Cleveland Teaparty. Destroy The AL East, Part 2
By Erie's Scribe on Oct 11, 2007 with Comments 4
Just in case you missed it, Red Sox fans, meet Asdrual Cabrera, he will break your will.
Okay, one series down and two to go. Nice win in the Yanks series. I tend to find Yankees fans to be pretty gracious losers so I didn’t rub it in too much. I was happy, but not as fired up as Scott (check the 3rd post down, compliments of my hippy buddy JJ).
On to bigger and better things like the ALCS. Whew, this is a tough match-up. I looked at the Yankees pitching staff and I smiled. I look at the Beantown staff my smile turns upside down. Personally I feel great about the Tribe’s starting pitching., but I have to admit that the Beckett/Schilling top of the rotation is a match for C.C. and Fausto. After that you get Dice-K and Wakefield. I consider them similar to Westbrook and Byrd. You could get an outstanding game from either of them or you could get crap, but the best bet is mediocracy. I’m thinking the starting pitching is a wash.
So what about the bullpen? The Tribe’s bullpen is dominant until the 9th. The brothers Rafael were nasty in the Yankees series. Lewis looked good as well. Despite the Red Sox having some quality with Delcarmen, Okajima, Timlin and Lopez, I like the Indians in middle relief. The Wahoo Warriors are just dominating there. Plus, maybe Eric Gagne could get involved? The Tribe has no Eric Gagnes lurking in the bullpen. At the end of the pen, the Red Sox have Papelbon. Solid. The Tribe has the “Human Heart Attack” Joe Borowski. Scary. Joe-Bo did stop the Yankees in Yankee Stadium, so that makes me feel a little better, but it’s still touch and go with him. “Yo, bartender, Jobu needs a refill!”
The fielding is comprable, the Indians made 9 more errors this year, but can match Boston’s .986 fielding percentage with a .985 one of their own.
The Beantown line-up isn’t as stacked as the Yankees were, but they’re nothing to trifle with. Manny and Big Plopy turned it on in the Angels series, a trend that cannot continue if the Tribe are to win this series. After those two, though, who scares me in the Boston line-up? Lugo? Crisp? J.D. Drew? Youkkilis? Lowell? Pedroia? Veritek? The answers would be: no, no, no, not much, a little bit, yes (becuse he’s their Asdrubal Carbrera), and hell no, isn’t that guy like 80? The Sox scored more runs in the regular season, but I’m giving the edge to the Tribe’s line-up. They showed that they can play station to station baseball if the situation calls for it in the Yankees series (with some great bunting) and that flexibility could be all the difference. And the Tribe has a mix of speed and power, not much speed for the Sox.
This series has the potential for great baseball. The Sox fans have yet to draw my ire like the Spankees fans did. Sure, Sox fans are annoying and the worst bandwagon, Johnny Come Lately, no baseball IQ ass clowns around, but they’ve just started this trend recently. I still look at them as loveable losers. An opinion that I’m sure will change at 7 pm on Friday. I think, though, that their preoccupation with the Yankees is going to be their undoing. While the Red Sox Nation is still grab-assing, harrassing Yankees fans and gloating over the Yanks demise, C.C. sandbags the Red Sox on Friday followed by Carmona dominanting over an aging Schill-dog on Saturday. This puts the Sox in an 0-2 hole before the clam chowder is served for the weekend. Then the usual, “The Sky is Falling” talk starts in Massachusetts and the Tribe takes the series in 6.
As ex-Tribe manager Lou Brown (he managed the Cerrano, Dorn, Taylor, Mays-Hayes, Harris and Vaughn team in the 80′s) said, this year’s Indians are “My kinda team, Charlie, my kinda team.”
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Erie’s Scribe aka Dr. A,
Glad you enjoyed the Indians series victory over the Spankees. I certainly did. What I am going to enjoy more, however, is watching the BoSox overwhelm the Mistake by the Lake in 5 games. Maybe 6. Depends on how many games Joe Borowski blows.
dear anonymous,
on behalf of ES who is attending this weekend, I am obligated to defend the tribe. uhhh…perhaps later tonight…
BTW, for any Tribe fans, I have two great blogs for you: http://www.letsgotribe.com/ and
http://indians247.com/index.php
Enjoy!
–ES
Well, anonymous (if that is your real name), C.C. and Fausto shocked me by pitching terribly, yet the Indians got the split.
Then the Tribe went up against a guy in Dice-K who has some strange aura when he pitches for the Japaneese national team and could call upon that good karma at any time. Only, he hasn’t yet and he doesn’t even know if or when it will happen.
Now you got Wakefield…… scary. More on him tomorrow.