Falling in love with these 2011 Cleveland Indians

In the afterglow of the Indians' second straight walk-off win and 12th straight win at Progressive Field, I find myself starting to wonder if this team is really this good. And you know what? I think that maybe, just maybe, they really are.

How can this be? A team that started the season expected to finish fourth in a fairly weak American League Central Division has set a team record for wins in the month of April, with 18 against just eight losses. Many of us thought when they lost three straight last week that they had started their downward slide into mediocrity, but they've followed that up with five straight wins.

How have they done it? In a word: Defense. These Indians played a phenomenal defensive game tonight. Jack Hannahan, Austin Kearns, Michael Brantley and Orlando Cabrera are among the Indians who made particularly fine plays tonight. Lou Marson threw out a runner at second base. Carlos Santana started a fine double play from first base. Even Shin-Soo Choo almost threw somebody out at second, from right field. (I know, horseshoes and hand grenades, but still.) I think this is the best defensive team I can remember the Indians ever having.

And I would be remiss if I didn't mention the fine performance turned in by Alex White, who went six innings in his major league debut, giving up just the two runs, both on solo homers. And let's not forget the Tribe bullpen, which shut the Tigers out for seven innings to give the offense a chance to win it.

For the second straight series, the Indians have turned back the team that started the series in second place in the division. The Royals have bounced back with two straight wins against the Twins, and have returned to second place, 4 1/2 games behind our Tribe. That's a pretty good-sized lead heading into May, though of course there's still a long way to go. But if we keep seeing this kind of defense, anything can happen.

I'm starting to love these 2011 Cleveland Indians. I don't know yet if they really are this good. But they're sure fun to watch right now.

Is this actually happening?

OK, the season is only a tenth of the way through. Still, the Indians have played as many games as the Browns play in a full season, and you'd be thrilled like crazy if the Browns finished 12-4 this year.

I don't get much time to watch Tribe games these days, but I did watch the last few innings of last night's game. What I saw was a team that plays smart and provides strong defense.

Michael Brantley made a great catch out in left field that saved a one-out double or better off the bat of Alcides Escobar in the bottom of the ninth, with the score tied at 3. On a potential double-play ball to first, Matt LaPorta made a bad throw that Asdrubal Cabrera fielded on a hop and failed to keep his foot on the base before throwing to first, but the runner, Billy Butler, assumed he was out, and Cabrera alertly and quietly called for the ball back in time to tag Butler out. I can't say I've ever seen that before.

And when the Royals' defense gave the Indians a break in the top of the tenth, our boys took full advantage of it. The Indians' first run came unaided by the defense (Shelley Duncan smoked a double to left to knock in Carlos Santana, who had drawn a leadoff walk), but after that, it was thanks to a gift by Escobar on a bad throw that would have ended the inning with a double play that opened the door for more scoring. Adam Everett scored on that play, and then Jack Hannahan and Grady Sizemore followed that up with back-to-back RBI hits. And what would have been a razor-thin one-run lead going into the bottom of the tenth became a nice four-run cushion.

And by the way, how awesome is it to have Grady back? He homered in his first game back on Sunday, and went three-for-five in last night's win. When healthy, he's been one of baseball's best center fielders, and he appears to have immediately returned to that form.

Have I suddenly reached the conclusion that these Indians are contenders? No, don't be silly. They're probably just on a hot streak. There are still 146 games to play.

But I'll tell you what, they've sure been fun to watch so far.

Go civil engineers

This post started as an assignment for my Tools for Civil Engineering class at the University of Akron, and you might not think civil engineering has much to do with sports, but in this case, it definitely does. Since I had already written some stuff for class, I thought I'd expand it a little for the blog. I hope my professor doesn't mind.

Akron is hosting the local region's American Society of Civil Engineers competition this weekend, and as my Tools professor is Akron's chapter adviser, he canceled class this week and told us to attend one of the competitions and write a paragraph or so about it. I chose the concrete canoe race, basically for no other reason than that it was held on Friday afternoon and I was already in Akron for Friday morning classes, so I wouldn't have to make an extra trip.

It was fascinating, though. Akron was one of eight schools involved, and three of them -- Ohio State, Kentucky and Pittsburgh -- are national powers in the traditional sports. Those schools cowered before the engineering might of the Zips, along with Western Kentucky and Youngstown State.

Akron’s teams did very well, running a canoe named the Bootlegger, finishing first in the men’s sprint and the ladies’ endurance competitions, and second or third in all others. It seems that the engineering aspect was a much larger component than the athletic aspect, as schools like Akron, Western Kentucky and Youngstown did well no matter who was rowing the canoes, and schools like Ohio State and Ohio U. were always bringing up the rear – especially OSU’s Matta Armada, which must make the Buckeyes’ basketball coach ashamed to have it named for him. I noted that one of the canoes actually snapped in half at one point, though it did not appear to be one of the competition canoes.

Maneuverability was a huge component. In the sprint races, the boats had to go down past some buoys and back to the original starting point. Akron's boat won the first men's heat because its canoe turned around much faster than Western Kentucky's, which was faster on the straightaway.

I'll tell you one thing -- the engineering students who attended were every bit as much into it as if they were at a football or basketball game. Four Akron students went shirtless with "ZIPS" painted on their chests, and they were chanting "Z-I-P-S, Zips, Zips, Zips!" There was much rejoicing whenever the Bootlegger came in first.

I also caught some of the root beer stein race, which was also pretty interesting. I’m not sure I see the tie-in to civil engineering, but it was fun anyway. It seemed that most of the competitors were much more interested in getting to the finish line in a hurry than keeping their root beer from spilling. I saw one guy from Kentucky wipe out just before the finish, leaving less than an inch of pop in his cup. I didn’t see how the scoring is done, but I’m sure than cost him, both because it took him more time to get there and because he lost most of his beverage.

What to make of Tribe's hot start?

OK, so the Indians aren't going to go 160-2 or 159-3. Dan Haren blanked them on one hit Tuesday night, and the Angels managed a victory in the rubber match of the series last night on a sacrifice fly in the bottom of the 12th that would not have scored the run if it had been hit about 10 feet shallower.

Still, the Indians are off to a pretty darn good start. The obvious question is, is this really how good this team is? Or are they just on a hot streak? I received this email from Jeff Brown three days ago, when the Tribe was 7-2:

As I have reported previously, the Tribe has had many fast starts over the past 25 seasons which have been a "flash in the pan" -- they ended up being a big loser by the end of the season.

That's what's happening again this season -- an impressive 7-2 start will, before, long, fade into the woodwork and they will become big losers once again.

Mark my words, Steve -- the 2011 Tribe will finish 15-20 games under .500!

Well, I don't know about all that. Do I think these Indians are a playoff team? Probably not. But if you think they were fundamentally a 15-under-.500 team at the start of the season, then you must revise your expectations based solely on the fact that they're four games over .500 right now.

This morning, I had this from Jeff:

Once again, as in the past, the Tribe zoomed out to a fast start at 8-2, however their precipitous decline has already begun.

They've lost two in a row to fall to 8-4, and just watch, Steve -- they are on a race to the bottom, and it's only a matter of time until they are in last place again.

They stink Steve, and no smoke and mirrors are going to cover up that fact over 162 games.

I anticipate they'll be in last place in their division no later than May 29, and as I have stated, they'll finish the year 15-20 games under .500.

Are you with me on this one?

Well, no. Jeez, talk about reading too much into two games. We're talking about two losses by a total of three runs. And to predict they'll finish last is to predict not only that they'll finish behind the Twins and White Sox (which is pretty likely), and the Tigers (which is about 50-50), but the Royals. Come on, Jeff! You think the Kansas City Royals are going to finish ahead of us this year? Have you looked at their "talent"?

In any case, to fully examine whether the Indians are for real, you have to take a look at the reasons for their hot start. The starting rotation has been really, really good. Fausto Carmona laid an egg on Opening Day, but he's gotten his ERA down from over 10 to 6.11 since then, with two strong outings. He's the only starter without a win now. Carlos Carrasco has been serviceable, and the other three starters -- Justin Masterson, Mitch Talbot and Josh Tomlin -- all have ERAs under 3, after two starts each. Can they keep this up? ... Well, probably not. These are all young pitchers who have not tasted this type of success in the bigs before, and they will get banged around from time to time. But I don't think it's unrealistic to expect any or all of them to finish with ERAs around 4, and 12-15 wins. Fausto has been a 19-game winner before, and could do it again. I would expect that Carrasco will finish with an ERA around 5 (it's currently 5.03). If all that happens, this will be one of the AL's better rotations.

They're helped by a solid defense behind them, strengthened by the off-season additions of Orlando Cabrera and Jack Hannahan. Asdrubal Cabrera -- who unexpectedly leads the team with four home runs and 10 RBIs -- is a solid glove man at short too. And this team is going to have to win with pitching and defense, because they're not going to keep up the offensive numbers they've posted. Asdrubal is no power hitter. I've heard talk about how he's changed his approach at the plate, and bravo for him, but he's currently on pace to hit 54 home runs. You're not going to convince me that the guy who hit three dingers all last season is suddenly a primo power guy unless he proves it to me. And I don't see that happening.

Anyway, the Tribe's fast start is encouraging. When the season started, I felt I'd have been happy with about a 76-86 record. I felt that was a realistic goal. Now? I think .500 is a possibility. It's going to require people to stay healthy and play well all year, but it could happen. Sorry, Jeff. I think you're wrong.