Cleveland Sports Forum

My view of Kipnis as a 2B. I have seen too many instances where he waits for the ground ball to come to him instead of charging. I remember when Ronnie Belliard played there and everyone laughed at him for playing a short right field. Kipnis does have a decent enough contract that maybe he can packaged with others to fill our needs.

Carlos Carrasco not happy with defense in Cleveland Indians' critical loss to Royals

Paul Hoynes, Northeast Ohio Media Group By Paul Hoynes, Northeast Ohio Media Group


on September 23, 2014 at 12:32 AM, updated September 23, 2014 at 2:22 AM




CLEVELAND, Ohio – The Indians may have been denied access to the postseason Monday night by a season-long problem – defense.

First baseman Chris Gimenez and rookie shortstop Jose Ramirez failed to make plays that led directly to two runs. That was one more run than Kansas City needed to beat the Indians, 2-0, in the second game of what amounted to a doubleheader at Progressive Field.

The Indians beat the Royals, 4-3, at 6:05 p.m. as they completed a suspended game from Aug. 31 at Kauffman Stadium. The victory pulled them to within 2½ games of the Royals for the second wild card spot with three games left to play against Kansas City.

In the regularly scheduled game, lefty Danny Duffy and three relievers combined on a seven-hitter to extended their lead back to 3½ games. It was a big blow to the Indians, who have just five games to play.

Carlos Carrasco (8-6, 2.64) pitched just as well as Duffy, but in his eyes the defense let him down.

"Everything was good," said Carrasco, referring to his start. "Everything was perfect right there. We should have made those plays right there. It cost me two runs.

"I thought they had a pretty good chance of making those plays, but sometimes we don't make them and it costs us runs."

Carrasco allowed two runs in 7 1/3 innings. He struck out nine, walked one and allowed seven hits in the loss.

Carlos Carrasco says defense hurt him Carlos Carrasco gave up two runs in a 2-0 loss to Kansas City on Monday night and both runs were tainted by bad defense. Carrasco said first baseman Chris Gimenez and shortstop Jose Ramirez should have made the plays in question.

"I thought Carlos was really good," said manager Terry Francona. "The two runs he gave up both came on hard hit balls, but if we're able to execute plays, shoot, we might still be playing."

The Royals took a 1-0 lead in the first when Eric Hosmer scorched a ball off Gimenez's glove at first base to score Nori Aoki from second. Gimenez was making only his third start at first since being acquired from Texas on Aug. 23.

Kansas City made it 2-0 when Alcides Escobar sent a hard shot off Ramirez's glove in the fifth to score Omar Infante from third. Ramirez was playing in to try and cut off Infante at home, but instead of getting in front of the ball, he tried to play it off to the side.

"The ball that Hosmer hit was scalded," said Francona. "It just hit the end of his glove. The ball to Jose would have been a really nice play. They're makeable, but they happened awfully quick. They were both hit awfully hard."

Francona said Gimenez was playing first because starter Carlos Santana, who DH'd, needed a break. He's been playing with a sore right quadriceps muscle since the start of September.

"I'm so upset with myself," said Gimenez. "Even if you've never played first base before, you should make that play.

"To be honest, he hit it so hard, I just stuck my glove out and it just caught the end of my glove . . .I need to catch that ball."

The Indians lead the big leagues with 113 errors.

CLEVELAND -- Indians starting pitcher Carlos Carrasco apologized Tuesday for criticizing his defense following a tough loss to the Kansas City Royals a night earlier.

After he gave up two runs in Monday night's 2-0 loss, Carrasco said he felt his teammates had let him down.

In the first inning, first baseman Chris Gimenez had a hard shot by Eric Hosmer glance off his glove for an RBI single. In the fifth, shortstop Jose Ramirez failed to come with a grounder as a run scored.

"You know what? Everything was good. Everything went perfect," Carrasco said afterward. "We should've made those plays right there. That cost me two runs."

On Tuesday, Carrasco issued an apology through the team.

"It was a terribly immature and foolish thing to say," Carrasco said in a statement emailed to media members. "I know better and I apologize for saying it. I have made some terrible pitches in my career and position players could have questioned what I was doing. No one wants to be criticized when making their best effort. I will apologize to everyone and it won't happen again."

The loss pushed the Indians close to elimination from the AL playoff chase. They're 3½ games out of the wild card with five games remaining.

Defense has been an issue all season for the Indians, who lead the majors with 113 errors.

Last one out please turn off the lights.

First baseman Chris Gimenez

Why in the world was Giminez playing 1b in a game that counts?
Now that games don't count please put Aguillar out there if not Santana.

When you score 1 run and have to pray your pitcher throws a shutout, you don't deserve to win.

Defense, shmeefense!!! get some freakin' bats and score some freakin' runs.

Offense is hard to find these days, anywhere in baseball, outside perhaps of Baltimore. Tigers have lots of offense but with leaky end of game pitching, and for that matter Price and Verlander being much less valuable to them than Carrasco and Kluber were to us, they are barely making the playoffs.

I don't object to getting some hitters, but not sure where they'll come from.

I am going to guess, you are not willing to wait a few years for Zimmer and Frazier and another one or two for Mejia and Bradley.

civ ollilavad wrote:

First baseman Chris Gimenez

Why in the world was Giminez playing 1b in a game that counts?
Now that games don't count please put Aguillar out there if not Santana.

I flipped out about that in another folder.

I guess Santana had a pull, so he used Giminez.

From the article posted by RUSTY above:


Francona said Gimenez was playing first because starter Carlos Santana, who DH'd, needed a break. He's been playing with a sore right quadriceps muscle since the start of September.

Santana needed a break???? He took the first 2 months of the season off.

Read the second sentence:

He's been playing with a sore right quadriceps muscle since the start of September.

Ramirez is developing into a major trade chip in the off season. Something similar to the value Didi Gregorius had 2 years ago. (Choo or Bauer)

After the 2012 season, the Reds traded Gregorius to the Arizona Diamondbacks as part of a three team trade that also involved the Cleveland Indians. The Reds sent Gregorius to Cleveland along with Drew Stubbs in exchange for Shin-Soo Choo and Jason Donald. The Tribe then flipped Gregorius to Arizona with reliever Tony Sipp and infielder Lars Anderson for pitchers Trevor Bauer, Bryan Shaw and Matt Albers.

If they need a first baseman, can't Aguillar handle the position? I guess he won't get any game time as long as the post season remains possible; but if Tito rates Giminez higher that says little for Aguillar.

I agree. At least we know Auguilar is there, I saw him in the dugout last night cheering the team on>