It’s not too often you can say your basketball team won by 18 points, and your baseball team wins by the same margin, but it happened for Cleveland sports fans on Saturday. The Cavaliers took game one from Detroit, 102-84, while the Indians were waxing the Yankees in New York, 22-4. It was truly an enjoyalbe sports day on the North Coast.
LeBron James made his presence felt early against the Pistons, going to the basket right from the get go, and punctuated the first half by banking in a three at the buzzer, culminating a 21 point first half. The Pistons tried to guard #23 man to man, but they better come up with a better plan come Tuesday night. James ended up with 38 points on 13 of 20 shooting. Joe Smith, Zydrunas Ilgauskas, Delonte West, and Mo Williams also pitched in with double figure efforts.
The only negative was the failure of the team to hold leads while James was on the bench. Because of the 18 point win, LBJ came out of the game a minute early, and played a little over 40 minutes, which is fine for a playoff game. Since the wine and gold have often bullt on leads while The King is on the bench, it’s not a big concern, but it is something worth watching.
Meanwhile, the Indians scored 14 runs in the second inning in route to a thrashing of the Bronx Bombers. The Tribe hit six home runs on the day in the new Yankee Stadium, which is playing like a bandbox thus far. Any flyball hit to right field has a decent chance of flying out of the yard.
The win guaranteed at least a split of the four game series, which was kind of unthinkable after the 1-7 start to the season.
Meanwhile, the starting pitching has improved, but the bullpen is in a state of flux. The relief corps, not named Kerry Wood or Zach Jackson, has walked 29 hitters in 36-1/3 innings. That’s the main reason for the problems they are having. Rafael Perez has walked nine and struck out two thus far, and right now cannot be brought in to a key situation. This means another southpaw is needed in the bullpen, so perhaps Rich Rundles or Tony Sipp will be recalled prior to tomorrow’s game against Kansas City.
Eric Wedge’s faith in Jensen Lewis is also misguided. Although both of the homers Lewis allowed were Yankee Stadium short porch specials, the right-hander has still allowed 12 hits and four walks in 6-2/3 frames. It seems to me that right now Rafael Betancourt should be the eighth inning guy right now, and maybe Masa Kobayashi could get a shot as well.
Wedge’s stubborness in not recognizing the hot man in the bullpen is one of his weaknesses. Remember how long he stayed with Betancourt last year when he was clearly ineffective. Of course, using Raffy Right in a 10-2 win on Thursday probably prevented him from being used on Friday with a 5-4 lead. Why wasn’t Vinnie Chulk used with an eight run lead.
Getting to Kerry Wood has become a big problem thus far. The Tribe needs to get the relief corps to throw strikes quickly or games like Friday and Sunday could become the norm. The Indians should have swept the Yanks instead of getting just a split.
KM
Cleveland Sports Perspective 