Tribe lose two, pitchers and games.

With the extended weekend, I'm making this a short one. Any arguments against that? No? I didn't think so.

The series opener saw not only the loss of Anthony Reyes but also Aaron Laffey. This now means that we have Scott Lewis, Joe Smith, Reyes and Laffey on the DL, not to mention Jake Westbrook. Obviously any depth we had at "people who can throw a baseball" is gone. Game-wise the Indians stayed in it until the eighth, but lost this one 1-3 to fall to 16-27.

Saturday's game was unfortunately started by recently called-up David Huff, who has yet to see action in a major league inning past the third. After two starts, Huff's ERA of 17.55 is not the kind of effort you would like to see from a guy about to become our fourth starter. Offensively, the Indians held up their end against Cincinnati pitching prospect Homer Bailey. Mark DeRosa had a homerun and four RBI's on the night, and Kerry Wood picked up save number seven. Tribe (17-27) win 7-6. Oh and this game lasted three hours and forty nine minutes.

Today's game was another long one at three and a half hours, but going eleven innings probably didn't help. Cliff Lee struggled, by Cliff Lee standards, but still went six innings, only surrendering three runs. If memory serves me right one of Cliff's few losses last year came at Cincinnati. The bullpen did another excellent job (something that may be a trend), pitching four scoreless, but Luis Vizcaino gave up the winning run in the bottom of the eleventh. You might hear something about a controversial obstruction call the third base umpire made on the tying run (see picture) - don't worry about it, we lost anyway 3-4 to drop to 17-28.

Finally this road trip is over and it is back to Cleveland to lick our wounds. The loss of Laffey is the big blow here. Reyes has probably been having issues for a few starts now, so it appears like Jeremy Sowers will see a few more starts. After seeing what Huff was capable of Sowers looks almost like big league material. The reason Huff wasn't brought up sooner was because he struggled early at AAA and no one wanted to rush him - looks like they were right.

Up next is a four-game series against the fighting Rays of Tampa.

Game 1: David Price, LHP (0-0, -.--) vs. Fausto Carmona, RHP (2-4, 5.74)
Game 2: Matt Garza, RHP (4-2, 3.41) vs. Carl Pavano, RHP (4-4, 6.10)
Game 3: Andy Sonnanstine, RHP (3-4, 6.60) vs. To be announced (Sowers)
Game 4: Jeff Niemann, RHP (4-3, 4.53) vs. David Huff, LHP (0-1, 17.55)

Hey we get to see the season debut of David Price. Carl Pavano tries to become the only Indians starter still starting with a winning record. Sowers gets yet another last chance. And finally, can David Huff pitch into the fourth inning on his third try? All this and more at Progressive Field starting tomorrow.

Go Tribe!

(AP Photo/Tom Uhlman)