Peralta hits the ball far when a lot of men are on base; Indians win
Posted by disappointmentzone on 20 August 2006
Jhonny Peralta hit his first career grand slam as the Indians beat down Devil Rays 9-4 to improve to 11 games shy of mediocre. Travis Hafner set a career high in RBIs when he hit is 38th homer of the season in the third inning. Not to be outdone, Ryan Garko also set a career high in RBIs when he followed Hafner’s homer with a home run of his own, his third. To be fair, every RBI Garko records sets a new career high. All told the Indians had 17 hits, six for extra bases, and grounded into only one double play. The lowlight was Shin-Soo Choo, who left 10 (!) runners on base. Andy Marte also regressed to form, going 1-5 with two strikeouts and five stranded.
Next up is Kansas City. If only every series were against either the Royals or Devil Rays.
The Disappointment Zone 
Dan said
Love the title. If we could just get Choo and Marte to play well at the same time, we might have something going for us. We really need those kids (and the rest of the rookies) for next years run…
disappointmentzone said
Choo is a nice player. If he can develop into a solid all-around hitter, he’d be a great fit in one of the corner outfield positions. If he struggles to hit lefties–and it’s fair to say that learning to hit lefties could take some time–a platoon of Michaels and Choo would work fine, since Michaels can’t hit righties.
Marte has impressed me with his defense, which is all I really care about at this point. I think the Indians have enough bats but not enough gloves, and with Sowers and Westbrook and Byrd a good defense is key. Once he stops trying to pull the ball (that same problem afflicts Peralta) he’ll improve.