Nice hustle

In the first inning of the Indians' 5-4 win Friday night over the Twins, while the Indians were battering Livan Hernandez (hero of the 1997 postseason for the Marlins, as we all remember), Grady Sizemore scored from second base on a sacrifice fly by Ben Francisco. I've seen that before -- I remember in particular a time in about 1994 or 1995 that Kenny Lofton was on third and Wayne Kirby was on second, and they both scored on one fly ball -- but it's pretty darned rare. From a Minnecentric perspective, it will be remembered for being the play in which Carlos Gomez injured his back catching a fly ball. Gomez deserves a great deal of credit for quickly flipping the ball to teammate Denard Span, which at least kept Jamey Carroll, who was on first, from going any farther than second. And I can promise you a very large number of major leaguers would have stopped at third on that ball. But Grady is not among that number, which is why we love him so much. (That's the only reason, ladies.)

Cliff Lee (14-2) is now 70% of the way to the Indians' first 20-win season since Gaylord Perry won 21 in 1974. CC and Fausto each got to 19 last year, and there have been a few other 19-game winners in the last 34 years, but Cliff, who was born in 1978, is six wins away from being the first Indian to do it in his own lifetime. There aren't too many pitchers who've done that. (Expansion teams, of course, but there probably aren't many more.)

Lee is the first major leaguer to start 14-2 since Roy Halladay in 2004, and the first Indian to do it since Perry, that same year. And he'd be 16-2 if the bullpen hadn't blown two games he'd have won. There's still more than two months to go in the season, but Cliff Lee has a chance to have the best season I've ever seen an Indians pitcher have, and I'm 37. (My current previous choice would be Jose Mesa in 1995, in case you're wondering.)