Month: August 2006 (Page 10 of 17)

With the way Indians rookie catcher Kelly Shoppach is playing defensively, Victor Martinez should seriously consider giving up catching. Shoppach has opened the eyes of many Tribe fans recently with his solid skills behind the plate and should be considered a very reasonable option as the team’s future backstop.

Shoppach is only batting .265 but has showed some promise offensively the past couple of weeks. He has begun to show some pop in his bat, hitting his third homer of the season on Saturday night. However, his biggest asset to the club at this point is his arm behind the plate. The Indians organization has been high on him because of his throwing ability and against the Royals we saw why. Shoppach threw out three baserunners and has an absolute cannon for an arm. He has much better mechanics than Victor and gets rid of the ball much quicker.

Some stats to chew on (2006 season) –

Martinez: 96 gms. played, has thrown out 14-of-86 basestealers…16%
Shoppach: 23 gms. played, has thrown out 6-of-13 basestealers…46%

One of the Indians’ problems all season, as well as in previous years, has been controlling the opposition’s running game. Teams have been able to run at will on Martinez but with Shoppach behind the plate that hasn’t been the case. We all know how important defense is and having a good catcher is especially important. Shoppach’s defense is already above average and his offense should only improve as he gets more playing time. With Shoppach gunning down basestealers, teams will be a little more reluctant to send runners once they reach first base.

Hold the phone, Tribe fans. The Indians are on a hot streak and are starting to make a habit out of late-inning comebacks. In the second game of their doubleheader, the Tribe got two runs in the eighth to overtake the Royals 6-5. It was another hit by Travis Hafner that gave the Indians the victory. This time, it happened one inning earlier. With Jason Michaels at first in the eighth, Hafner drove a ball in the right-center field gap. Michaels, running on the pitch, was able to score. A few batters earlier, Grady Sizemore blasted a pitch that landed deep in the lower deck in right field to tie the game.

“It’s tough to win a doubleheader,” manager Eric Wedge said. “We had multiple guys step up in both games.”

“We haven’t had many walk-off wins or wins in our last at-bat,” Hafner said. “It’s nice to get on a roll.”

Jeremy Guthrie struggled a bit in his spot start. He allowed four runs and six walks in 4 2/3 innings but Tom Mastny came on in relief and did a decent job keeping the Royals at bay. Brian Sikorski got the win for the Indians.

Four in a row and it could be five by the end of the day. The Indians used more last at-bat heroics to beat the Royals 5-4 in the first game of a Saturday doubleheader. After Hector Luna walked in the bottom of the ninth, Aaron Boone got him to second on a sacrifice bunt. Royals reliever Joe Nelson intentionally walked Sizemore, struck out Michaels, and gave up the winning single to Travis Hafner. Pronk’s winner got the Indians’ bullpen off the hook, who had a rough top half of the inning. Some shaky defensive play allowed the Royals to score three and tie it off of Jason Davis. Starter C.C Sabathia was outstanding yet again, allowing only one run and striking out 10 in eight innings. In his past 23 innings now, Sabathia has given up just two earned runs.

The controversy will no doubt start. Should Wedge have left C.C in to finish out the game? Maybe, but he was at 111 pitches, we had a comfortable lead at the time, and Davis has pitched well as of late. The error by Luna and Marte’s poor throw set up the disaster so you can’t blame it all on Davis.

In front of over 30,000 at the Jake, the Tribe showed some energy and enthusiasm in an extremely rare come from behind win. It’s exciting victories like this that provide some hope for the future of the organization. Wins like this have been few and far between this season and it was satisfying and nostalgic to see the fans passionate and to feel some electricity in the stadium for once.

These guys have caught a spark recently. If the Tribe would have been competitive at this point in the season, most of the young players would still be in Triple-A so they are taking full advantage of their opportunity at the big league level.

Moments like what happened Friday night occured on a daily basis in the mid ’90s with the Tribe. Those magic days of walk-off homers and last at-bat thrilling victories most likely won’t return for quite some time. But, it was fun for one night to experience a flashback of what was for this franchise and what we as fans are hoping for again in the near future.