Tuesday, March 11, 2008

Offensive explosion (and pitching trouble)

I spent some time looking through snowstorm photos yesterday, and the above is my favorite (it's from Saturday, so it's now 20 days until Opening Day).

The Indians scored nine runs in the fourth yesterday against the devilish Rays, on their way to a 12-10 win. They got two hits each from Travis Hafner, Jason Michaels and Jamey Carroll, and AAA catcher Wyatt Toregas homered in his only at-bat.

But Paul Byrd struggled on the mound, giving up five runs in four innings. Byrdie walked two hitters, which is uncharacteristic. And Tom Mastny, who was dominant in one inning Sunday, was anything but on Monday, giving up four runs on five hits in his one inning of work. Jorge Julio, who's fighting for a bullpen spot, gave up one run on two hits and two walks in one inning, and Rafael Betancourt and Jensen Lewis each contributed a scoreless inning.

It's tough to write anything insightful about a game I didn't see, though. I hate that most spring training games aren't on TV. Today's game against the Tigers is on SportsTime Ohio, however, and I'll be DVRing it. And boy howdy, am I looking forward to seeing it, even if I don't get a chance to watch it until this weekend.

All right, here's my second-favorite storm photo, because I'm such a softie:

2 comments:

Jeff Brown said...

Steve,

I will never forget the 2007 Indians' home opener that was snowed out. In fact, if I remember accurately, three games altogether were snowed out.

Steve Mullett said...

You're quite right, the entire home-opening series against the Mariners had to be rescheduled due to snow. And they played their next three "home" games in Milwaukee!