A’s 5, Indians 0: A Diary of Fail

This was a bad game by a bad team having a bad season.  I’d like to end the recap there, as that more than explains what we need to know, but the WFNY bylaws require some elaboration.  So be it.

Let’s recap an Evening of Outright Fail™.

Starting Pitching Fail: After Coco Crisp led off the first inning with a single and a stolen base, Fausto recorded five consecutive outs—giving him two out in the top of the second.

Then came a healthy dose of fail.  Rajai Davis singled to center, and Jeff Larish homered to right for a 2-0 lead.

This was clearly an insurmountable deficit, as the Indians only had eight innings left to score.

Clutch Offense Fail: After going meekly in a 1-2-3 first inning, the Tribe’s offense managed to threaten in the second inning.

That’s not actually true, of course, because the Indians didn’t have a hit in the second inning.  The first two batters weakly grounded out.  Next up, Matt LaPorta reached on an error by Cliff Pennington.  Dandy Marte followed by inducing two errors on the same play from Jeff Larish, who not only couldn’t field the ball cleanly, but then managed to throw it toward Akron, allowing the runners to advance to second and third.

So Trevor Crowe came to the plate with two outs and runners on second and third.  What would this clutchedy-clutchy-clutch master do?  After all, he was batting .295/.329/.423 with runners in scoring position!  He had successfully worked a 3-0 count, and once Crowe has three balls, he’s batting .324/.596/.441!  He hasn’t failed to reach base this season once after getting to 3-0!

He struck out on the next three pitches.  New name for Trevor Crowe: Crazy Eyez Rally Killa (H/T: Curb Your Enthusiasm).

Trade Fail: Coco Crisp went 3-5 with a home run.  Dandy Marte did not.

Manager Fail: Fausto Carmona had thrown well over 100 pitches through six innings in a game he was trailing by three runs.  The bullpen was rested.

So Manny Acta trotted Carmona out for the seventh inning.  He immediately allowed a lead-off double to Crisp.  Pitching change?  No.  Fausto stayed in and retired the next two batters.  Then Acta, deciding that Carmona couldn’t get Jack Cust out—a guy he made look silly in the first inning with three straight changeups—went to Tony Sipp.

Sipp immediately gave up a two-run shot to Cust.  5-0 A’s.

“I’m not worried about Tony,” Acta said. “He’s had some rough spots but also a lot of good ones. You take away his rough spots in New York and Detroit, and he’s been good for us. I can’t complain about him.”

Right.  If you don’t count all the fail, he’s been very good for us.  Sort of like if you don’t count any of Lou Marson’s outs, he’s batting 1.000.  Terrific.

Midge Fail: The Midges returned to Jagressive Field last night.  Fausto was on the mound.  The opposing offense looked distracted.

Alas, this was not the playoffs, and our offense was the anemic one.  It stirred memories that did more to make me sad than happy, considering how far we’ve fallen.

Rally Fail: In the bottom of the seventh, Crazy Eyez Rally Killa singled to center to start the inning.  After a Lou Marson lineout, Jason Donald was hit by a pitch.  As Steve Buffum noted, “Excellent piece of being hit by Jason Donald there!”

Anyway, the Indians had two on, one out, and the meat of the order coming up.  Rally Time!

Cabrera struck out on four pitches.  Choo weakly grounded out to first.  Rally Time over.

——————————————————————————-

There were bright spots, I suppose.  Carmona’s changeup is starting to look like a pretty good pitch.  Like I said, he made Cust look silly in the first inning, waving at 86 mph pitches that dove out of the strikezone.  Matt LaPorta reached base three times.  The Indians didn’t commit an error, which was absolutely shocking.

But over the last four games, the Indians have scored just three runs.  In the last eight days, they have managed to score more than three runs in a game just once—a 9-7 loss to Kansas City, who is pulling away from us in the standings.  This will likely represent the first season in the Wild Card Era the Indians will finish last in the division for two consecutive seasons.  Are you in the Tribe?  I wouldn’t admit it at this point.

Our pitching is bad.  Our hitting is bad.  Our defense is bad.  We are on pace to win 65 games this season.  Our only goal should be to avoid losing 100 games, and I don’t even know if that’s possible at this point.

Sure, there’s September call-ups to get excited about, but from what I’ve read, they’re likely to be minimal.  We’ll see Carrasco for sure, but probably no Jared Goedert, probably no Nick Weglarz, definitely no Chisenhall.  Not that I disagree with any of these decisions, it’s just hard to get excited by anything this team is doing right now.

Optimism Fail: Hey, there’s always next year.

Photo Credit: Chuck Crow, Plain Dealer