Tribe Homestand (Pale Hose and Rangers) Wrap: Trendspotting
Posted by Fred on May 29, 2008
Question: When is a 2-4 homestand something to cheer about?
Answer: When the homestand features an offense that appeared to be in permanent hibernation. In the just-wrapped six-game set against Chicago and Texas, the Tribe collected 55 hits and scored 31 runs. On the preceding road trip to Chicago and Cincinnati, the Indians managed only 37 hits and 13 runs. As a club, the Tribe hit .248 against Texas and .265 against Chicago, their best performance since an April trip to Kansas City that featured wins of 15-1 and 9-6.
With the exception of the trip to Chicago, the offense has been steadily improving in both batting average and OPS:
Individually, many of the Tribe’s regulars swung the bat much better in this homestand. Six hitters hit better than .275 for the homestand, and seven had an OPS above .750:
| Player | AVG |
| Jamey Carroll | .385 |
| Andy Marte | .333 |
| Victor Martinez | .316 |
| Asdrubal Cabrera | .308 |
| Ben Francisco | .296 |
| Jhonny Peralta | .280 |
| Player | OPS |
| Jhonny Peralta | 1.013 |
| Jamey Carroll | 1.000 |
| Grady Sizemore | .955 |
| Ben Francisco | .866 |
| Andy Marte | .833 |
| David Dellucci | .813 |
| Victor Martinez | .771 |
Now if we could only do something abouth the pitching…
Up Next: The Tribe starts a brutal 11-game road trip in Kansas City Friday night. Cliff Lee (7-1, 1.50) looks to continue his splendid 2008 against Gil Meche (3-7, 5.35). Lee has been shakier his last two starts, but appeared to find control of his fastball against the Rangers, settling down after a couple of rocky innings. Meche only gave up two runs his last time out against the Blue Jays, but struggled to throw strikes, needing 115 pitches to get through six innings. C.C. Sabathia (3-6, 4.74) battles Brett Tomko (2-6, 6.11) on Saturday. C.C. took yet another hard-luck loss in his last outing, a 2-1 loss in which he gave up one run on five hits in seven innings. Tomko has a tendency toward the big inning this year, and gave up four runs in the second inning in his last start. Sunday’s finale features Paul Byrd (2-4, 4.10) and Brian Bannister (4-6, 4.97). Byrd got hit hard by the White Sox his last time out, but managed to limit the damage to three runs, thanks to some timely double plays.
If the Tribe hopes to stay in the AL Central race, they really need to take at least two from the Royals, with Sunday being on paper the hardest one to win. The White Sox are in Tampa bay to face the Rays, who (somewhat amazingly) sport the best record in the majors at 32-21.
