MVN - Most Valuable Network

Peralta powers up Indians sweep of the Devil Rays

Jhonny Peralta hit his second home run of the series, as the Cleveland Indians completed a four game sweep of the Tampa Bay Rays, 5-2.

Peralta’s third inning sacrifice fly, tied the game at three. Ben Francisco had gotten the Indians on the board an at bat earlier with a single, scoring Franklin Gutierrez. Peralta would save his real fireworks for the fifth inning. Grady Sizemore had walked to lead off the inning. Jamey Carroll moved him over with a sacrifice. Peralta didn’t need it, as he took the second pitch over the wall in left field for a two-run homer that would give the Indians the lead for good.

Peralta has been scorching of late. He’s 9 for his last 21 at bats, scoring five runs, and driving in 13. His average has climbed ten points during the surge. He is also riding a seven game hitting streak going into the break. If the Indians are going to deal their clean-up hitting shortstop, his value isn’t going to get any higher than it is right now.

If I didn’t see it with my own eyes, I wouldn’t believe it. Andy Marte hit a home run. I’m not kidding. His home run is the first of the season for Marte. Maybe it had something to do with playing in four out of the past five ball games. He was the only Indian to have multiple hits today. Let’s not go too crazy here, he’s only batting .177.

Seriously, Jeremy Sowers had one of the strangest starts I’ve ever seen. In the second inning, he gave up a run, without giving up a hit. He walked Jonny Gomes with one out, then balked him to second. He then stole third. Sowers walked Shawn Riggans, to put runners on first and third. He struck out shortstop Ben Zobrist next, for his second K in the inning. He then walked Gabe Gross and Akinori Iwamura back-to-back, to give the Rays their first run. He then struck out Willie Aybar to end the inning. So for those counting at home, he struck out the side, and in between, walked four, gave up a stolen base, and a balk. All that for one Rays run.

Sowers struck out eight, walked seven, gave up three hits and two runs, and was gone after the fourth inning. Weird start.

The World Team beat the U.S. team in the Future’s Game today. Matt LaPorta went 1 for 3, with a walk, and Wes Hodges went 1 for 2, with a double. The U.S. Team only had three total hits. Hector Rondon, the only pitcher in the game today for the Indians, pitched a perfect third inning, with a strikeout. What I watched of this game was excruciating, but it was good to see the Tribe players doing something, when nobody else was. You’d have to think it might put Hodges and LaPorta on the Olympic team.

The bullpen went five perfect innings. I’ll give you a few seconds to blink, and re-read. Tom Mastny, who got the win, and who I slammed earlier in the week, went two innings, striking out two. Edward Mujica went 1 1/3, striking out two. Rafael Perez went 2/3 of an inning, striking out one, and Masa Kobayashi got his fifth save in an inning of work, striking out one.

I don’t know how much we can judge the Indians by this series. You’d like to think they just swept the first place team in the East (they did), but this is the Tampa Bay Rays we are talking about. The irony? We may have just swept them out of any deals for Peralta and Blake…or…swept them right into it, depending on your take.

This entry was posted on Sunday, July 13th, 2008 at 3:27 pm and is filed under Masa Kobayashi, Edward Mujica, Tampa Bay Rays, Jamey Carroll, Tom Mastny, Gabe Gross, Tribe Victory, Hector Rondon, Willie Aybar, Shown Riggans, Wes Hodges, Ben Francisco, Rafael Perez, Jhonny Peralta, Cleveland Indians, Akinori Iwamura, Jonny Gomes, Ben Zobrist, Grady Sizemore, Franklin Gutierrez, Matt LaPorta, Jeremy Sowers, James Pete, 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.