DawgTalkers.net Forums DawgTalk Tailgate Forum Surprising Tribe down the stretch

Marson picked off a guy stealing second and the ump called him safe. Cabrera approached him saying "That's BS" and the ump responded to him while pointing his finger at his face. It wasn't aggressive but it wasn't necessary either, especially considering that the ump unmistakably made an error. That runner then came around to score, too.

MLB really needs to examine their umpiring situation. These guys are far too concerned with being the center of attention and stroking their egos to do their jobs effectively. Unfortunately, Selig may be the worst commissioner of major sports in the US.

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Unfortunately, Selig may be the worst commissioner of major sports in the US.

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May be?

I would put him in the top 5 all time worst in any sport.

Thanks for the info on the play.

Yeah. Stern is really awful too, though.

What a way to piddle away two on in the ninth with no out. Oh yeah, and Hafner got hurt again. 4.5 out, 1 game over .500 (Tigers are 10 games over .500). This team is done.

Well, so much for THAT. We couldn't pick a worst time to get swept. Good effort to come back today though. Too bad it got wasted by lousy execution. Again. That ball by LaPorta wasn't NEARLY deep enough to send Fukudome. <sigh>

That trade for Jimenez is looking worse by the start. I still say the Rockies knew something about the kid and fleeced us. Hopefully, I'm wrong and he'll get it turned around. I just have a bad feeling about this...

that was a gigantic kick to the balls.

the tribe has some winnable games coming up. detroit has 4 with tampa this week. go rays.

The fat lady's warming up. I think we need 8-2 homestand, 7-3 at worst, to still be in this race on Sept. 1.

when we're 6-7 games out then you could start talking about the fat lady. Still have 39 games, and only 3 back in the loss column. We're still very much in the thick of it.

This ubaldo trade is looking like a disaster. This guy better produce the next 2 years, or someone needs to get fired. We were getting better production from alex white when he was up here. Hopefully he could solve his control issues, and stop throwing fastballs down the middle.

I agree Trella. We're not out of this thing yet, but we sure didn't help ourselves this weekend. I'm most worried about Kipnis and Pronk being out for too long. We had enough trouble producing runs WITH these guys in the lineup.

... and the Ubaldo trade... Yikes. I'm not giving up on it just yet, but I'm seeing more reasons why the Rockies were willing to trade him than keep him. If this doesn't work out, it could really set the Tribe back going forward.

I get there's still 40 games left. My though process is based more on what i've seen rather then games back.

As to what i've seen: how many games in the last 2-3 weeks have we had a shot at and lost late? 9 or 10? This team excels when it has a 'what do we have to lose' attitude, but can't seem to get over the hump. Yesterday's game is a perfect example of this. And to me that says that this team, right now, is not ready for the pressure that comes with a playoff race. We thought they were, and went into Detroit and got bitch slapped.

It's a learning experience for these kids and it will payoff in the future, I just don't get the feeling they have it this year.

Over the next 10 games, we're playing the dregs of the AL while Detroit has Tampa and the Twins. The tigers have a similar stretch at the end of Sept. We must make up ground this next 10 games. Face it, we're not gonna sweep the last six games from them.

Jc...
After that hot 30-15 start, playing .500 ball the rest of the way would've been good enough to get a spot in the playoffs...hardly a tall order. Now they need to go .500 the rest of the way just to win 80 games. They have to win five more games than the Tigers do with three more games than they have. Barring a monumental Detroit collapse, it's all but done.

no problem. the Indians are in that category with those teams too since we appointed Bud Grant in charge of our draft (instead of the disaster that Shapiro was in drafting).

what is surprising to me is that it was only 10 years ago when the Yankees, Red Sox, etc. just overpaid for all the top talent in the draft and international signings too. since then, they have stopped (Red Sox still spend alot but not in excess of those other teams mentioned).

just strange to me and I would suspect at some point the scales will tip back over, but for now, it seems incredibly hypocritical of Selig to complain about the wage wars in the draft when it's the only way for the small to mid market teams to compete.

man perez blows, each time he pitches it gets harder to watch...has no idea where its going

they're done. it was fun while it lasted. really really really disappointing.

a lot of really nice things went to waste this year.

We just don't have enough depth to handle things. We've gone through our upper level prospects, and have added about everyone we can from the Minors.

Choo wasn't with the team tonight. Hafner is out. Kipnis is out. Sizemore is out.

There is talk that Jim Thome, who was designated for assignment, might be headed to Cleveland. He would be a huge help right now, even though I have no clue what we'd do when Hafner returns. We sure need something to spark this team.

carmona looks good.








that is all.

it's pretty obvious that they need to go out and get a right handed power bat in the offseason. i think they were counting on laporta to be that guy, but that guy just continues to look like a marginal mlb/aaa player. at least we got brantley outta that deal.

Looks like it's on ESPN:

Link

The Minnesota Twins placed pitcher Nick Blackburn on the 15-day disabled list Monday with a strained right forearm and placed veteran slugger Jim Thome on waivers.

As reported by FoxSports.com and confirmed by a source to ESPN The Magazine's Buster Olney, 40-year-old Thome, who last week became the eighth player to reach 600 home runs, has hit the waiver wire and is expected to attract interest from teams such as the Phillies and Indians. Thome, however, declined to comment on the reports Monday.

"If that comes about in the future, we'll deal with that," Thome is quoted as saying in The Minneapolis Star Tribune. "Today, I know nothing really about that, so it's hard for me to answer your questions right now. ... Out of respect to the [Twins] organization and all that, the best thing is not to comment, to be honest."

We could really use a right handed 1st baseman and a power LF. I have a feeling that Sizemore is about done, and his power isn't coming back even if he himself manages to.

I suspect that Choo will turn things around next year. He's too talented to stay in the kind of funk he's been in. The DUI really seemed to play on his mind, then he got hurt ..... but I do think that he'll be back to normal with a vengeance next year.

Ah, they just did it this morning then.

there's no way we exercise that option on Grady. he's way too risky from an injury standpoint. and there's no way we don't exercise Carmona's option. at least they both made the decision easy.

it's a shame we had so many injuries down the stretch here. we kept pushing that boulder up the hill only to have something happen and it slid back down. major kudos to the guys for just going back to the bottom and pushing it back up again.

Tribe HAS to win both games today, with Mastersom and McCallister on the hill, and just hope D Price can shut down the Tigers and the Indians can get back to 4 games back after tonight.

As for Thome, bring him back, let him DH, when Hafner comes back let him play 1B til the end of the season or we are eliminated. If the Phillies are looking at Thome they have to be looking at him to play 1B right, so if he can do it there, he can do it here as well.

Is it disappointing that we won't go to the post season? Absolutely. You'd have to be in a comma to have avoided getting post-season hopes this year.

But this team has no where near the offensive firepower to compete in the post-season pool. Everyone talks about being in the race this late in the game. The only reason, the ONLY reason we are (were) anywhere near contention was that our division has been ridiculously bad up to now. ANY other division and we're 12 back - right where they projected us. Our crappy division is the real story this year. Not the Tribe's resurgence. It's a forgone conclusion that .500 is a pipedream. And if "average" is a pipedream, well that means you're bad. If you aren't average, you're bad.

Our pen has to be flawless. If there is even the slightest hiccup, the game is done. We can't score runs. We just can't.

What really disappoints me this year is not that we have all but sqwandered any chance to play post season. It's that the management caved in to the fan's near-sighted demands to make deals for players that haven't impacted the direction of the club. Opposite to our perennial "wait 'til next year" approach to management, the FO panicked and traded away next year for this year. A trade akin to driving a black step-van into a gated, upscale community and unloading the contents of a wealthy home into it during broad daylight, the Rockies stole us blind. This was sheer panic. Fukadome was a cheap excuse for improvement. Even my 10 year old daughter could break down the numbers on that one.

Long winded way of me being able to deal with the disappointment. We haven't played well enough to earn a spot in the playoffs. And for some reason, if all the other teams in our division decided, at the same time, that they were going to under-perform, it doesn't mean that we deserved to be in it.

And if we ever, by some accident, DID make it in, we would have gotten totally embarrassed infront of everyone.

The thing is, Frenchy, trade waivers means you have to trade something for Thome.

I say no way (if it were me). We have already given away too much for nothing. I really believe that the Jimenez nightmare will turn out to be a shockingly bad trade. It really already has. He was brought here to plug the hole before all the water drianed out. But the water HAS drained out.

We're on life support. The lungs are working but the brain is dead. Any heroic efforts to save the patient is out of emotion - not common sense.

We've already done enough damage by giving our 2 best young kids to another team. I'll tell ya, we can develop pitchers like no other team around. If we could just figure out how to not give them away for 24 dollars and some beaver pelts, we'd have something here.

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You'd have to be in a comma to have avoided getting post-season hopes this year.

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I prefer exclamation points myself .......

J/K

Anyway .. I really don't think that the Front Office gave in to anyone. I really think that they saw a team that is close enough to contending to add parts rather than trading them away. I think that they saw 2 really top rate starting pitchers in Masterson and Tomlin, and a glaring need for a 3rd. We control Carmona for another year, but he's been up and down. I think that they like Jimenez a great deal, and see him as a front of the rotation guy. He may need a bit of time to adjust to the AL. I think that he'll get there though.

Further, we gave up some really good pitchers to get Jimenez, but if Carasco comes back and continues to develop, and Huff does the same, where do guys like White and Pomeranz go? This team has a lot of quality pitching throughout the system, and grabbing a guy you think is a stud, and under contract for a couple years after this season is never a bad thing.

No matter what happens this season, I suspect that we will try to keep the bullpen together, and add a pair of right handed bats at 1B and RF. With Brantley, Kipnis, Cabrera, and Santan, the middle is strong. We have a legitimate 5 tool guy in Choo. Chisenhall has massive potential.

I'm pretty psyched,even if we do wind up falling short this season. I think that we do have a good run left in us though.

You are right, I completely forgot about Howard. As for giving up prospects for him do you really think it would cost a AAA prospect to get him. I'm thinking low level prospect at best.

Well looks like we need a DH for the rest of the season, Thome fits, make it happen if you feel we are still in it FO:



Travis Hafner might need foot surgery

Associated Press

CLEVELAND -- Cleveland Indians designated hitter Travis Hafner might need season-ending surgery on his right foot.

Indians trainer Lonnie Soloff said Tuesday that surgery is among the options the team is exploring for Hafner, who was placed on the 15-day disabled list Monday. He is wearing a walking boot after an MRI showed a strained tendon in the bottom of the foot.

Soloff said a decision would be made in the next two days. The Indians entered Tuesday's doubleheader against Seattle tied for second in the AL Central with the White Sox, 5½ games behind Detroit.

Hafner has been playing with pain since injuring the foot on a slide in April. He aggravated the injury running the bases Sunday against Detroit after getting a single, a hit that broke an 0-for-16 slump.

Hafner is hitting .281 with 11 homers and 49 RBIs in 82 games.
http://espn.go.com/mlb/story/_/id/688805...ng-foot-surgery

I'd love to see a stat showing how many time our pitchers give back runs immediately after our offense scores. I wouldn't be shocked at all if it was around 50% for the last month. Terrible pitching.

2-2 today. Way to go guys!

It was fun while it lasted....the wheels are coming off...not sure why they left Masterson in. Guess because Perez was all over the place last night?

This one's on Acta. You can't send a struggling closer out there like that. If your gonna use him, give him a fresh inning.

Season = over

Tough stretch of games the past few weeks....seems like we've either won outright or lost the lead in the 9th. And now getting swept by detroit and probably by Seattle.

Oh well. We had a good run. Losing Kipnis, Sizemore, Hafner and Choo for a big chunk of the season didn't help.

It's Browns time anyway.

Agreed.