relative. Ryan Garko had a home run in back to back games. Travis Hafner had two RBI in the series. Ben Francisco continues to hit the ball well too.

This was a big series for the Tribe. The A's came in a half game ahead of the Angels and leave one game behind. The Tribe hadn't fared too well before against the A's this season but was able to win the season series thanks to the sweep at home. Yes, thanks to the MLB schedule the Tribe has now played all their games against Oakland for the season but hasn't played more than 4 series against the AL Central.

While everyone in the national media has been concentrating on the starting pitching, and I really do enjoy the Tribe getting as much positive media as possible, the intriguing pitching situation is currently happening in the bullpen. With Rafael Betancourt struggling recently it appears as if Masahide Kobayashi could be pitching his way into the closer's role. Masa got his first major league save this week and picked up his second save today coming in after Betancourt loaded the bases with only one out. If Joe Borowski returns soon it will be interesting to see how Wedge uses him and how long a leash he gives both Borowski and Betancourt in the near-term.

So the Tribe now sit atop the AL Central with a 22-19 record and winners of eight of their last ten. The second place Twins are a game and a half behind at .500. The AL Central isn't the division it has been the last few years. That's not to say the Detroit Tigers may not get hot and win a few games but you have to be surprised they sit at 16-25 and six games back at this point in the season.

So the Tribe are off to Cincinnati to participate in that wonderful experiment called inter-league play.

Game 1: Jeremy Sowers, LHP (0-0, 5.06) vs. Johnny Cueto, RHP (2-4, 5.91)
Game 2: Fausto Carmona, RHP (4-1, 2.40) vs. Aaron Harang, RHP (2-5, 3.32)
Game 3: Cliff Lee, LHP (6-0, 0.67) vs. Edinson Volquez, RHP (6-1, 1.12)

Hmm, what game looks the best on paper? Well I'm going to go out on a limb here and say Sunday's matchup of Lee and Volquez with a combined ERA under 2.00. This should be an interesting series. Expect to see Hafner mostly pinch hit but may get one start at first base.

Go Tribe!

(AP Photo/Mark Duncan)

Off base

In the most recent issue of Sports Illustrated, there is a poll taken of 495 current Major League Baseball players that asks: Which team has the best starting pitching in baseball? The results:

Boston Red Socks 25%
Arizona Diamondbacks 19%
Detroit Tigers 17%
Seattle Mariners 8%
New York Mets 7%

That's it. (16 teams received votes, but these are the top 5). Can you think of a starting staff that maybe should have been included, one that recently ran off 44 straight scoreless innings? (And no, I don't mean the Oakland Athletics, who had baseball's best starters' ERA when the poll was conducted).

I'm confused

I'm here at work during lunchtime with an MLB GameCast window open, and I can't for the life of me figure out what it means. At the top, in big letters, it says "Cleveland 3, Oakland 1." What the heck?

OK, the "3" by Cleveland's name I understand - it means that the Indians have scored three runs to this point in the game. The vertical line next to Oakland, however, I don't get. I've been watching Cleveland Indians baseball for six days now, and ther is ALWAYS an oval, kind of like: "0" next to the opponent's name. I want to know how Oakland got that stick and I want to know now.

Further, non-absurd investigation reveals that the run allowed was unearned, meaning Indians starters can still (as of 1:19 PM) claim a lengthy streak of not allowing any earned runs. What allowed the run to score was a throwing error by pitcher Aaron Laffey. I've always had mixed feelings about how that should count in the statistics: sure, runs that score only with the benefit of errors are unearned, I get that, but you're the pitcher. By any reasonable definition, if you made the error, you earned the run, no? This goes double for throwing errors - anything arm-related should definitely count against ERA.