Often Outscored and Unsupported, but Over .500
The Cleveland Indians have lost their last three games by a collective score of 22-3. The most recent, a 7-1 defeat on Monday at Yankee Stadium, was over early. The Yankees scored two runs in each of the first three innings, and the Indians do not win slugfests.
But they do win games. Somehow, the Indians remain two games over .500, at 37-35, in second place in the American League Central. A formula based on run differential, devised by Bill James, says the Indians should be at least nine games below .500. And yet, here they are.
“Over all, we’re pleased that we’re still in the race despite clearly not playing our best baseball,” General Manager Chris Antonetti said outside the visiting clubhouse after the game.“We still feel like the roster we have has a lot of upside to it and hasn’t played to our potential.”
The Indians are not imposing. Their best-known players, Grady Sizemore and Travis Hafner, are on the disabled list. Right fielder Shin-Soo Choo and catcher Carlos Santana have not become consistent stars. They are futile against left-handers.
Coming into Monday’s game, the Indians ranked 10th in the league in runs scored and 13th in earned run average. Their hitters were 12th in home runs, their pitchers 12th in strikeouts. They have now allowed 48 more runs than they have scored.
“It’s been kind of weird, honestly,” closer Chris Perez said. “If we’re ahead after five, we win. And even if we’re down by one or two, it seems big. It’s just one of those anomalies.
“When we get beat, we get beat. It’s usually big runs. And when we win, it’s close. The run differential is not going to be there.”
Perez and his setup men, Vinnie Pestano and Joe Smith, are the team’s greatest strength. The rest of the bullpen has been shaky, but the three late-inning relievers have helped the Indians go 11-2 in one-run games. Cleveland has lost only twice when leading after six innings; the Yankees have three such losses.
“The main thing has been our bullpen, the back end of our bullpen,” Manager Manny Acta said. “Close ballgames we feel we have a very good chance of winning, because those guys at the end are lights-out.”
Starters Ubaldo Jimenez and Justin Masterson have pitched well lately. The Indians are strong up the middle, with second baseman Jason Kipnis and shortstop Asdrubal Cabrera, and their batters walk a lot. They missed a chance to trade for third baseman Kevin Youkilis, who was sent from Boston to the Central-leading Chicago White Sox on Sunday, but Antonetti said improvement would have to come from within.
“No one guy externally, no matter who we bring in, will solve our issues,” he said. “The guys that are here need to play to their potential.”
The Indians should learn a lot about their true selves in the coming weeks. They play series against the Yankees, the Baltimore Orioles, the Los Angeles Angels and the Tampa Bay Rays before the All-Star break. Losing two of three in Houston last weekend was not an encouraging send-off.
Back home, the fans seem skeptical. The Indians have turned over nearly their entire roster since 2007, when they beat the Yankees in the division series. The progress they seemed to show last season, when they started 30-15, was overshadowed by finishing 15 games behind the division-winning Detroit Tigers. Now Cleveland ranks last in the league in attendance, averaging only 18,408 fans a game.
Perez has expressed frustration with that, and did so again Monday. He said fans seemed to care more about rooting against LeBron James and the Miami Heat than they do about rooting for the Indians.
“I don’t get the psyche,” said Perez, who grew up in Florida. “Why cheer against a guy that’s not even in your city anymore? Just to see him fail? Does that make you feel good? I could see if the Cavs were in the championship, but that’s their mentality.
“They’ve had a lot of years of misery. They say, ‘You just don’t understand because you don’t live here.’ O.K., maybe I don’t. But that doesn’t mean it has to keep going.”
The Indians drew more than 3 million fans for six seasons in a row starting in 1996, the year the N.F.L. Browns moved to Baltimore. The new version of the Browns has not won a playoff game in its 13 seasons.
“That’s what I don’t understand,” Perez said. “Their whole thing is, ‘We want a winner.’ Well, why do you support the Browns? They don’t win. They’ve never won. They left. You guys blindly support them. I don’t understand it. It’s a double standard, and I don’t know why.
“It’s head-scratching. It’s just — they don’t come out. But around the city, there’s great support. They watch it in the bars. They watch it at home. They just don’t come.”
Maybe the schedule will doom the Indians by the middle of July. Maybe the run differential will widen so much that it swallows the team. Maybe the Tigers will come alive and sprint to the playoffs again. There is a chance all of that will happen.
But summer is here and the Indians are contenders, without even playing very well. Their statistics might improve, but who wants to believe so rigidly in numbers, anyway? So far, they have lied about the Indians.
Link:
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/26/s...-explain-how-indians-win.html?_r=3&ref=sports
