Tampa Bay @ Cleveland preview
Progressive Field
Last Meeting ( Jul 23, 2010 ) Tampa Bay 1, Cleveland 3
Mitch Talbot has cooled considerably following his fast start to the season.
The hurler would like nothing better than to put it back together Saturday against the Tampa Bay Rays, the team he came up with before being traded to the Cleveland Indians over the winter.
Talbot is winless during the month of July and has won once in his last seven starts. That followed an incredible start to the season, when the 26-year-old won three of his first four starts and carried an ERA around 3.50 into the middle of June.
Talbot was traded to Cleveland over the winter for catcher Kelly Shoppach in a deal that the Indians have enjoyed more than the Rays. Shoppach has homered just once in 65 at-bats this year, while Talbot is maturing into a reliable major league pitcher.
He was simply the victim of too much pitching depth with the Rays, caught behind prospects like Jeff Niemann, Wade Davis and David Price. His matchup on Saturday won’t be easy, since he’ll be opposing Price.
Price ranks second in the American League in victories and his 2.84 ERA is also near the top, but he was battered by the New York Yankees in his last start, allowing a season-high seven runs in five innings.
He’ll have to be much better on Saturday for the Rays to snap an 18-game losing streak in Cleveland, the longest active streak by any visiting team in any city in the league. Tampa Bay hasn’t won in Cleveland since the end of the 2005 season.
The statistics are equally baffling – the Indians are batting better than .300 during the streak.
Price single-handedly has the ability to change that, but he is 0-3 with a 5.68 ERA in his last three road starts. The Rays are struggling, too, going 4-3 to start the second half to fall four games behind the Yankees in the AL East.
The Indians are the exact opposite. Their seven-inning win over the Rays on Friday extended Cleveland’s dominance over the Rays, but it also added to the Indians’ scorching-hot play. The Indians have won seven of eight games to start the second half, but it has had little impact on the standings.
The Indians are still 14 games under .500 and one of the worst teams in the American League.