Tribe Report

MLB Headlines

MVN - a Cleveland Indians blog

Game #26: Laffey’s five no-hit innings not enough to beat Yankees

By James Pete | April 28th, 2008

E-mail | Print | Share

New York

CLEVELAND

W: Mike Mussina (3-3) L: Aaron Laffey (0-1) S: Mariano Rivera (8)

Aaron Laffey carried a no-hitter into the sixth inning tonight against the New York Yankees. Unfortunately for Laffey, that’s when the Yankees capitalized on an inning that saw only one ball leave the infield with four runs. The Yankees would go on to win the game, 5-2.

Melky Cabrera ended Laffey’s no-hit bid with an infield single to start the Yankees’ sixth inning rally. Derek Jeter followed with another infield single to Casey Blake on a ball that took a funny bounce, and Blake couldn’t barehand. Bobby Abreu than hit the only ball out of the infield that inning, a single to left, loading the bases. Laffey beaned ARod, to give the Yankees their first run. Jason Giambi scored another run on a ground out to Ryan Garko. Hideki Matsui followed with a ground out of his own to Garko, that scored both Jeter and Bobby Abreu, and the Indians’ lead was gone, 3-2. Laffey was gone after that, in favor of Jensen Lewis. Laffey was visibly upset walking off the mound, yelling into his glove. It was good to see Laffey and his fire, as opposed to the lost pitcher we saw in spring. Lewis would give up another run on a Morgan Ensberg dribbler up the middle before the inning was over.

Laffey still looked solid, although the stats ultimately won’t show it. Tribe management has already made the commitment to Laffey staying with the club to replace Jake Westbrook, but it remains to be seen which Tribe lefty has the advantage long-term. Jeremy Sowers pitched well on Saturday, and both seem to have done enough to stay in Cleveland. Ironically enough, what got Sowers the first start, pitching of five days rest, lost him the entire month. The next open start isn’t until next Saturday, so Sowers wins…for now.

After tonight’s start, it would be hard to say he didn’t earn it.

The Yankees pitching shut down the Tribe bats in the last four innings, in a mirror image of what happened Sunday. Ryan Garko hasn’t hit in what seems like a month, and Travis Hafner hasn’t hit since 2006. Without Grady Sizemore, who missed his second straight game with a sprained ankle, the Indians seemed helpless in the latter part of the game. Sure, the Yankees’ bullpen aren’t dogs, but there was no life at all at the end. The offense had something going against Mussina in the third, with runners on second and third and one out, only to have David Dellucci strike out, and Jamey Carroll ground out. Cleveland left the bases full of Indians in the fifth, when Jhonny Peralta hit a soft liner to Jeter. In the sixth, Cleveland had runners on the corners with two outs, only to have Dellucci strike out again. Yeah, it was pretty putrid.

Seattle comes to Cleveland tomorrow night. Fausto Carmona will face off against Carlos Silva.

This entry was posted on Monday, April 28th, 2008 at 10:48 pm and is filed under Travis Hafner, Fausto Carmona, Jeremy Sowers, Carlos Silva, James Pete, Aaron Laffey, Casey Blake, Tribe Loss, ARod, Jamey Carroll, Jensen Lewis, Grady Sizemore, Jhonny Peralta, Derek Jeter, Melky Cabrera, Hideki Matsui, Jason Giambi, Alex Rodriguez, Bobby Abreu, Ryan Garko, Cleveland Indians, David Dellucci, Seattle Mariners, New York Yankees, Tribe Report. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

8 Responses to “Game #26: Laffey’s five no-hit innings not enough to beat Yankees”

RollingWave says:

April 28th, 2008 at 11:51 pm

the Yankees really hit the shit out of the ball in the 6th didn’t they? that was the weakest 4-run rally without a error or wild pitch or walk i’ve seen in a loooong while.

not good for the Indians to not be able to put this series away after leading 2-0 getting 2 wins in close games. espically when you had CC Sabathia throw one of his best game and facing Mike Mussina
Mick says:

April 29th, 2008 at 5:46 am

I haven’t looked to see how Michael Aubrey is doing down on the farm but isn’t it time for Garko to take a nice little vacation to Buffalo or someplace to regain his perspective. He must have options.
Chet Wheeler says:

April 29th, 2008 at 6:52 am

How long is it going to be before the Indians get a real hitter in their lineup? Peralta, Hafner, Blake, Gutierrez, Cabrera, Garko, Dellucci, Michaels — anyone this side of Grady and Vic is completely hit or miss at this point and time. You have no idea what kind of at bats you’ll get from them. This team has very few professional hitters.

Maybe Sowers and Laffey grabbed some people’s attention with their nationally televised artistry (Sat) and 5-nning no-no with a four run infield hit rally by the Yanks on Monday.

The Indians have great pitching and PATHETIC offense, and they really need to do something about it because waiting around for this team’s two-week hot streak to carry them to the central title ain’t working this year.
Joe says:

April 29th, 2008 at 9:22 am

No one likes to say this because he’s been so entrenched in the great young tribe triumvirate, along with Vic and Hafner, but Grady Sizemore has gone from superstar-on-the-rise to a “nice” player who gets to a lot of fly balls and strikes out entirely too much. As an armchair quarterback watching on TV and in the stands, when Grady and Hafner come up, I’ve literally stopped getting my hopes up.

It’s not a popular opinion in these here parts, but Grady Sizemore is overrated. At least he has been over the last two years. Because his numbers have been pedestrian when you compare them to the hype surrounding him that still hasn’t gone away. He’s still considered one of the best young players in the game, and, while he still is on paper, he hasn’t shown it in the field on a consistent basis for over a year.
James Pete says:

April 29th, 2008 at 9:25 am

It’s such a catch-22. I’m ticked off the Tribe didn’t deal for a hitter…

Of course…to get one, the were trying to deal Lee.

I agree with Geoff that I don’t know we have the answer in the minors, for what we need. You now have the option of dealing Paul Byrd, Jeremy Sowers and/or Aaron Laffey, in my opinion, for a stick.

The problem is that there isn’t much out there. I wouldn’t deal ANY of them for Adam Dunn. Well, Byrd, but nobody is going to touch Byrd, without a Miller or lefty involved.

Let me ask you this?

Would any of you deal Lee right now?

He’s as sell high as you can get. Could we get a major bat for him? Would we want to?
Barry says:

April 29th, 2008 at 9:54 am

Well, probably not if we’re going to lose CC. But I think we could all be encouraged, after seeing Laffey and Sowers (esp Laffey) of what this staff could look like without a Lee (his ‘08 incarnation) or Sabathia in the rotation. So I guess my answer, James, is “maybe.” But it would have to be for someone not as marginal as Jason Bay or Xavier Nady or Adam Dunn.
Geoff Beckman says:

April 29th, 2008 at 1:25 pm

Let me clear something up, guys. I spent a long weekend seeing my family. I did not pack the Indians’ offense…

At least, I don’t think I did. I take what I thought was a backscratcher– could that have been it?

The depressing part about the last few games is that, except for Gutierrez (who’s 25), Marte (24) and Cabrera (22), this isn’t a young team that just needs some patience.

Dellucci, Michaels, Hafner, Blake and Carroll are all over 30. In the last two cases, way over. They can’t be expected to get better– best case is that they hold their ground, worst case is they get worse.

Dellucci is having an OK year– .268 with 18 homers in 400 at-bats is pretty decent production, but everyone else is pond scum.

Martinez (29), Garko (27) and Peralta (26) are in their primes This is the period when players have their best years Martinez is godlike. Peralta’s production (he’s on pace for 30 homers and .250) isn’t bad for a shortstop, but he offsets it by not walking and playing mediocre defense.

I’ve been expecting the league to catch up with Garko, and they might have done it. Best I can say: he’s not getting much to swing at (13 walks and 13 strikeouts). If teams had to pitch to him, perhaps his average would go up– they’re just pitching around him and letting him get himself out.

Grady Sizemore is 25, but he’s working on his fourth full season. Joe is quite right about his performance. In 2005 and 2006, his batting average, on-base percentage and slugging percentage all rose. Since then, his offense has decayed.

The average fell from .290 to .277 last year and it’s now at .266. The impressive slugging percentage (.533 in 2006) dropped to .462 last year and it’s down to .372– lower than his on-base (.375).

Sizemore has gone from being one of the best players in baseball to a pretty good centerfield-leadoff guy– like Brett Butler used to be (but with three times as many strikeouts) or Trevor Crowe (if he ever puts it together) might be

There isn’t anyone in the minors– you can tell that by looking at the records of the teams. The AAA club is 10-16, the AA team is 9-13, the high A team is 7-14. They ain’t winning because they ain’t got no players– look at the rosters and you see guys in their late 20’s.

(Lake County is 15-8, so there is help coming– but it is years away.)

Francisco is a marginal gain over Michaels. And, other than more at-bats for Shoppach (moving Martinez to DH and Hafner to the bench) and some at-bats for Marte (he’s had four plate appearances since I last wrote his name), there isn’t any help on the bench.

This lineup looks a lot like the Twins in recent memory– get by the catcher and the centerfielder and don’t make a mistake to the other two guys who might hurt you and you can pretty much hold them to 2-3 runs a game.

I have nothing to add to my recent suggestion that the Indians need to trade for a hitter. It should not be an older guy– Adam Dunn or Jason Bay– but a young guy who’s either (a) messed up his first shot and is out of favor with his team and could be had cheap or (b) hitting .350 in AAA and seemingly destined for a great career.

If I were going to trade pitchers, I’d rank them by the probability that they were going to have great years for the Indians in the next 2-3 years, and try to move the ones least likely to. That would make the ranking something like:

1. Sabathia (contract)
2. Byrd (age, contract also up)
3. Lee (won’t keep it up, not sure how far he’ll drop)
4. Sowers (one good year and one bad one)
5. Westbrook (now 30; has had injury issues)
6. Laffey (23, no major missteps in his brief time up)
7. Carmona (24 and already a star)

The top two guys are difficult to trade, so Lee and Sowers are the first options. But they don’t have unhittable stuff– they need to be 100% physically and mentally in order to win. And when they’re not, they get shelled.

They might, I think, bring the following in a 1-1 swap:

1. A tarnished prospect (someone else’s Marte).

2. A boom/bust AAA guy. Tonight’s opponent has Wladimir Balentien on the farm. He’s 23, has hit 110 homers in 521 minor league games (about 35 a year), and draws about 70 walks a year and plays decent defense..

But his career average is .273, and he’s struck out 558 times (165 a year). He could get control of his swing (he’s on-pace for ‘only’ 105 this year) and be a good low-average, high-power hitter (Joe Carter). Or he might end up as a less-extreme version of Russ Branyan.

3. They could get a good medium range prospect. I love Mike Saunders future (also in the M’s farm system) He’s 21, and already a good AA player. A good centerfielder who can steal bases, draw walks and hit for average. In the teens in homers and might be able to improve his power into the 20’s (or maybe 30’s).

But he’s hitting .306 in AA and his ETA is ‘09 or ‘10, so that doesn’t really help the Indians now.

If they want a good player– a guy who can step in and help now– it’s going to take two pitchers, plus some lottery tickets from the minors (like Akron’s Josh Rodriguez, who looks like a poor man’s Jhonny Peralta, but maybe could get it together).

Opposing GM’s aren’t stupid– they have access to the same information we all do, plus their scouting reports and tape.

Cleveland might be able to hold up a guy in the grip of pennant fever– but they’ll need to wait until June, when they’re still playing well and all the blood has rushed to his loins.

At this point, about all they can do is wait, see if anyone comes out of the spin (Cabrera has hit .313 in his last five games; Gutierrez has hit .267) and hope the pitching doesn’t slump, and that nobody gets too far in front of them by the time they can make a deal.

Not a real good strategy,. but it’s about all they have now. The best thing going for the Indians is that they have a history of slow starts, followed by streaks of great baseball– and maybe history will repeat.
Chet Wheeler says:

April 29th, 2008 at 8:08 pm

Their offense . . . pathetic.