Minnesota rolls over Tribe 12-3 as Sabathia rumors persist
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| CLEVELAND | 0 | 0 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 3 | 8 | 0 | ||||||
| Minnesota | 1 | 1 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 4 | X | 12 | 15 | 0 | ||||||
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The Minnesota Twins scored early and often against Indians starter Paul Byrd, as the Cleveland Indians dropped their sixth straight game, 12-3, in Minnesota.
In fairness to Indians’ starter Paul Byrd, it wasn’t all his fault, even though he got the Tribe off to a bad start. Byrd gave up a first inning blast to Nick Punto, his first of the season. In the second, he gave up a lead-off single to Delmon Young, who came home on a Brian Buscher double to make the score 2-0.
Cleveland actually showed some life in the top of the third, when Ryan Garko led off the inning with a single, and Kelly Shoppach hit his seventh home run of the year. The two-run blast actually tied the game. Unfortunately, it wouldn’t take long before this game was out of reach…one inning to be exact.
In the bottom half of the inning, Byrd got two quick ground outs. What looked like an easy inning, turned ugly quickly. Justin Mourneau walked on five pitches, then Jason Kubel doubled, putting two runners in scoring position for Delmon Young, who was picked up in a big offseason trade for starter Matt Garza. Young took another step in his growth into a five-tool star, when he took a 1-1 pitch over the wall in left for a three-run blast, to give the Twins a 5-2 lead they would never look back on.
The Brewers vs. The Dodgers, Olney, Rosenthal and Tom Haudricourt
With rumors exploding like fireworks about the Brewers and the Indians conspiring on a deal to send the reigning Cy Young Award winner, C.C. Sabathia to the Cleveland Indians, it wasn’t a surprise to see the long-bantered Dodgers rumors finally catch some wind.
The Indians are apparently interested in Dodger 3B Andy LaRoche, AA RHP James McDonald and AAA SS Chin-Lung Hu. Again, Ken Rosenthal is at the center of this particular rumor, and again, there doesn’t seem to be any other evidence other than a bunch of blogs that have been speculating the same thing for the past month.
In the meantime, J.J. Hardy’s name surfaced earlier this morning by Rosenthal, then backed by Buster Olney. Tom Haudricourt, the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinal writer on the Brewers beat then quickly shot this down, stating that “a reliable source has told me I could forget the rumors that shortstop J.J. Hardy would be included in a deal for C.C. Sabathia.”
Obviously, Haudricourt is the guy that probably has the best sources, since it is starting to appear like Olney and Rosenthal’s sources are each other. That said, Haudricourt better watch himself, because when he starts publishing pieces under the heading, “Forget the Hardy rumor,” he better make sure it doesn’t happen. Still, it’s fun watching Haudricourt play the wet blanket to Olney’s and Rosenthal’s fires.
So for now, it’s the Dodgers vs. the Brewers. I’m fairly sure that we’ll see a few more teams in the mix before it’s all over.
Just what the Indians want, a bidding war.
This could get interesting.
Sabathia to the Brewers? Borowski designated for assignment
photo courtesy of BNSF Celyn/flickr
First comes the front office meeting. Then comes the Borowski demotion and Bauer DFA. Then comes the Jensen Lewis and Brian Slocum promotions to bolster the bullpen.
Now come the rumors.
Buster Olney and other media outlets reported that the Indians have sent scouts to the Brewers AA and A affiliates, the stocked Huntsville Stars and Brevard County Manatees.
Depending on who you believe, the Indians have focused their attention on four Brewers: 3B prospects Mat Gamel and Taylor Greene, SS prospect Alcides Escobar and outfield prospect Matt LaPorta, with LaPorta and Greene at the top of their list.
Then, Ken Rosenthal reported that the Brewers had made an official offer to the Indians that involved both LaPorta and Escobar. There was also mention that the Brewers would prefer to include current starting shortstop J.J. Hardy.
It didn’t take long for the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel’s Tom Haudricourt to refute the claim in his blog.
“I have serious doubts that the Brewers are offering both of those players for Sabathia, who can be a free agent after the season. In fact, I’ve been told by people connected to the organization that the Brewers wouldn’t want to trade either for a pitcher who would leave as a free agent at the end of the season…I respect Rosenthal but his sources might be off on those two names. I would think the Brewers would offer Green or Mat Gamel or any number of other top prospects before parting with LaPorta and Escobar. That would be a steep price.”
In a later blog, Haudricourt did offer these tidbits,
“I have it on good authority the Brewers would never send LaPorta AND shortstop Alcides Escobar to the Indians for Sabathia. The Brewers might be willing to overpay a bit in prospects — and I think Taylor Green is in there somewhere — to get the Indians to pull the trigger now and not entertain other offers.”
The Brewers do have a history of dealing prospects for rent-a-players. Last year, they dealt three prospects for Scott Linebrink last season, only to watch him leave for the Chicago White Sox this season. This is a deal that could be done sooner, rather than later.
It’s official, Joe Borowski has been designated for assignment. The Indians have 10 days to do something with JoeBo, which is fine, as long as he stays gone.
Slocum and Lewis called up: a sign that Borowski is gone?
The Cleveland Indians have called up both Jensen Lewis and Brian Slocum after last night’s marathon game in Buffalo. The moves will be made today to shore up their a struggling bullpen. As mentioned yesterday, Rick Bauer will be designated for assignment, and it’s also believed that Joe Borowski will be, well, moved somewhere. It’s my guess that there’s being every effort made to move Borowski in a minor trade, so that the Indians wouldn’t be responsible for the two million still owed the reliever. If not, look for Borowski to join Bauer in the DFA category.
The only question left is whether or not there is a move we haven’t been appraised of yet. Surely anything is possible at this point, after the Indians front office and field coaches met in Minneapolis to discuss the Tribe future. The moves will be made official before the game today against Minnesota.
There were some hints about the moves coming out of Buffalo, and the transaction reports late Thursday night.
Indians front office meeting nets immediate bullpen change
The Indians brass, led by Mark Shapiro, Chris Antonelli and Eric Wedge met in Minneapolis today to discuss immediate and future changes to the Tribe lineup. As previously noted here at Tribe Report, the Indians will immediately address the bullpen. The first move will be Joe Borowski’s removal as Tribe closer. It’s not known whether or not he will be moved out of the roll and into the pen, or if he will be outright released. It’s believed that the Indians are in the midst of trying to trade him, and won’t announce anything in regards to where Borowski ends up until the official moves are made before tomorrow night’s ballgame against the Twins.
Wedge has yet to commit to one reliever to replace Borowski, although Masa Kobayashi appears the clear favorite. I’m sure Rafael Perez will also be in the mix, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see Rafael Betancourt in the mix as well, even though this year has been a year in futility for the set-up man. In my opinion, a bullpen by committee would be a mistake at this point, although you could make a case that Kobayashi has been used too much already, having pitched 40 innings, when last season in Japan he only pitched 47. Still, I think it’s important that this bullpen establishes roles again, and putting Kobayashi in the closer role might be the best way to go.
The Indians next move will be to designate for assignment Rick Bauer. The hard-luck pitcher was sensational in Buffalo, but just didn’t find a role on the big league club after getting shelled in his six innings of work. The Indians will then call up one of three pitchers from the minors: Jensen Lewis, Brian Slocum or Jeff Stevens, although bum Juan Rincon is also being mentioned as a possibility.
Hopefully, Borowski will either be moved, or cut, so that we can see Lewis and Slocum make the move to the pen.
Check the Tribe report over the fourth of July weekend for up-to-date news regarding these moves, and anything in the future that was decided upon at these meetings. I’m sure by the time the fireworks start tomorrow night, the picture of the after-effects of this meeting will be much more clear.
Borowski--photo courtesy of firebrandal/flickr
Will today mark the end of Borowski, and the beginning of trade talks for Sabathia and others?
Today’s an off day for the Cleveland Indians.
It seems such a harmless sentence, but with the Cleveland Indians playing baseball far south of good, today’s off day might mean the beginning of a major shake-up for the Cleveland Indians team in general, and to, specifically, their bullpen. When Mark Shapiro was asked about his bullpen, and specifically, Joe Borowski, he replied,
“We’ve got an off day. We’re going to be meeting, we’re going to be talking, we’ve got a lot of things that we’ve got to work through right now. We’ll be working on the off day to try to solidify some things, make some decisions and go from there.”
I’m sure Borowski wasn’t exactly jumping up and down at that quote, when Shapiro has already been pretty clear about Borowski having the job since signing him before last season. It may be the quote that leads to an imminent departure for Borowski, and the beginning of the end for several other Indians.
A.J. Pierzynski’s walk-off homer trumps Grady Sizemore’s big night in Tribe loss
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| Chicago (AL) | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 6 | 8 | 1 | |||||
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A.J. Pierzynski’s lead-off, tenth inning home run gave the Chicago White Sox a 6-5 win over the Cleveland Indians, it’s second straight extra-innings victory, and a sweep of the series at Chicago’s U.S. Cellular Field. Grady Sizemore deserved better.
Cleveland’s Joe Borowski blows another one
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| Chicago (AL) | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 3 | 9 | 0 | |||||
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Joe Borowski blew his fourth save of the season, as the Cleveland Indians lost to the Chicago White Sox 3-2 in 10 innings in Chicago. The loss puts the Indians 11 1/2 behind the first-place White Sox, and may be the straw that breaks the camel’s backs on the Indians’ season.
What’s left to say about Joe Borowski? The Indians had taken the lead over the White Sox in the 10th inning, when Casey Blake hit a home run over the left field wall. It felt a bit like 2007 again, with late inning heroics winning an important game for the Indians. Enter Joe Borowski, who seems to prove nightly that when the game’s on the line, he’s not up to the task. He’s 6-10 in save situation, and there’s a sick part of me that wants him to end up at 50%. Maybe that will shut up the Borowski-backers that keep bringing up 45 saves from last year. Of course, I don’t think we’ll have that problem.
He started off by getting Joe Crede to ground out, and striking out last night’s hero, Nick Swisher. Then came the normalcy we’ve all grown to loath in our ‘closer.’ Borowski immediately got behind Alexei Ramirez, who ironically, the Indians were scouting last offseason. Ramirez took a 2-0 pitch, and deposited just over the wall in left field. Once that happened, Borowski was finished. He gave up a single to the next batter, Dewayne Wise, who promptly store second. Orlando Cabrera then singled up the middle, scoring Wise, and ending the game.
It may have ended more than that.
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