Player of the Game
Francisco Lindor continues to impress as more and more teams get to see the rookie phenom. Tonight he lead things off with a triple, added a solo home run and then an opposite field single to finish 3/5 with an RBI and two runs scored. Lindor had a chance for a cycle in the ninth inning, but flew out deep to right.
Feathers Up
The Tribe got on the board early tonight as Francisco Lindor legged out a triple in his first at bat and Michael Brantley brought him own with a ground out to first. They added one more in the third the grab the lead back when Roberto Perez and Jason Kipnis doubled consecutively. The double was a big one for Kipnis who is still fourth in all of baseball with 38, but hadn’t hit one in his past seven games. Considering he missed two weeks in August on the disabled list, this is still very impressive.
A pair of Tribe youngsters took advantage of Jeff Samardzija in the fifth today as Jose Ramirez went deep for the second consecutive game followed by Lindor’s 8th home run of the season. Coming into the game Lindor was tied with Carlos Correa with a 2.8 WAR (raised to 3.1 during the game) to lead all AL rookies and showing a little power could help his case in the Rookie of the Year voting.
Trace Thompson has been a problem for the Tribe this whole series including a great catch, home run and late RBI single today, but he isn’t perfect and he handed the Tribe two runs tonight in the eighth when he allowed a Chris Johnson single to get under his glove. This scored Lonnie Chisenhall from second and Abraham Almonte from first. Johnson was able to go to third on the play, but didn’t score, leaving the Indians with a three run lead.
Feathers Down
Josh Tomlin continued his solid run of starts since returning from the DL and his tendency for giving up solo home runs. Nine of his ten home runs allowed this year have come with the bases empty, most likely to do with his paltry 0.71 WHIP. Three of those came tonight against Thompson, Tyler Saladino and Jose Abreu. He is still giving up quite a few home runs, as his 2.2 HR/9 mark is even higher than his career of 1.4 and his HR/FB rate is at it’s highest ever. To further point out how solid he has been outside the long-ball, only two of his 13 earned runs allowed this year have come without a home run. Tonight, he continued that by allowing just two singles in 5.2 innings besides the home runs.
Final Score: Cleveland Indians 6 – Chicago White Sox 4
Scoreboard Watch: The Twins and Royals were locked in an extra inning tie game when the Indians finished. The Angels versus the Dodgers and Rangers against Seattle started late. Last night the Rangers won against the Indians’ loss, so Cleveland is now 5.5 games out of the second Wild Card.
On Deck: The Indians and Tigers will repeat their September 6th match with the Tribe hoping for a different result. Alfredo Simon will pitch for Detroit against Danny Salazar at 7:10 PM Thursday night.
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