Reaction: Cleveland Indians Waste Opportunities In Loss to Rangers

The Rangers pulled out a late-inning win against the Indians on Tuesday, as they beat Cleveland 4-3 behind Wandy Rodriguez. Danny Salazar made the start for the Tribe, allowing six hits and three walks in route to three runs over 5.2 innings, and striking out six batters in the process. Rodriguez had a similar night, allowing three runs on four hits and five walks, with six strikeouts of his own throughout 5.1 innings of work.

Key Moments
First Inning
The Indians scored their runs early, starting with a leadoff solo blast from Jason Kipnis in the first inning. Three batters later, Ryan Raburn followed with a two-out solo home run of his own, putting the Tribe up 2-0 from the start. Cleveland tacked on another run in the fourth inning, when Raburn doubled and scored on a sacrifice fly off of the bat of Yan Gomes.

Fifth Inning
Salazar started to labor in the top of the fifth inning, when he walked Leonys Martin with one out. He followed up by hitting former-Indian Shin-Soo Choo with a pitch, but it was the next batter that made him pay for his mistakes. Prince Fielder launched a no-doubt home run to deep right center field, tying the game at 3-3. After giving up a single to Adrian Beltre, the trainer checked Salazar’s hand for an apparent nail injury, but Salazar was able to stay in the game and escaped the inning.

Eighth Inning
Nick Hagadone had entered the game with two outs in the sixth inning, and in the eighth inning, he finally ran out of steam. With one out, the left-hander gave up a go-ahead solo home run to Mitch Moreland, giving the Rangers a 4-3 lead. Despite a two-out error in the bottom of the ninth that gave the Indians the chance for a walkoff, the Tribe couldn’t capitalize, and Texas walked away as winners.

The Positives
Despite giving up a home run, Hagadone did pitch 1.2 otherwise perfect innings. Kipnis continued his hot streak, going 1-for-4 with a walk, as well as reaching on an error in the ninth inning. Raburn also had a big night, with two hits in three at-bats.

The Negatives
The Indians left a lot of runners on base Tuesday night, and continue to have trouble hitting with runners in scoring position. There were no runs scored in response to the Rangers’ runs, even though the Tribe had base runners in all but one of the five innings.

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Check It Out
– Raburn is having another big year for the Tribe, batting .309 on the season. In fact, the Indians had four hitters in their lineup on Tuesday who are batting over .300 – Kipnis, Raburn, Michael Brantley and Mike Aviles. Unfortunately, the next highest average in the order was .235, so there’s a huge gap that the Tribe needs to figure out how to fill.

– On Wednesday, Carlos Carrasco and the Tribe will take on right-hander Colby Lewis. Lewis is 4-2 with a 3.49 ERA, with 44 strikeouts over 56.2 innings. Carrasco, meanwhile, has a 4.74 ERA and a 5-4 record, but he has a 2.64 FIP. No one else has that kind of differential between ERA and FIP, and it’s due in part to 58 strikeouts in just 49.1 innings. The Indians will be counting on another solid outing from Carrasco to get them back on track.

Next: Jason Kipnis Catches Fire in May: Hot Streak Breakdown