Joe Blow

I said it in my post last night - anyone else worried about Joe Borowski in the playoffs? He blew his second save in two nights in the Indians 3-2 loss in game two agains Seattle. The return of Jeremy Sowers (five scoreless innings) was wasted. Handed a 2-1 by Sowers, rising star Jenson Lewis, and The Realtor, JoBlow got the first two out in the ninth before giving up a solo, game-tying pizza to the one and only Jeff Clement. Who? Jeff Clement? You read correctly. It was his first major league homer. The game was lost in the 10th thanks to Jhonny Peralta's butcher job with two outs. Mike Morse (no, not the comedian who writes brilliant song parodies for the Howard Stern show including "Ralphy Cakes," and "Rich Nerd") was given a hit on the play, but major league shortstops make the play Peralta couldn't. The ball was hit right at him. With the spilt of the doubleheader, the Tribe and Red Sox are now tied for the best record in baseball with four games to play. Its also becoming almost a lock that the Indians will start with the Yankees coming to the Jake, thanks to the Angels four game losing streak and the Red Sox closing in on the AL East crown.

Lets talk facts and figures. All the credit here goes to my statistical guru, Matt G. MG - take it away:

Some of these have been discussed before or recently been written about, but it is nonetheless amazing:

No one on the team will hit 30 home runs

We might not have a player that hits over .300.

Our leadoff hitter is second in the league in strikeouts, while our shortstop with limited range is fifth

Our starting second and third basemen, two-halves of our outfield platoon, and two starters in the rotation at the beginning of the year were all benched or sent to the minors

Our current second baseman hit .250 last year in AAA

Our third baseman has four home runs since the All-Star break

Our left fielder is older than all of us

Our DH hit about 50 points lower than last year, with 19 fewer home runs despite 70 more at-bats

Our best pitcher weighs 300 pounds

Our second best pitcher is a busted closer

Our third best pitcher has a .298 BA against him

Our fourth, fifth, and sixth starters at the beginning of the year were a combined 12-23

Our closer has an ERA over 5.00 and .291 BA against him

Last year, we traded a .290-30-100-110-30 player for single A minor leaguer (sneaky could be good one day)

All that equals - the best record in baseball.

Meanwhile, espn.com has the Tribe at #1 in their Power Rankings, cbssportsline.com has them at #2. Rob Neyer from espn.com kills Borowski today in his column today. If you are an espn insider, you can read the full thing. Here is a snippet:

In October, though, Borowski's ninth-inning failures will be magnified far beyond anything that's happened already this season, to the point where it might become a huge organizational distraction. But at this point, there's nothing to be done about it.