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Cleveland Indians

Smith laments firing of Radinsky; Hafner back on DL

By Sheldon Ocker Published: August 9, 2012
   CLEVELAND: Seventh-inning relief specialist Joe Smith, for one, was unhappy about the firing of pitching coach Scott Radinsky today.
  ""This just sucks,'' Smith said. ""But I guess it's the business side of baseball. This is a guy we loved, and he wae someone we trusted. He's been with some of our guys a long time; he's been with Tony Sipp his whole career. Our guys have the utmost respect for him.''
   Smith blamed his fellow pitchers for the staff's failures.
   ""It's a shame that we pitched so poorly that they had to make the decision to get rid of the pithcing ocach,'' he said. We're the ones who stink.''
   This is not the way General Manager Chris Antonetti described the reasons for the ouster of Radinsky. 
   “”It's not a decision we arrived at lightly," he said. “”It's something we spent considerable time talking through, but in the end we felt we had reached that point where we had to go in a different direction."
  Columbus pitching coach Ruben Niebla, 40, will take over as pitching coach on an interim basis.
  Travis Hafner began his second stint of the season on the disabled list today with inflammation in his lower back.  
   Replacing him on the roster is infielder Jason Donald, who was batting .277 with 18 doubles, six home runs and 31 RBI in 256 at-bats for Columbus.
           

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