Here are seven Walk-Off Thoughts after the Indians fell to the Twins 3-0 Saturday night, dropping their season record to 5-4.
1. Indians manager Terry Francona concluded his pregame Zoom call with reporters by saying, 'It's the Year of the Adjustment.' It was fitting, as at least in Francisco Lindoir's view, it's the need to make adjustments that has plagued the Indians' offense the last several days.
The Indians' offense struggled on Friday and then followed that up with a brutal night on Saturday. The lineup totaled two hits, both of which were infield ground balls. One of the two hits was a weakly hit ground ball that had an exit velocity of 40.5 mph and was largely based on the speed of Bradley Zimmer. The offense has been slow, for the most part, since the regular season started, though the torrid stretch by the starting rotation helped to cover up some of the imperfections. Lately, though, the lineup's issues have become more severe, and while the Indians pitching staff has been the best in baseball so far, the Twins' Bomba Squad won't be held down forever.
2. This is another case of having to balance patience with it being so early in the season with urgency due to having so few games overall. Francona was certainly right when he said it was the "year of the adjustment." For the Indians offense, Lindor knows he and many others need to start making a few as quickly as possible.
"Just compete, compete, compote and make adjustments," Lindor said on a Zoom call. "If we don't make adjustments as big-league hitters, we're not going to go anywhere. I'm one of those guys and it's taken me longer to make adjustments and I'm very accountable for it. We just gotta make adjustments as hitters. ... They can throw the Rosin bag right now and I'd probably pop it up."
3. Lindor saw his average rise to .222, as he had one of the weakly-hit singles. He's now 8-for-36 this season. Half of those hits have gone for extra bases, but he has lacked consistency sitting in the No. 3 spot in the lineup. He's certainly not alone. Carlos Santana, Franmil Reyes, Domingo Santana and a few others all have averages below .207. After Cesar Hernandez and Jose Ramirez as the 1-2 in the lineup, the Indians have struggled almost across the board (Bradley Zimmer has also had a nice start). Normally, a slow offensive start might he chalked up to it being the beginning of a long season, or the cold weather playing in cities like Cleveland and Minneapolis. To a degree, neither can be the case. The Indians were spared the frigid temperatures, and despite it being early, the home stretch of the season will be arriving soon. Lindor said he doesn't feel any extra pressure trying to carry the lineup: the Indians simply aren't where they need to be yet as a group.
"No, not at all because this is a team sport, and every guy in the lineup can play the game," Lindor said. "It just so happens we got caught in that stretch where seven hitters or eight hitters are struggling and you have one hitter that's not, where usually you have three or four hitters who are really good and the other ones are struggling. Right now we're that stage where seven of us are not doing what we're supposed to do."
4. The Indians did have their fair share of hard-hit outs that just didn't fall Saturday night. They totaled five outs with exit velocities of at least 100 mph, two more that were at least 98 mph off the bat and three more that were at least 90 mph. The hard contact might be a small, positive sign for a struggling offense, though it also doesn't help with the frustration in the moment.
"It's part of the game," Lindor said. "Whenever you hit the ball hard, it's not as frustrating because you made the adjustment and you got success. You can't control where the ball goes and who catches the baseball. What you can control is what you do in those 17 inches of the plate and maybe you have a really good swing, those 23, 26 inches. After that, you can't really control anything else."
5. Perhaps the starting rotation can buy the lineup some time, but this season, everything has a condensed time frame and a sense of urgency attached to it. Shane Bieber put together one of the best two-start stretches to start a season in baseball history. The rotation as a whole accomplished something only the 1993 Braves had been able to in the modern era. But until the Indians start to hit, even historic performances could go for naught.
"I'm extremely excited for our pitching staff," Lindor said. "The pitching staff continues to be one of the best ones since I showed up to the big leagues. ... Some people leave, and the people that have left are outstanding pitchers, but we have great guys that come up and they do the job and they get it done. I'm excited for what the future is going to look like here in Cleveland, with the pitching staff and the hitters, the hitters that we have are really good. They're younger, they're younger hitters. Once we start making the adjustments faster, we're going to be very good and maybe that's tomorrow, maybe that's next March. Whenever it is, I just hope it's fast."
Carlos Carrasco, Saturday's starter and the veteran on this younger rotation, has faith.
"Yeah, yeah, yeah, keep the faith," Carrasco said on a Zoom call. "I'm one of those guys who always trusts my teammates. Some day we're going to have some ups and downs. I think yesterday the game was 4-1 and then today 3-0. We're going to get there. When we get hot, there's nobody who can stop us. We have a good team. Tomorrow is another day, tomorrow is another game, and we go from there."
6. Carrasco allowed three runs — all via solo home runs — in six innings to go with five strikeouts Saturday night. Miguel Sano crushed two home runs and Eddie Rosario went oppo taco on a third. Carrasco felt two of the three were bad pitches, and that was all the Twins would need. Though, against this lineup, Francona would accept a three-run, six-inning performance just about any day. Sometimes a loss can paint a performance in a different light.
"You know, all things said, he ended up giving up three, and they were solo homers," Francona said on a Zoom call. "If you look up, sometimes you're playing Minnesota and you know what, we'll take three. We didn't mount any offense at all, so three seemed like more."
7. Carrasco now has a 3.75 ERA though two starts in his return to the rotation. But more than that, he's continued to feel strong through the entirety of his outings. That has been a main focus in his journey back to being a starting pitcher after coming out of the bullpen toward the end of last year.
"Yes, it's completely different. Last year, I just went one inning and the second inning I'd feel tired," Carrasco said. "Now, I feel strong from the first inning to the last inning, too. I just go as hard as I can until Tito comes to me and takes the ball away from me. This is two starts I'm really happy for. The result today, no, but I feel great and I feel strong. I need to work a little more on those breaking balls so I don't make the same mistakes in the next game. Those two pitches hurt a lot. ... I got two homers right there on two bad pitches."
Ryan Lewis can be reached at rlewis@thebeaconjournal.com. Read more about the Indians at https://ift.tt/2WB0NvK. Follow him on Twitter at @ByRyanLewis.
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