Speaking of oddities ... Joey Gallo hit his 100th home run yesterday. First guy in history to hit his 100th homer before he hit his 100th single.

The next closest guy in history had 172 singles.

Now that is a crazy statistic!

What likely made those walk stats about Vlad Sr. even more amazing is that (considering his hitting prowess) he likely was pitched VERY carefully.

But Francona is not worried about Luplow’s production falling off if the Indians do not face a left-handed starter for long stretches.

“Those things have a way of working themselves out,” Francona said. “It’s just, you know, you’ve gotta be patient sometimes.”

Lol, maybe TOO patient at times, right HB?

I’m sure there is an ideal spot somewhere between me and Tito.

Look, I know he’s a popular manager, but I will put myself out there, I do not think he is above taking flack. In my opinion he makes mistakes.

Last year Brandon Guyer hit 200 the whole season. Stayed on the roster, and played pretty much every game against a lefty. He even put Guyer on the postseason roster. He even started Guyer the final game of the playoffs, when we got eliminated.

There is patience, then there is textbook insanity, where you keep trotting a bum out there expecting different results.

I can't bitch about and second guess Tito's game time decisions. He should be judged on how the team fares during the season and in the post season. If the team fares well, he should be rewarded. If not, he should be shitcanned. I'm and Indians fan, not a Tito fan.

He's had a good run. Good runs eventually end. Usually, runs end because the on-field talent disappoints. A good skipper can pull a few rabbits out of the hat, once in a while, but not forever.

You can't shine shit.

But can you tell shit from shinola?

Mandy Bell @MandyBell02
18 minutes ago

The Indians have optioned Cody Anderson to Triple-A and called up AJ Cole.

Also, Max Moroff cleared waivers and has been outrighted to Columbus.

Cole? Was he on the 40 man roster? Of course they had room to add one guy, anyway, but I hadn't noticed he was doing anything useful.

OK, so his numbers were OK: 17 innings, only 10 hits, 2 were homers 6 earned runs 21 K.
His Major League career has covered 144 innings during which he has allowed a Tomlin-esque 31 homers. He and Neil Ramirez will make a nice pair of HR launchers in the Tribe bullpen

Anderson won't be allowed back on the major league roster for minimum of [what is it? 10 or 15 days?]. Not sure who'd they use as a starter instead. Plutko made his season debut a few days ago and didn't make it out of the first inning. Anderson was declared "ready" after not having pitched more than 3 innings at a stretch. I hope that they don't do the same with Plutko. Of course, it's only about 24 days until Clevinger is allowed back.
So we have only a couple starts to fill in.

and last year Cole was really in command: 15 homers allowed in 48 1/3 innings; with an especially amazing sequence with the Nationals: 10 1/3 innings 6 homers!

Remember seeing those numbers when they signed him last winter and hoped we would never see him on the big league club. Still can hope he never gets into a game.

There is a glass case in the bullpen that you only break in case of emergencies. Cole will sit in that.

You know, if you replace Tito's name in the last several days of posts you could easily put in Grover all for the same reasons. "They're veterans for a reason......"

I've come to a conclusion, and not a very cheerful one.

This team misses, above all, Michael Brantley. This guy is tearing it up in Houston, but is this a surprise?

Put Michael Brantley in a lineup like that, in a ballpark like that...it is a formula for success. And that team was already loaded.

Brantley is such a professional hitter, he rubbed off on all our guys in addition to his own production.

In a perfect world, they would have dealt Kluber and used that money to do the same 2 year deal Houston did with Brantley.

Needless to say it's over now, but I believe Brantley is the missing piece and without coming up with a reasonable likeness of him (incredibly unlikely) this offense is doomed to be stuck in neutral all season.

I usually like to give the front office the benefit of the doubt because they are generally quite good. We don't have to argue that - when you add up all the good moves, and bad moves, it adds up to an outstanding win/loss record the last 5 years in a mid to small market. Not Tampa good, but still top notch.

But the loss of Brantley will haunt the team as a very poor decision until and unless a suitable replacement is found. And Brantleys don't grow on trees.