Rays 0, Indians 6: Only winners get cover pictures

The Rays knocked a couple of back to back singles in the top of the ninth inning, ruining the topicality of this video:

Frankly, though, the Indians in Major League at this point had only lost three game in a row, and they did manage to scrape across a single run. A three-game losing streak sounds pretty nice for the Rays right now, since they’ve now lost six straight and can see the season slipping away like so much sand in an hourglass.

Today was going to go so well! Blake Snell was pitching, and Kluber is an ace. Today was supposed to be a fun pitching matchup. Even better, I was lucky enough to have a sleeper agent at Progressive Field tonight. My friend Eric, a Brewers fan who is home for the summer, somehow managed to grab tickets to tonight’s hotly contested game with the biggest sports team in Cleveland. I had planned to send him a series of Manchurian Candidate-style instructions that would compel him to run onto the field when Kluber was pitching, hoping that he could run onto the mound to establish dominance and Kluber would slowly slink away, but it didn’t work that way. Instead, Eric just sent me updates about the game and interesting tidbits about Progressive Field, which apparently is pretty nice.

Do you want to read texts I got from a friend, that are actually just full of inside jokes that nobody outside of maybe three people would get? Of course you would, because that is far superior (more like LAKE Superior...but more on that later) to critically analyzing this 100 megaton bummer of a game.

The Game

Corey Dickerson hit a single in the second. That is a rare sentence for BSD, and yet it accounted for all of the Rays’ offense until the aforementioned final inning. The superior Corey tonight was Corey Kluber, who kept the Rays off-balance with everything, showing about as much emotion as a brick wall. Snell started strong early as well, but fell victim to an absolutely insane error by Desmond Jennings.

With a runner on second, Snell allowed a line drive that Jennings just...overran? Didn’t jump for? It’s simply a bizzare error, where he was caught in-between a hop that wasn’t overly high. Frankly it’s the kind of error that happens to slumping teams.

MLB.com devilishly labels this a “little league” home run, which is incredibly demeaning and absolutely accurate.

At this point, that’d be all the Indians would need, as the Rays didn’t get another hit until the ninth (have I mentioned that already?) and in fact wouldn’t get another baserunner until the seventh inning on a DJ walk. The Indians of course continued to pile on. Snell allowed seven hits and walked three men, but for the most part limited the damage. After allowing a leadoff double/sac bunt combo in the fifth, Snell pitched around the heart of the order to keep runs off the board, for a time. Eric, encouraged by our wonderful young pitcher, deciding to take in the ambiance.

Frankly (hot dog pun) I think racing Great Lakes would be fantastic. Lake Superior could be the one that wins most of them, but sometimes it could be neck and neck with Lake Michigan and Lake Erie. Lake Erie and Lake Huron could be the comic relief characters that get hit by Chief Wahoo or fans or something, toppling over like the garbage Great Lakes they are. Get out of here, other lakes.

Sorry, past Eric. It would not be a pitcher’s duel. How young and naive we all seem when we look back. In the sixth the Rays did poorly again. Brad Miller couldn’t gather a ball and allowed Juan Uribe to reach base, putting runners on second and first with one out. Lonnie Chisenhall drove a single to score the third run of the game.

I misspelled Lucroy because I am a fake fan who doesn’t know the game. Blake Snell departed in the seventh, and Enny Romero actually retired a man without walking anyone to close out the seventh.

Steve Geltz came out for the eighth and promptly allowed two back-to-back home runs:

One of them was to Juan Uribe. I think that Steve Geltz is not a very good baseball player, but that’s my personal opinion and you don’t have to agree with me.

In the ninth Miller and Longo got a couple of singles but nothing came of it, as Klubot finished off his three-hit shutout on 115 pitches. Well done, non-Rays pitcher. That’s about all that happened this game. Any final thoughts, Eric? From a Brewers fan who has followed the game for years?

Go Rasy!