I don't want to say watching the Indians offense is torture, but Dick Cheney has been seen in the scouting section the last two days at the Metrodome making tapes for use at Guantanamo.Who in the Tribe's lineup do you want to see come to the plate in a clutch situation?
Who in the Tribe's lineup do you want to see come to the plate in any situation?
Grady Sizemore with his 15 Ks in 73 ABs. (More than 1 in every 5 trips).
Victor Martinez? OK I'll give you him.
Ryan Garko? Maybe, but he can be streaky.
The so-called PronK? He seems to be continuing to employ the swing-hard-in-case-I-hit-it approach he perfected last year. And talk about your strikeouts - 18 in 70 ABs (on in four!!)
The other guys? No need even asking about them.
This is not a good offensive team. Period.
Even in last year's 96-win season the offense was in mothballs for a month at a time at least twice. Remember the post-All-Star-game period?
With today's 9 Ks, the Tribe has whiffed 122 times in 19 games so far this season. That's about 6 1/2 Ks a game. About one in every four of the outs made.
The modern thinkers in baseball say the strikeout is overrated as an offensive deficiency, especially if you walk a lot.
The Tribe has walked 67 times so far. That's a little over 3 walks a game.
Even if the Tribe was showing a better eye, I still don't go along with the strikeouts-are-no-big-deal crowd.
If you put the ball in play, things happen. Balls are booted, lost in the sun (or the Metrodome Roof), or thrown into the seats or up the right field line. Even if the ball is played well, runners move up when contact is made.
Watching this team flail away at the plate is painful indeed.
The anemic nature is sometimes obscured a bit by the occasional blowout victory - the proverbial lipstick on the pig.
The Tribe has scored 76 runs in 19 games so far this year. But 21 of those runs came in just two games. Eliminate those two aberrations and it becomes 55 runs in 17 games, or 3.09 runs a game.
The team was last in the league in hitting going into today at .239. I'm going to guess that today's 6 hits didn't do much to move them up on the list.
This team needs to bring in a hitter from somewhere, without regard for the fact that they might be trading away the third starter in the 2011 rotation.
Unless and until, it aint water boarding, but it's the kind of entertainment Dick Cheney would love.
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4 comments:
no, it's an offense that eric "the genius" wedge loves because it has nothing but slow, white journeyman veterans and younger sub-servient hispanic gentleman. where are all the cocky and talented black guys with attitude??? wedge just can't seem to deal with those kind of players and so he would just as soon trade them away or send them back to the minors so he doesn't have to deal with them. just look at his track record with african-american guys like milton bradley, jody gerut, matt lawton, brandon philips, coco crisp, josh barfield and ben francisco. by the same token, look at his preference (or maybe even a weird fetish???) for mediocre caucasian guys like aaron boone, trot "the rot" nixon, jason michaels, david dellucci, casey blake and the worst of the bunch - mike "the louse" rouse. he just seems to have much more patience for his precious "wedge pets" and very little patience, if any, for the "brothers". so much of the indians problems would be cleared up if they just get rid of one or the other or both dellucci and/or michaels, call up ben francisco to be the full-time left-fielder, let andy marte play for about a week or two straight to see what he can bring to the table and just let blake be a super-utility guy who can fill in at a variety of spots as needed. lord knows it couldn't get any worse than it already is and who knows, it might actually get better??? we can only hope.
Hey Dave:
Let me first be clear that I am not agreeing or disagreeing with you about Wedge on the race issue.
I don't know him personally at all and so I can't make those kind of judgments.
But I will say Milton Bradley has worn out his welcome in a year or two at every stop he's made, not just Cleveland under Wedge.
Jody Gerut mangled his leg and was out of baseball rehapping for a two or three years. He tried comebacks with a couple of teams and I think he might have made it as the last guy on the roster of the Padres this season, though I'm not 100% sure of that.
Lawton was traded for Arthur Rhodes, who is not only African-American but also turned out to be more useful to the Tribe. So on its baseball merits it was a good deal.
As for Philips, Crisp, Barfield and Francisco, I can't argue one way or the other because I don't know.
Barfield had a miserable year and was given 2/3 of a season to get it back together.
On the other hand, Francisco showed plenty of promise in his brief time up with the Tribe, Coco Crisp was a solid player here and we all know the story with Phillips.
As for Wedge's soft spot for talent-challenged white guys, you may have something there, but I'm not sure it is their "whiteness" that is at play.
Wedge never really made it big in the bigs and had to scrap and claw for every game he got in the show.
Again, I have no way to really know, but I think he tends to favor guys with limited talent who have to scrap and play hard at all times just to get enough out of themselves to stick.
That's my attempt for the day at amateur psychology.
I will also agree that the sooner we open up left field for Francisco, or Choo/Francisco we will likely be a better team.
As for Marte, he doesn't seem to have the mental toughness and self confidence to allow his talents to blossom. I would have disagreed with you even a week ago about giving him a shot, but this team is so punchless that they might as well take a look at a guy who at least has the ability to do something, even if that ability is hiding behind his ow self-doubt.
(There I go again, with the amateur psychologist thing.)
Anyway. Thanks for writing. I wish more readers would. It makes this whole blogging thing a lot more fun.
here comes "big ben" - are they going to let him play - who replaces westbrook in the rotation
cliff lee - unbelievable !!!!
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