Game 128: Indians 2, Royals 1

There is nothing I hate more than the wave. It’s even worse when it happens in Cleveland, because I expect more.

I don’t understand the overuse of the word “hipster.” It has lost all meaning.

Doesn’t get anyone into the game. It gets people standing… then sitting again. At no point does the wave react to anything in the game. I’ve seen people doing the wave in a 1 run game with runners on. It doesn’t stop when there’s action on the field.

If we come up one short, you could argue he already has.

I’m fine with Perez. Lights-out closers are very rare. Most closers make their fans sweat. I think we underestimate how few relievers can consistently close games. If we can find a better closer, fine, but until then I’m glad we have Perez. No reason to believe he won’t get better with time.

Has this not already happened?

This is the biggest take away from last night’s game. It will be huge if he can pull it together for the next 2 plus years.

It was nice to see so many swinging strikes last night. It looked like he was fooling batters, and we hadn’t seen much of that from him previously.

STO did it absolutely NO justice. It was an amazing moment. People starting cheering essentially right after the Royals finished batting, as Thome was leading off the inning. People also cheered Thome right back into the dugout. I DVRd the game, hoping to come back home and see the moment again. I wasn’t really pleased.

Yeah, they were stuck at the beginning of an inning and couldn’t really do anything about it live. But they could have shown his walk-up and tipping the cap shortly thereafter, and didn’t. They did show it in the postgame.

My buddy stopped by to visit and he yelled at me for not having told him that Thome was up for his first AB. I said I would have told him, if I could have gotten the words out of my mouth before it was over. I had a feeling I would miss it anyway once I saw he would lead off the inning. MLB.tv frequently cuts first ABs of the inning slightly.

He could go out there with it tied around his head if he pitches like he did last night.

Underpants and Manning mentioned once or twice that they didn’t think he generally threw that hard.

He’s got major control issues throughout his career as a starter.

Two years if he’ll sign on the cheap? Chiz is clearly going to get the chance to play next year, and Kipnis at second. If we have Hannahan, he’s “blocking” Phelps and Donald, but that maybe that’s not an issue.

If his hitting against righties could improve, he’d be a viable 3rd basemen.

If Grady’s health would improve, he’d be a viable CF. If Zeke’s slugging would improve (a lot), we wouldn’t have to worry about Grady’s health. If LaPorta’s hitting, fielding, and throwing would improve, he’d be an All-Star. If Tomlin’s HR rate would improve, he’d be an ace. If my velocity would improve, I’d be the answer. I don’t think we should be holding out too much hope for any of those things to happen, nor do I think we should be handing out three-year deals thinking that a 31-year-old player is suddenly going to change who he is. I think it’s disingenuous to assert that “if (player) would improve (facet of his game) he’d be (what he is now, plus some value).”

Beyond that, though, I don’t think there’s much harm in wanting to hold onto Hannahan for his glove, but that kind of leaves us with nothing to do with Donald. Hannahan’s a corners-only kind of guy at this stage; I’d prefer Donald if it comes down to it.

1. Hammy quoted Acta a little bit ago that “this is the playoff run, defense is more important” or something similar
2. Chiz was hardly setting the world on fire
3. Hannahan is warming up at the plate

can we at least send chiz back to cbus to get everyday ABs if superhannahan is playing every day?