BOXSCORE

https://www.mlb.com/gameday/indians-vs- ... ame=490354

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Three homers......4 stolen bases.............

Carrasco............Excellent

The secret to pitcher success on this trip....limiting the pitch counts per innings pitched. More quality pitches! Tomlin, Bauer, Kluber, and now Carrasco all made it to the 7th inning or better before tossing up their 100th pitch. It was a battle to reach 5 innings before tossing up that 100th pitch.

We can sweep this series if Salazar can follow suit. He's had his problems with pitch counts. Like Bauer and Carrasco, he's hit the 100 mark by the 5th inning. If Salazar can go 7 or 7+ innings under 100 pitches, a sweep is very much possible.

We had problems with the lefty, Derek Holland, at home. He's a nibbler and very effective at it.

That seems to be the norm against us since the Chicago series at home. That's all we've been seeing lately. We're a fastball hitting team. Teams are adjusting accordingly. We've got to turn it around and now we have to adjust to these pitchers. It's only going to make us a better hitting team down the road. We have a very smart lineup.

Both Santana and EE have done a good job this series. Both are staying on the ball much better. The homer EE hit tonight was just to the right of center. He's had a couple of hits to the opposite field this series. He's being more patient and drawing more walks. He's got good hitters behind him. Just concentrate on reaching base and let the hitters behind him do their jobs. He's powerful enough. Keep putting good swings on the ball and the homers will follow. Hopefully, this series is just what the doctor order for Encarnacion. Hell! Even Gomes looks like he's coming around. THAT'S a big deal! He's had a couple of hits to the opposite field. One tonight with the shift on. Excellent.

We're set up for a "FAST BREAK". We need Salazar to keep the ball rolling.

Tribe rides homers, Carrasco past White Sox

Michael Brantley lines a two-run home run to right-center field to give the Indians a 6-0 lead in the top of the 7th inning

[ Now that's a sight for sore eyes. It looks like Michael Brantley is back. That homer was Brantley's 3rd on the season ]

CHICAGO -- Carlos Carrasco followed the example set by Corey Kluber Friday night at Guaranteed Rate Field by shutting out the White Sox over eight innings Saturday in a 7-0 Cleveland victory. The Indians came within three outs, recorded by Zach McAllister in the ninth, of producing back-to-back individual shutouts for the first time since April 16-18, 1981, when Wayne Garland and Bert Blyleven did the honors.

Cleveland's last consecutive overall shutouts came July 27-28, 2013. Carrasco allowed three hits Saturday, walked one and struck out eight.

Full Game Coverage
The White Sox offense, meanwhile, dove deeper into a recent funk. They have not scored a run in the past 23 innings, and have had just one baserunner reach second base in this series. Tyler Saladino had two of the three Chicago hits.

Mike Pelfrey suffered the loss, coming up from Triple-A Charlotte to take the spot of the injured James Shields in the starting rotation. He allowed four runs (two earned) over 4 1/3 innings, striking out one and walking one. Edwin Encarnacion hit a two-run homer off of Pelfrey, and Michael Brantley went deep off of reliever Michael Ynoa in the seventh.

Jose Ramirez added a solo homer off of Ynoa in the top of the ninth.

WHAT'S NEXT

Indians: Right-hander Danny Salazar is scheduled to take the mound for the Tribe in a 2:10 p.m. ET game against the White Sox on Sunday at Guaranteed Rate Field. Salazar currently leads Major League starters with 13.8 strikeouts per nine innings. He has averaged 13.7 K's per nine in 49 1/3 career innings against Chicago.

White Sox: Derek Holland makes his second start of the season against the Indians coming off of a loss against the Yankees during his last trip to the mound. Holland is 6-1 with a 2.35 ERA lifetime against the Indians and is 3-0 with a 1.00 ERA in his last three starts against them. Game time is set for 1:10 p.m. CT.

I watched a replay of this evening's ballgame and paid close attention to the pitch cast. A batter from either team was lucky to see one pitch where the complete ball was within the rectangle. It was a rarity that two balls would be within the zone. Every other pitched ball was either on the rectangle or completely outside of the rectangle. Many balls outside the rectangle especially the down and out pitches were called strikes which leads me to believe that a bunch of balls that are hit in play are borderline pitches or pitches outside the strike zone. An extraordinary amount of the pitches that were just off the rectangle, especially the down and out pitches were swinging third strikes. Of the swings and misses, many pitches were in the dirt.

With all the statistics these days, I figured there had to be statistics for batted balls put into play that were out of the strike zone. Guess what? Yes! But, rather than post boring charts and numerical data, I found an article that hit the nail on the head.

In just three years, about one out of every nine pitches that had previously been thrown in the zone started missing its mark.

The trend here is striking. As pitchers started throwing outside the zone more and more — again, the really big decline in strike-throwing started around 2009 — hitters not only started swinging at more pitches outside the zone, they also started getting much better at making contact on those wayward pitches. Add it all up, and you see that instead of making contact on just 10 percent of all balls thrown outside the strike zone, as they did back in 2002, hitters made contact on nearly 20 percent of such pitches in 2016. That’s double the rate! That’s unbelievable!

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BATTERS LEARNED TO TAKE WHAT PITCHERS GAVE THEM
HERE IS THE ARTICLE - A MUST READ

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/pi ... d-pitches/

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While the current competition is not on par with the boys, it is good to see them take advantage. Love winning streaks, and love it when the offense shows up.

In case you're wondering, the last time that Cleveland recorded 3 consecutive team shutouts occurred Sept. 18-19, 1956 vs. Washington (played a DH on 9/18/56).

Guess that record is intact

This was done early. Can't see scoring more than 3 runs against Holland. Salazar with 35 pitches in the first. I didn't realize the Salazar was a 1 pitch pitcher. That's not good.

Steve Stone mentioned that the 59 sox scored 11 runs on 1 hit. 10 walks, 3 errors, 3 hit by pitch.

I HATE the Chicago uniforms!

Those are "throwback" unis, from the early 80s:

http://www.whitesoxinteractive.com/rwas ... =3&id=2104

Well, they should throw them back!

The unis are for CWS fans, though:

http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/mlb-big-l ... --mlb.html

Here's a video that shows them wearing shorts back in 1976. Bill Veek loved to have fun!
Also some nice shots of the old Comiskey Park, with the exploding scoreboard, and shower in the bleachers.

https://youtu.be/CQiX62Y1N_Q

Here's an article about the unis.

http://www.freewebs.com/karamaxjoe/thew ... shorts.htm

I wish that Holland would let us see half of the pitches Salazar has grooved today. Still pretty obvious we can't hit southpaws very well. Holland eating us up like I thought he would. you would think after seeing Holland dominate us in Cleveland that we would make some adjustments.