0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.
The only time you would see him in Cleveland was in a World Series.
More good pitching.
Son a big Cubs fan wants to go to game 3
Downtown Cleveland was pretty nuts tonight with the Indians/Cavs combination.During the Cavs game, they were putting the World Series feed on the jumbotron during time outs, and Cavs coach Tyronn Lue was just standing there watching.Really cool how the Cavs and Indians players have been backing each others' teams.
Oh, I wondered if you might have been there @Maj. Bill Martin ! Exciting times!Tonight's game is an hour earlier because of the prediction of rain. I hope they get it in before anything nasty gets going!
As Yosemite Sam would have said, maybe that’ll learn me to keep my big mouth shut. Because if Game One of this World Series was any passable example, it looks like the Indians have the best ex-Red Sox so far.Two such creatures appeared in the game. Jon Lester, who was deadly in two Series with the Olde Towne Team, started for the Cubs Tuesday night. Andrew Miller, who was converted to relief pitching in the first place while he was a teammate of Lester’s in Boston, showed up while the game was still manageable enough for the Cubs to think about coming back.Fat chance of that happening. Not only did Indians starter Corey Kluber pin the Cubs’ ears back and shake off a couple of deadly threats while he was at it, Miller toyed with them almost from the moment he relieved Kluber after Ben Zobrist’s leadoff single in the top of the seventh.The Cubs, for whom it seems the entire world is rooting in this Series, got a Game One fanning from a pitcher who picked a fine night to become the first ever to strike out eight in the first three innings of a World Series game, including five on called third strikes, and a catcher who’d hit only three homers in the regular season but dialed nine on them twice Tuesday night.And Lester, who looked like he didn’t have his fastball under command or a reliable breaking ball despite getting two outs on five pitches in the bottom of the first, would open the proceedings surrendering a bizarre bases loaded single to Jose Ramirez, whose squibber up the third base line died before any Cub could get a hand on it, and delivering a still bases-loaded plunk to Brandon Guyer.“The first inning was tonight’s game,” Lester said, ruefully but honestly, after the Indians finished the 6-0 conquest. “Didn’t have the best command coming out to start the game. Playoff games, that’s all they need. Two walks can’t happen. Put the ball in play. Make them earn it. Didn’t do it.”The World Series wasn’t even 25 minutes old and Lester put the Cubs into a 2-0 hole. It didn’t help when Francisco Lindor, the Indians’ swift shortstop, smacked a two-out single in the first and took prompt enough advantage of Lester’s distaste for throwing over to first base, taking a bigger lead than the law allows and stealing second at the first chance he had to gun it, setting up the hole.Kluber’s six sharp shutout innings and the Cubs inability to cash in when they did put runners in scoring position on him—Zobrist was left stranded after ripping a leadoff double off the right center field fence in the top of the second; Kyle Schwarber, freshly re-minted after losing a season to a knee injury but showing a hefty swing in the Arizona Fall League, was left hung out to dry after he hung a hefty two-out double off the fence in the top of the fourth—stung.Almost as bad as Roberto Perez, the Indians’ heretofore reputed good catch/good frame/no hit backstop, stung Lester in the bottom of the fourth when he hit a hanging 0-1 slider into the left field seats with one out. Or, the way Perez really stung former Cubs closer Hector Rondon, relieving Justin Grimm in the bottom of the eighth, when he squared up and hit a three-run homer a few rows further back in the left center field seats.What else but being toyed with would you call the Cubs loading the bases on Miller with nobody out, only to see Willson Contreras—batting for surprise right field starter Chris Coghlan—fly out to center, then Addison Russell and David Ross strike out swinging?The one positive the Cubs could take into Game Two was that they managed, somehow, and who’s to say other teams won’t be ringing them up to ask how, to wring Miller for 46 pitches in his two innings’ work. They may not see the tall lefthander in Game Two. May. But it’s no consolation puncturing Miller’s perceived super-humanness when they had no runs to show for it, either.Because Miller knows how to patch the puncture. He showed it in that top of the seventh. When he threw that poisonous slider on 3-2, starting over the outside to a righthanded hitter and diving down and in after crossing the zone. When Ross couldn’t check his swing if you held his upper arms back for him. Strike three, side retired, ducks stranded on the pond.The plate approach the Cubs used in overthrowing the Dodgers in their League Championship Series disappeared early enough and often enough.It was child’s play to catch on early to Kluber’s tack of working backward, showing the Cubs breaking balls to open counts instead of fastballs. But the Cubs—who got here in the first place by waiting Dodger pitching out, laying off breaking balls unless they hung, and forcing fastballs—were caught asleep at the switch by a pitcher who knows how to catch teams that way. And even if the first inning was a little on the freakish side, Lester won’t buy that as an excuse.“When you give a guy like Kluber, locked in from pitch one, two runs in the first,” Lester mused, “it makes his job a lot easier.”When you give the Indians a clean shot at opening a World Series with a win like that, it makes their job a lot easier, too. Don’t look now, but over the past three decades, the team that wins Game One goes on to win the Series, with two exceptions—the 2002 Angels (whose clinching game winner, John Lackey, is now a Cub) and the 2009 Yankees.“I have no concerns. It’s the first game,” said Cubs manager Joe Maddon, who’d been Mike Scioscia’s bench coach during the Angels’ staggering run to the 2002 Series conquest. “I’m fine. We’re fine.” Even if they might face Kluber in Game Four and, if needed, Game Seven?Ross knows only too well what Kluber’s Game One performance meant. “That,” said Grandpa Rossy, “is what Cy Youngs do. That’s what aces do.” Translation: They put their teams in better positions than they were supposed to have had. And the one the Indians sent to the mound to start isn’t even an ex-Red Sox.
I wasn't nuts enough to be downtown last night, but there was a ton of local coverage and I had some friends who were downtown. It's a different vibe from the Cavs' playoffs. During that run, there was this undercurrent of anticipatory dread that kind of kept a cap on joy during the Finals -- though obviously not at the end. But the Cavs win seems to have lifted a cloud from fans, and that "we're just waiting for the inevitable failure" aura is gone. People are just plain happy, and enjoying the whole experience. Obviously, we want to win, but the prospect of losing won't be the ultimate black hole it's been in the past.That's reserved for Cubs fans right now -- the monkey is on their back now.
