Player of the Game
Yet again, Michael Brantley was one of the only bright spots in the Indians offense. Brantley added another steal (he is perfect in eight attempts so far), in addition to two singles an RBI and a run scored. There were few other positives out of this game where poor defense and poor situational pitching cost the Indians a chance to win.
Feathers Up
In his first start against a left handed pitcher, Lonnie Chisenhall helped score the Indians first run. In the third, he walked to lead off the inning and Justin Sellers followed with a single on an 0-2 count. Despite strike outs by Michael Bourn and Mike Aviles, Michael Brantley still came through with an RBI single to extend his hitting streak to 12 games, giving the Indians a 1-0 lead.
Josh Tomlin has an another great start against Chicago, allowing no earned runs while he was in the game and striking out a career high eight in five innings. Tomlin only gave up five hits, but one of which was a three run home run after an error, giving the White Sox three unearned runs. Two more runs did score off Tomlin, but they came in against Bryan Shaw, after Tomlin had been removed in the sixth inning.
Feathers Down
Carlos Santana was originally scheduled to hit fourth and DH, but was removed from the lineup just prior to the game due to an unknown illness. Asdrubal Cabrera replaced him at DH, moving up to clean up with Justin Sellers replacing Cabrera in the field.
Chisenhall gave back the run he scored right back and more besides. In the bottom of the third, Josh Tomlin retired the first two batters easily before Chisenhall mishandled a ground ball, allowing Marcus Semien to reach base safely. After a Connor Gillaspie single, Dayan Viciedo crushed a home run to left field, giving the Indians three more unearned runs and the White Sox a 3-1 lead. It was the Indians 38th unearned run of the season, by far the worst in the Majors. With those runs added, the Indians have a run differential of -22, but without considering unearned runs, would be up 16 runs on their opponents.
The Indians had scoring opportunities late in the game, but just couldn’t come through due to the White Sox unexpectedly solid defense and the mammoth strike zone of home plate umpire Ron Kulpa. The Indians had base runners in the fifth and sixth, but scored just one run, mostly because Moises Sierra threw out Ryan Raburn at second on an attempted double. They had another shot in the eighth, loading the bases with two outs, but pinch hitter David Murphy was called out on strikes on a ball that went by his shins. While the strike call was poor, Kulpa was fairly calling this poorly all game. It was so bad early on that Tyler Flowers was ejected arguing after he and Alejandro De Aza struck out looking in the fourth.
Final Score: Cleveland Indians 2 – Chicago White Sox 6
On Deck: Game two of this three game series will take place at U.S. Cellular at 8:10 PM tomorrow night.
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