Rangers 10 Indians 4: The Dog Days Are Upon Us

Man this season was fun for the first four and a half months. Then the Detroit Tigers stepped on our collective throats, ran away from the rest of the division, and haven’t stopped winning. The Motor City Kitties have won 11 straight and have peaked at the right time. The Indians on the other hand….

Think back to August 19th. The Tribe was just a game and a half back and heading for Detroit. Today on September 14th, they are 12.5 games behind and under .500.

I hate to go back to the old “if I would have told you in March that….” card, but its true. Nobody expected our Wahoos to be in first place for the first four months of the season or to even be contending at any point. It can’t be lost on us, even though the wheels have fallen off the wagon of late.

If the Tribe was still in it at this point, we’d all be freaking out night in and night out considering this team is running out of gas. Take Asdrubal Cabrera for example. You can tell by the way he is swinging, his body language, and by his dropping batting average (down to .270) that he is worn out. Or take last night’s starter Justin Masterson. The Tribe’s top dog took the mound last night and wilted in the Texas heat. 

Over his last five starts, Masterson has not shown the arsenal that we have seen for most of his season. He may be tiring out considering how much the Indians have counted on him this year, but he would never make an excuse. Justin is as stand-up and solid of a guy as you could ask for. He takes the ball every fifth day and doesn’t complain, no matter how little run support he seems to get.

Last night, the home run ball really got him. This is something that hasn’t happened much. He entered the game having allowed just 10 homers. The Rangers got Masterson three times  in their 10-4 victory Tuesday night, including two by David Murphy.

Masterson, ever the good sport, said after the game “I guess I was just trying to make up for how well I did all year,”

He lasted just five innings, giving up six runs on eight hits, walking three and striking out two. In his four of his last five starts, Masterson has allowed four or more earned runs and has just one win.

The Rangers stacked lineup just kills Tribe pitching and last night was no exceptions. Josh Hamilton’s two-run homer, the third Masterson allowed, broke a 2-2 tie in the fifth and Texas never looked back.

“He missed out over the plate a little bit,” Indians manager Manny Acta. “Usually, he struggles against lefties when he can’t get the ball in there to them. When you fall behind to Hamilton, you have to throw the ball over the plate, and that’s not a very good thing to do.”

The Tribe offense scored single runs in the fourth, fifth, and sixth to bring them to within a run, but a four-run Rangers sixth broke things open.

Masterson opened the inning, but was chased after back to back singles. In came lefty Nick Hagadone, who is expected to be a big part of next year’s pen. The hard-throwing southpaw faced just two batters. He walked Mitch Moreland and gave up a single to pinch hitter Craig Gentry that scored two. Acta yanked Hagadone for another kid reliever, Josh Judy. After getting Ian Kinsler to pop out, Elvis Andrus got him for a double to the gap in right center, bringing in Moreland and Gentry.

A third Tribe rookie reliever, Zach Putnam, entered in the seventh for some mop up duty. The first hitter he faced in his Major League debut, Adrian Beltre, took him deep for the Rangers fourth bomb of the night. Murphy followed with a double and was driven in by a Mike Napoli single.

“[Putnam] bounced back, threw the ball well, threw some split-fingers,” Acta said. “He made a comeback — rude awakening by Beltre and those guys — but he’s got a good arm and he’s going to get innings here for us to take a look at them.”

When it was all said and done, the Rangers scored 10 runs on 14 hits.

The lone bright spot for the Tribe was catcher Carlos Santana, who homered from both sides of the plate. He now has a team-high 23 on the season.

“Other than the batting average, he’s had a good year,” said Acta of Santana. “How can you complain about a guy who is probably going to hit 25 homers and drive in over 80 runs. And I think the batting average is going to come around for him.”

Game two in the series features a pair of left-handers, David Huff (2-4, 3.05 ERA) for the Indians and Derek Holland (13-5, 4.12 ERA) for the Rangers. Holland has faced the Tribe twice this season and has gone to both ends of the spectrum. In June, he threw a five-hit, complete game shutout in Cleveland. In August, Holland couldn’t get out of the second inning, giving up five runs (four earned) on five hits in Arlington.

(AP Photo/Tony Gutierrez)