The Tribe begun their first trip to Houston in over 10 years with a win. In fact, the first two batters of the game ignited the offense to lift off, and then the Indians and Astros just orbited around the playing field with great pitching or really poor hitting. It could really go either way in this one.
The game started off on a solid note for the Tribe when Shin Soo Choo got a triple that hit the left field foul line. Choo debated stopping at second, but luckily it didn't take him too long to decide and he lead off the game with a triple. It was his fourth consecutive game that he got an extra base hit to start us off. The next batter was A-Cab who did exactly what he needed to and that was hit a sac fly to the outfield, and drove in Choo. 1-0 Tribe.
In the bottom of the first the Astros got runners on 1st and 2nd with 1 out, and then on a sharp grounder hit to Jason Kipnis, the runner trying to advance to 2nd stopped in the basepath when Kipnis attempted to tag him, so Kipnis had to throw to first for the force out. Grimmace got the force at 1st and then threw back to 2nd to get the tag on the runner who had previously stopped in the basepath. However once again, the runner stopped and forced a rundown. Rather than focus on him only, Cabrera was smart and threw to Santana were another runner was attempting to score before the tag was applied in the prior rundown, but Cabrera got the ball to Santana with about 6 steps to spare. Double play, ended the inning and the threat, still 1-0 Tribe after 1.
The rest of the game didn't allow for any excitement. Lucas Harrell looked like a Cy Young contender, and Ubaldo Jimenez who had allowed those first two runners via the walk got in command of the strike zone and dominated as well. Both guys looked like they had good movement, but the hitting was awful. Astros not named Chris Johnson were chasing pitches and falling for the Ubaldo curve all night. Indians hitters would only rattle off 3 more hits and go after the first pitch fastball nearly every at-bat to little or no success.
Ubaldo Jimenez: 6.2IP, 4 hits allowed, 0 ER, 4 Walks, and 8 Ks
Lucas Harrell 7.0IP, 2 hits allowed, 1ER, 3 Walks, and 9Ks.
Those are the real stats of the these pitchers, and now I ask, was it great pitching or really bad hitting? Obviously it will be somewhere between the two, but as I am watching the 2nd game of this series as I write this, I am going to say that it is lousy hitting. For a visiting team playing in Houston, I am sure the small park makes hitters do things that maybe they wouldn't do at the plate, but 2 runs usually isn't a winning formula for any offense. Not many great approaches at the plate by the hitters, I did like what Choo and Brantley did batting in game 1, but that is the usual suspects. Grimmace had a great opportunity to blow the doors open in the middle innings with the bases juiced and 1 out, but he could only hit a pop fly in foul territory into RF, and no fault of Grimmace, but the 3rd base coach allowed Santana to tag on the fly, but he was gunned out by a mile thus ending the Indians threat.
The fun happened again in the bottom of the 8th with the Indians up 2-0 and Vinnie Pestano on the mound. Pestano allowed 3 warning track fly balls to get a 1-2-3 inning, and they all initially looked like they could have been in the seats when they left the bats, so hopefully we just escaped that time, and Pestano will fix things the next time out. After the Astros showed off their power, Chris Perez entered in the 9th and struck out the side.
That's all I got for now, heading to see the movie El Caballo: Indian Hunter 3D. Until next time, adios!
Go Tribe!
-Grey Beard
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