Bye, Jhonny; roundup

• In case you missed it, the Indians traded Jhonny Peralta to the Tigers just before last night's game against the Yankees. Peralta came up through the Indians system and debuted in the majors in 2003, then replaced the great Omar Vizquel as the Indians' shortstop beginning in 2005. He never really lived up to the expectations the Tribe front office had for him. In '05, at just 23 years old, Peralta hit .292 with 24 home runs (the latter number a team record for a shortstop) and appeared to be a budding superstar. But he's never had another year that good. He's been a good enough hitter for a shortstop, except that he was never a very good defensive shortstop, which is why they moved him to third this year to make way for the slick-fielding Asdrubal Cabrera at short. He is just 28 (barring any forged documentation; he is Dominican, after all) and may have more good years in him, but I wouldn't put money on it. And since he is in the walk year of his contract and the Indians aren't going anywhere, there was really no reason not to move him.

• Coming back from Detroit is Giovanni Soto, who is not to be confused with Cubs catcher Geovany Soto. This Soto is a 19-year-old minor league pitcher who hails from Puerto Rico, and is 6-6 with a 2.61 ERA in A-ball. He's a long way from the majors, but his early results are promising. He's struck out more than three times as many hitters as he's walked, and he's given up just two home runs in 82 innings. Still, though, a lot can happen to a young arm, and the proverbial streets are proverbially littered with the proverbial bodies of many promising young pitchers who never made it because their young elbows and shoulders couldn't handle the strain they were putting on them. I'd have thought the Indians could have gotten more than that for an established major league infielder who can play short or third and has some pop in his bat.

• I love this a lot more than I feel I should: Some douchebag showed up at the Indians-Yankees game last night wearing a Miami Heat LeBron James jersey, and got screamed at and taunted so much, he had to leave. The police escorted him out. I don't know if he left voluntarily or what, but he probably should have known better than to pull that crap. Nobody seems to know who he is, but he looks young, which, as anyone who's lived through adolescence and is old enough to reflect on it knows, equals stupid. He probably intentionally showed up in that to get attention, but he's lucky he didn't receive that attention in the form of fists to the face.

• Oh, yeah, the Indians lost 8-0 to the Yankees. Fausto Carmona had his worst outing of the season. The Tribe offense couldn't get anything going. Alex Rodriguez didn't homer, so he's still stuck on 599. The end.

• But how about Tuesday night's game! Josh Tomlin beats the freaking New York Yankees in his major league debut! That's fantastic. Tomlin outpitched former Indian (and Cy Young winner) CC Sabathia, taking a shutout into the eighth inning, then came out after giving a leadoff double to Robinson Cano. He held the Yankees to three hits and zero walks in his seven innings of work. Bully for you, Josh! Keep up the good work! (Oh, and he struck out just two. Now, don't be negative.)

• Rest in peace, Jack Tatum, 1948-2010. The Ohio State great is best known for paralyzing a guy on a hit in an NFL game, but it was a perfectly clean, legal hit. That's just the nature of football. He wasn't a dirty player, he was just a hard hitter.

Today's roundup involves Jeopardy!

• The Indians dropped their third in a row yesterday, as the New York Stinking Yankees came from behind to beat them 3-2, behind a two-run homer by Curtis Granderson off probable soon-to-be-former Indian Jake Westbrook in the eighth. Westbrook pitched pretty well, giving up three runs in eight innings on four hits and two walks against five strikeouts, while pitching to a very powerful Yankee lineup. But he gave up two home runs, and that was his undoing.

• Shin-Soo Choo again showed why he's the best player on the Tribe. Not only did he hit an RBI double that temporarily put the Indians ahead 2-1, he threw out Granderson trying to stretch a single into a double. Replays showed Granderson should have been called safe, but still, it was a heck of a play by Choo, who fielded it off the wall and gunned it to second in one motion.

• The game drew 27,224 fans, which is the Indians' third-highest home attendance of the season. (The top two were the home opener and Nationals rookie Stephen Strasburg's second major league start.) That's due to two factors: One, the Yankees always draw well in Cleveland; and two, Alex Rodriguez is one home run away from his 600th. With Mr. Rod failing to go deep last night, we can expect another large crowd tonight. Too bad for the Indians' bottom line the Yankees are only in town for four games; the Tribe remains 30th out of 30 teams in home attendance.

• Westbrook's contract is up at the end of the season, and while he probably won't be all that expensive next year, given his injury history, it makes sense for the Tribe to flip him for prospects because they're not playing for anything this year. The trade deadline is this Saturday, so this might well have been his last start as an Indian. On the other hand, Westbrook seems like the kind of guy who might help a contender for the rest of the year and then come back to Cleveland. Who knows.

• Jhonny Peralta is also in the last year of his contract, and I don't see any reason not to get prospects for him too. No doubt Mark Shapiro will see what he can get for a lot of players, but off the top of my head, those two guys are the ones who seem most likely to go. Peralta's been kind of a disappointment the last couple of years, both with the bat and the glove, but he could help a contender who's got a hole in the infield, such as Colorado.

• The Cavaliers made a trade yesterday, sending Delonte West and Sebastian Telfair to the Timberwolves for guard Ramon Sessions, center Ryan Hollins and a second-round draft pick. West has been a starter before, and has done some nice things on the court, but he was highly inconsistent this past year — possibly due to his legal troubles — and I'm not very sorry to see him go. Telfair is just a throw-in; he never contributed to the Cavs in any meaningful way. The 24-year-old Sessions only averaged 8.2 points and 2.1 assists last year for the Wolves, but that's in just 21.1 minutes a game, and he had 20 points and 24 assists in one game. He's got an upside. Hollins, 25, will probably never be more than a backup center, which is fine. We'll need one. Anderson Varejao will probably be the starter, with Z and Shaq both gone.

• OK, a game show is not a sport, but this too cool not to mention: The "Jeopardy!" Clue Crew spent some time at the Cleveland Clinic at November, filming an entire category's worth of clues for the show. The Cleveland Clinic category will come up Friday. I DVR "Jeopardy!" and look forward to getting all the questions correct.

Four-game sweep, batches!

I figured the Tribe had a chance to play well against the Tigers this weekend, but a four-game sweep? Never would have guessed that.

Yesterday's 7-2 win was particularly satisfying, in part because of Jhonny Peralta's extremely unlikely inside-the-park home run, which came in his first at-bat upon returning to the lineup after missing three games with the flu. I don't know about you, but I don't usually feel like running 120 yards at top speed when I'm getting over the flu—and Peralta's probably no faster than I am. He did get an assist from the bullpen door, which opened when Detroit's Ryan Raburn crashed into it in a vain attempt to catch Peralta's ball on the fly. Raburn subsequently landed on his petoot, and was unable to get up in time to make a play. I've often said that when you watch a baseball game, the chances are excellent that you'll see something you've never seen before, and that was one of those moments.

Jeanmar Gomez won his major-league debut yesterday, and was better than anyone had a right to expect. Dude was lights-out, going seven innings and giving up two unearned runs on just five hits. He walked one and struck out four. Gomez is a home-grown prospect, having signed with the Indians as an undrafted free agent out of Venezuela in 2006. His career ERA is 0.00. I'm pretty confident he won't keep that up, but he sure showed a lot of promise. Gomez only started that game because Saturday's doubleheader threw off the rotation, and he got sent back to Columbus after the game—but barring injury, we'll surely see him again this year, and probably very soon.

Sunday's victory followed a pair of one-run wins in Saturday's twinbill, necessitated by a May rainout; those, in turn, followed an easy 8-2 win on Friday night. And the Indians, who went a dismal 34-54 before the All-Star break, are now 4-0 since the break. If they can win all their games after the break, they'll finish 108-54. I think I'll order World Series tickets right now.