Tribe Baseball: The Smell of Summer

"Well, beat the drum and hold the phone - the sun came out today!
We’re born again, there’s new grass on the field.
A-roundin’ third, and headed for home, it’s a brown-eyed handsome man;
Anyone can understand the way I feel."

John Fogerty's centerfield sums up what every Indians fan is thinking right now. Could this be the year? Is a whole generation of fans going to get what no Indians' fan has seen since 1948? Or is this just another step towards the big dance?

I don't know the answer to that, and unlike my bold NBA prediction for the Cavs, I've decided to stay quiet on where I think the Tribe will end up this year, but I sure like the message that Cleveland sent out in the first three innings:

Here follows a short description of Jose Contreras getting his ass handed to him:

Grady Sizemore led of the season with a home run. Trot Nixon followed with a single. Travis Hafner followed with another single. Trot made it to third. VMart followed with another single, scoring Nixon. Pronk to 2nd. Casey Blake hit into a fielder's choice, but Pronk made it to third. Dellucci K'ed. Then the fun started. Jhonny Peralta singled, scoring Hafner, and getting Blake over to third. Then newly acquired Josh Barfield tripled, scoring both Blake and Peralta. Marte popped out to end the inning.

What an inning, and what a start to the season. It didn't end there. CC did struggle initially, giving up a double and a dinger and a single before getting out of the inning after giving up 2 runs. Then came more thunder from the offense.

Grady Sizemore walked. Trotter doubled (sorry about anything I said Trot) and Grady went to third. Pronk legged out an infield single, scoring Sizemore, and Trotter scored on a throwing error. Contreras was gone. VMart flied out, but Casey Blake doubled, moving Pronk to third. Dellucci was walked intentionally, to get to Peralta, and allow for the double play potential.

Last year, Peralta hits into a double play.

This year, Peralta singles, scoring Hafner and Blake, and moving Dellucci to 2nd. This year, Peralta is back to normal.

Finally, Barfield hit INTO that double play, to end the inning.

After a quick bottom of the inning, the Tribe started off with two quick outs. Then came Trotter, who singled to go 3-3 in three innings as an official member of the Indians. Hafner followed up with another single, and then VMart rifled one to deep center, a double, and Hafner and Trotter both scored. Blake struck out to end the third.

So in case you weren't keeping score at home, Cleveland is up 11-2 in the top of the fourth. After three innings, the only Indians not to have a hit are David Dellucci and Andy Marte. After three innings, the only Indians not to be on base is Marte.

I'm not going to sit here and give you another play by play. I'll let better blogs to that, but I will say it's a great start.

Of course...there's still six innings to play, and we still have to see our bullpen.

Who cares.

It's BASEBALL SEASON!

My synopsis of the Indians will be coming later this week, as well as an update on the game 1 destruction of the White Sox.

So PAY ATTENTION!!!!

Let's Go Tribe!