Peyton Hillis to Play Hurt on Sunday?
October 13, 2010Josh Cribbs To Be Honored By Kent State
October 13, 2010I clicked onto SI.com this morning and above this big picture of the celebrating Texas Rangers piling on their ace, Cliff Lee, the headline read: “The New Mr. October.”
That’s him, our old friend Clifton Phifer Lee.
I’ve heard baseball experts such as ESPN’s Tim Kurkjian and SI’s Jon Heyman say they’ve never seen such domination in one postseason career as they have with Lee. After last night’s complete game, one run, 11 K, zero walk, series clinching win on the road in Tampa, Cliff is 6-0 with a 1.44 ERA in seven postseason starts. The guy can literally put the ball anywhere he wants whenever he wants.
But this is something Tribe fans like us already knew. We saw this every single start in 2008 and half of 2009 before he was dealt to the Phillies at the deadline. Cliff Lee is the pre-eminant left-handed starting pitcher in the game (sorry, CC), and he is a free agent at the end of the season. He couldn’t have timed his renaissance any better.
Or could he have?
It seems like a lifetime ago, but if you remember in 2007, Cliff Lee started the season in the middle of the Indians rotation, coming off three consecutive years where he won at least 14 games. He was never spectacular, but solid. But during the magical Indians ’07 season, Lee was all out of tricks.
While Fausto Carmona came out of nowhere to become a 19-game winning dominator, Cliff’s game fell off the table. He only made 16 stats, going 5-8 with an ERA of 6.29. Things were so bad he had to go through a stint in AAA to try and recapture what he had lost. When he returned, things weren’t any better. He was banished to the pen in September.
Need more proof that he was completely out of it? Aaron Laffey made the postseason roster over Lee as the long man in 2007.
Talk about a scary thought.
Compare the careers of Lee and Laffey from 2008 on. Lee has won 48 games, a Cy Young award, and will cash in for more than $100 million this winter. Laffey still hasn’t been in the majors for a full season, bounced back and forth between the rotation and the bullpen, and has just 14 wins in three seasons.
Here is the thing, if Cliff Lee would have found himself just one year earlier, had that epiphany that he had to pitch with no fear and attack hitters the way he does now, does anyone think the Indians wouldn’t have won the World Series in 2007? They may not have lost a game in the playoffs with a top three of a Cy Young Winner CC Sabathia, a peaking Carmona, and a dominant Lee.
Heck, the 2007 Tribe had a 3-1 lead on the Red Sox in the ALDS without him.
I don’t mean to get all doom and gloom on you and revisit yet another of our city’s major collapses, but its all I could think of while I was watching Lee completely shut down the Rays in a deciding game on the road last night.
I’m happy for Cliff. Here’s a simple guy from Arkansas who just wants to go out and win. He doesn’t care about the media, he doesn’t care about endorsement deals, he just cares about winning. Just watch him on the mound or in interviews. Cliff is completely locked in on the mound and when the media asks him questions, he answers calmy, quicky, and quietly – just like he pitches.
A lock prediction for you – If the Yankees don’t win the World Series, Cliff Lee will be wearing pinstripes next year with the same type of contract given to CC Sabathia two years ago.
Who says Major League Baseball is a level playing field?
photo via Mike Ehrmann/Getty Images
21 Comments
Sabathia, Lee, Carmona or some permutation thereof. You’re talking all-time playoff rotations at that point.
One game. One game.
We would have steam rolled Colorado.
Great article.
One small contention:
Here’s a simple guy from Arkansas who just wants to go out and win [b]and make as much money as possible[/b]
Not faulting him, because he never pretended this wasn’t true. But as you said at the end, such an uneven sport.
*sigh*
Phillies fans are still kinda bitter that Lee wasn’t re-signed this year. Not that they don’t already have 3 aces, *cough* spoiled *cough*… But if Lee takes out the Yankees, maybe for Phils fans, it’s better that he wasn’t re-signed. I kinda doubt, even with Lee, the Rangers could beat the Phils in those other games.
As long as the Yankees lose, we win, right?……… right?
Without Cliff Lee, I believe in my heart had the Indians gotten past the Red Sox that they would have blown Colorado out of the water.
Think of the cathartic event that would have been:
Beat New York
Beat Boston
Beat Denver
Win Championship
To this day, I don’t see why that didn’t happen. It would have been storybook worthy. They may have made a 30 in 30 episode on it. I watched that 30 in 30 episode on the 2004 ALCS. Yeah, that was amazing, but Boston was in the midst of winning their 3rd Super Bowl in 4 years.
Cleveland winning a championship would put many, many psychologists and therapists out of work in NEO.
Oh well… that’s how it goes.
Kind of a disturbing trend emerging of athletes who underperform here in Cleveland, then go on to achieve greatness elsewhere. Can’t think of any Browns offhand (maybe Byner?), but we now have 2 Indians and 1 potential Cav
… I also love that the few Yankees-Fan friends I have seem to think the reason small markets have to give up their talent is only due to poor ownership and lack of innovative ways of earning money. They suggest Cleveland gets it’s own TV station, like the Braves’.. and that would solve everything.
right. deeeeeeee-nial! or just terrified they won’t be able to compete on a level-playing field.
(fyi- I am “friends” with these people b/c they are also talented webcomic creators such as myself. we just try not to talk sports, LOL)
“While you’re at it, why don’t you give me a nice paper cut, and pour lemon juice on it?”
I like it TD. It was always hard for me to fathom how quickly Lee went from being average to amazing. It was like flicking a light switch.
One small correction, though: Cliff Lee will be in pinstripes whether the Yankees win or not this season. They’ve made it clear that they want him (to replace Vazquez or Pettitte), and he’s made it clear Lee wants top dollar. I think it’s as close to a fait accompli as I’ve ever seen. Which would give them the following four pitchers for the next 7 years or so:
CC Sabathia
Cliff Lee
AJ Burnett
Phil Hughes
That’s scary.
Heck, we didn’t even need Cliff those playoffs. We just needed regular-season CC.
2008 Cliff on 2007 Indians would have been incredible though. 60 wins between 3 starters. I think about it every time I see either of those three guys pitch
Forget 2007 for a second and realize if the Tribe was a big market spending team the CC, Lee, Carmona trifecta would be rolling for the better part of the next decade. It sucks, it really does. I have finally realized why my dad has just stopped watching (not stopped caring, just stopped watching).
Another what could have been huh folks isn’t this getting old? Pretty soon this site will be completely about ex-Cleveland sports players and their success. Tears of a clown, tears of a clown!
@Jon I just read that about Lee and the Yankees. Hey if you can’t be ’em, buy ’em!
Stinkfist is absolutely right. While its fun to imagine the 2007 Indians with the modern day Cliff Lee, all we needed was for our 2 aces to pitch like aces. CC and Fausto were terrible in that series, and they still needed 7 games to beat us. CC especially choked, his control during the 2007 season was impeccable, and he couldnt find the strike zone against Boston or New York for that matter.
this story made me think about the time when I was 10 and my sister had just come home from field hockey practice, and we got in a fight, and she kiced me square in the junk with her cleats on. Thanks. I needed a reason to gargle Jhonny Walker later today
Ghost’s and Stinkfist’s point is important. If the “new” Cliff had been on the ’07 Indians (assuming no Cy Young and current performance history), I’m not sure the post-season would have been different. He would have probably the 3rd pitcher behind CC and Fausto. In that instance, he would have replaced one of the two pitchers that actually did well in the post-season: Westbrook and Byrd. Assuming he won the games he would have pitched, the Indians record would have been exactly the same as it was.
Now, if he was either #1 or #2 (where we now know he belonged, ex post facto), the story would have been different – but still not a sweep in either series – as the other guy (CC or Fausto) still choked. Would have been a great World Series, though . . .
Oh well, as my old coach used to say, “Woulda, coulda, shoulda: the words of a loser.”
@14 Gary needless to say the Indians would have been better off then they were/are now. I agree though people can’t forget how bad CC and Fausto choked in that series because it was one of the main reasons yet another Cleveland team tanked in the playoffs.
The Colorado Rockies have always had the Indians’ number in interleague play, if I’m not mistaken. I wouldn’t be so sure that we’d have won that matchup in 2007, even with an amazing rotation.
If Lee, Carmona, and CC had put it all together at the same time – that would be the most dominant pitching staff since the 95 Braves.
If “ifs” and “buts” were candy and nuts, it’d be Christmas all year long.
(Good point, though. Especially considering how well Byrd and Westbrook were pitching at the time.)
I was at game 4 – Byrd was so gutsy. Can’t believe we lost that series. Beckett was unhittable.
Lee looked good in 2006 too. He pitched hurt in 2007.
I remember because I picked him up off waivers before the 2008 season started. Big pick up for “Colavito’s Curse”.
[…] Watching Tim Lincecum giving interviews with the Commisioner’s Trophy on the back of his hat likley made a lot of Indias fans say “what if?” Not that such a phrase isn’t uttered about this time every season – just last week we touched on the fact that Cliff Lee was merely a year late. […]