The Indians walked off an incredible 11 times this year and say breakout performances from quite a few players including Mike Napoli, Rajai Davis, Jose Ramirez and Tyler Naquin. These extraordinary players helped lead the Indians to be second in the AL in runs scored after finishing 11th in 2015. With this increase in both team scoring and individual player exploits, there were plenty of plays to choose from for the ten best of the 2016 season.
10. July 28th: Speed Never Slumps
[mlbvideo id=”867797883″ width=”400″ height=”224″ /]Anytime there is a steal of home, even if it isn’t a straight steal, it has to be included among the best plays of the year. In fact, you’re generally going to get a lot of home runs, walk off hits and creative base running in a list like this. This time Ramirez took second on a swing and miss by Lonnie Chisenhall. Notoriously poor defender, A.J. Pierzynski threw through on the play and Francisco Lindor took off full speed for home as soon as the ball left his hand. Erick Aybar had his eye on Lindor the whole time and misplayed the throw coming in to second, allowing Lindor to score without a throw. While it isn’t as exciting as a straight steal of home, it is a play that has a much higher chance of success and it certainly worked to perfection.
9. August 11th: Get it Moving, Big Man
[mlbvideo id=”1038991383″ width=”400″ height=”224″ /]This one is more fun than anything truly incredible. As part of a five run first inning, Chisenhall cleared the bases against the Angels thanks to a poor route and an even less impressive jump by Ji-Man Choi in left. What makes this one of the more entertaining plays of the season was that after Lindor scored easily, the lumbering Napoli was nearly passed on the bases by Ramirez, ending in two players sliding into home at the same moment like something out of Major League. Chisenhall was even able to get into third as the ball sailed past home.
8. September 4th: The Chiz Kid is Buried Alive
[mlbvideo id=”1136707083″ width=”400″ height=”224″ /]The Indians had to come back twice in this game against the Marlins, the first one orchestrated by Jason Kipnis with this bases loaded single. In the ninth, however, the game was tied at five with the bases loaded, two outs and an 0-2 count on Chisenhall. He took the delivery from Fernando Rodney and ripped it to right just beyond the reach of Ichiro Suzuki. If it wasn’t a walk-off, it could have been a three run triple, but instead Chisenhall was beaten to death by his own teammates before he was able to reach second.
7. July 1st: Someone Just End This Already
[mlbvideo id=”879925983″ width=”400″ height=”224″ /]Easily the most memorable game of the season for multiple reasons, the Indians went into the 19th against the Blue Jays on the first day of July tied at one. With a chance at a 14 game winning streak on the line, Terry Francona went with Trevor Bauer rather than position players as John Gibbons did for Toronto and it paid off. Bauer went five scoreless and earned the win after Carlos Santana hit this 3-2 pitch over the wall in center off second baseman Darwin Barney, the second position player to throw for Toronto in the game.
6. June 26th: A Whole Lot of Crush
[mlbvideo id=”861284383″ width=”400″ height=”224″ /]Justin Verlander may be involved in the Cy Young discussion this season, but he more greatly resembled Jamie Moyer than the award’s namesake on this day in June. Juan Uribe started off the fifth with a solo home run to break the 2-2 tie. Immediately after, Naquin added one more, this time going out to right. After two outs and a single, Mike Napoli added a two pointer in his imitable style and after one more reached, Chisenhall finished things off with the fourth home run of the inning, all off Verlander, just barely clearing the wall in right.
5. May 18th: Davis & Lindor bully Reds in extra inning win
[mlbvideo id=”713327483″ width=”400″ height=”224″ /]What’s better than a game tying home run? Two home runs to tie the game, then win it. While the degree of difficulty was decreased by playing against the worst bullpen in baseball, Davis and Lindor combined to do just that in this interstate rivalry. Davis had already hit a home run earlier in the game and he did it again in the ninth inning with one on to tie the game at seven. After two scoreless bonus innings, Lindor hit a solo shot off Keyvius Sampson of the Reds for the win in the 12th.
4. September 20th: One Lucky Guyer
[mlbvideo id=”1177987783″ width=”400″ height=”224″ /]The Indians final walk-off of the season was my favorite for a number of reasons. First, it was against the Royals, who just weeks earlier national media pundits were claiming would be nipping at the Tribe’s heels by this game for the division title, but instead the Indians walked off in game one of the series and swept the rest leading to the Royals official elimination from the divisional race the next day. Second, it was the full culmination of Chisentray, where Lonnie Chisenhall for some reason brings an entire tray of full water cups onto the field to dump on a teammate. Finally (and this is the reason for the title of this play), it lead to these tweets from a person who should be considered among the trolliest trolls in troll history.
@TonyIBI Killed it? LOL.he hit a ball that was fair by inches LOL..Why be good when you can be lucky…Like he INTENDED to hit it there? LOL
— S B (@Conigman) September 21, 2016
@JL_Baseball So when Guyer went up to bat,…did he say “i am going to hit it inches fair”? LOL…Thats all it is….LUCK.
— S B (@Conigman) September 21, 2016
3. September 8th: Jim Joyce sees no foul ball, speaks no foul ball, hears no foul ball
[mlbvideo id=”1149615683″ width=”400″ height=”224″ /]With the bases loaded against the Orioles and the Indians hanging onto a one run lead in the third, the oddest play to happen for the Tribe in 2016 occurred. What actually happened was that Chisenhall check swung and fouled off a ball. The ruling on the field, however, was that it was a wild pitch and two runners were able to score as Jason Castro never retrieved the ball while Lindor and Napoli circled the bases. None of the umpires saw anything to go against home plate umpire Jim Joyce’s initial decision and when a replay finally took place, it was to determine what base Ramirez, who had been on first, should be given. This still bothers me, because he was placed on second, but should have scored. Just because a catcher decides to stop playing baseball and argue with an umpire doesn’t mean that the game should be stopped. Joyce is famous for making some of the biggest mistakes in recent history and he made two on this play, first missing the foul ball, then stopping calling time out while the ball was still live.
2. July 8th: Napoli attempts to hire drummer for party
[mlbvideo id=”910207783″ width=”400″ height=”224″ /]The Indians have had some prodigious home run hitters in the past, although it has been awhile since anyone put together the kind of season that Napoli did this year. In addition to simply hitting 34 home runs, he hit some of the highest and longest shots ever seen in the history of Progressive Field. The video above shows his longest at 467 feet, but he hit 11 on the year that went at least 420. His second longest came on the road in this upper deck shot at Target Field and he neared the top of the bleachers at Progressive with this one as well.
1. August 19th: Tyler Naquin, Rookie Rock Star
[mlbvideo id=”1070372483″ width=”400″ height=”224″ /]Anyone who didn’t have this play as their #1 for the season must have been watching some other team. While the Indians only played seven games against the Blue Jays, they were among the toughest the entire season and filled with drama. First, there was the 19 inning game that the Indians won to extend their franchise record winning streak to 14 games, then two consecutive losses to split the four game set in Toronto. Back in Cleveland more than a month later, the Indians were trying to make up for their poor showing in the last two games the teams played against each other and when Naquin came up in the ninth of a tie game he did just that.
Like any inside the park home run, things had to work out just perfectly and a little weird. It appeared that Naquin’s hit would simply be a normal home run at first as the ball was skied, but came straight down and glanced off the top of the wall. Michael Saunders‘ misplay of the ball and the extreme force of the ricochet would have allowed Naquin to reach third easily on the play, but he was running hard out of the box and center fielder Melvin Upton slipped when retrieving the ball, allowing Naquin to score the game winning run.
Add The Sports Daily to your Google News Feed!
