lucky 11 :)

wow, game 1 was bad. it was c.c. vs beckett. i expected a pitchers duel worthy of two pitchers who will be #1 and #2 in the cy young voting. good thing last night does not decide who gets number 1. most say c.c. will win the award. beckett won last night. c.c. had his worst outing of the season. he probably had 1 or 2 outings that were worse statistically speaking; but when the importance of the start is weighed into the equation, it was hands down his worse. he pitched nothing like the workhorse ace of the staff that he has been all year. similar to his bad start against the yankees, only worse. he had his chance to redeem himself after barely eking out a W against NY. it was a W, but it was ugly and it was nerve wracking. not nearly as bad as the whole of game 1 against boston though. we are on the road, but still, it was horrible. one of the worst games of the year, both for c.c. and for the tribe. but mastny was a bright spot. he was in a mop up role. he did not pitch in the new york series. initially, i was pissed this was the case. i wanted mastny to be brought in in game 1. i thought he, not bentancourt, should have ended that blowout game. so thought my father. after a couple of days, i realized the genius of eric wedge. i realized my want to have mastny pitch that inning was personal, not baseball related.

now i realize wedge put raffy in because he wanted to keep the yankees bats in check. do not jump start their bats. a few meaningless runs to end game 1 could run over into a few big runs early in game 2. if this was the case, we would have lost game 2. as it was, bugs from heaven were the only reason our offense scored a run through the first 9 innings. thankfully, these bugs only affected yankees pitchers.

and as of the fears that mastny would be rusty, not true. he was the only effective indians pitcher last night. and he 100% without a doubt earned the W tonight. he faced the roughest part of the red sox order tonight. the part that gave c.c., fausto, and raffy perez major problems. the part that lewis wnd raffy betancourt figured out tonight. the fearsome threesome of hot hitting and walk drawing big papi, manny, and lowell. and tom blew through them tonight. our post season record 7 runs in extra innings gave tom his first post season W. and hopefully also restored eric's faith in him. raffy perez has had consecutive bad outings. mastny stepping up is huge. just what a team in the playoffs needs to help beat an equally talented team. boston has the two best offensive hitters, hands down. as indians fans know, when manny is on, look out. he will do ridiculously good things. it just happens that now he is doing them against us, not for us. a monstrous home run is always a fear when he swings the bat. victor and hafner have that potential though. and they are holding their own in the series. but i really believe we have them overall. we have depth, and it is all quality. the fact that mastny got the victory and trot got the go ahead single are proof. even barfield contributed with a stolen base. although we did not score that inning, that stolen base set up a chain of events that nearly won us the game. lowell made a nice play on a hard hit shot by garko to end the 9th inning though.

but tonight was huge! now it is a best of 5 series, with more games at the jake than in boston. i feared schilling would provide a quality start, or even a dominant start. but neither was the case. he did not make it through 5, and gave up 9 base hits, 5 runs, 3 extra base hits, 2 doubles, and a homerun. the thing i like series-wise is that c.c., fausto, and raffy perez's bad performances were not injury or age related, hopefully. they can and hopefully will come back to pitch well. and old and injured schilling would most likely not do so.

major props to jhonny. he had one bad K, but other than that he had a walk, a single, a double, a 3 run home run, 4 total RBI, and made some nice plays on D. i believe trot was the team player of the game. not to dis trot. his go ahead pinch hit single was AWSOME! but it would have never been possible if not for the constant efforts of jhonny. if i were wedge, i might think about moving swapping garko and jhonny in the order. pronk, hafner, and jhonny would be our match to boston's big 3. if garko can stay hot and get more hits when it counts, then we have the edge with our big 4. actually, jhonny excelled in the 3 hole in '05 before apparently succumbing to the dreaded sophomore slump. a pronk of '06 demands to hit in the 4 hole. a.c. has to stay in the two hole, just based upon his bunting abilities shown in the NY series, and his clutch hitting in the regular season. blake for the most part has not been hitting. he had a 2 run double in game 1 versus NY, and a good game last night. other than that, hitting wise he has done nada. that's why he stays in the 9 hole. the thing i do like about him though: he continues to play the best third base he has ever played with us and until tonight he was making 'loud' outs. hard hit balls right at people. or nice plays made on them.

and, lastly but not least, the man eric wedge. every time i second guess him, it always seems he is right. he managed the game beautifully tonight. actually, tonight should not be a surprise. he had done so throughout the playoffs.

now we are on to the jake. tied at one game a piece. i can't wait for monday.

cleveland rocks!