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Blake's clutch hit, Shoppach's swinging tag put down White Sox rally in season opener
By Sheldon Ocker
Beacon Journal sportswriter
Published on Tuesday, Apr 01, 2008
CLEVELAND: Take that, you Negative Nellies and Dubious Dudes in Cleveland and everywhere else Indians fans occasionally take Casey Blake's name in vain.
Who says he's a lousy hitter with runners in scoring position? You can't do better than one thousand (actually 1.000 in baseball arithmetic).
Of course, Blake has been to the plate once this season with runners on second or third, but his bases-loaded double scored three runs in the eighth inning to snap a 7-7 tie and sink the White Sox 10-8 in the season opener Monday at Progressive Field.
Fans and the media gave Blake plenty of grief about his .190 average with runners in scoring position last year, so here's his chance to get even.
''Write it,'' he deadpanned to reporters who surrounded his locker after the game. ''You guys won't write it.''
Even if they don't, Blake won't complain. He knows that gloating, or griping, are risky reactions during the course of a long and inevitably hilly season. The Opening Day victory provides a perfect example of an event that in another context
would trigger extreme ecstasy for the winners and extreme sorrow for the losers.
But all of the participants know that tomorrow or the next day, the shoe could be on the other foot, and that foot might get stuck in the mud for a while.
In truth, the Tribe should have had this win wrapped up in the second inning, when Franklin Gutierrez's three-run homer led to a major rally that forced Chicago manager Ozzie Guillen to come to the mound and point starter Mark Buehrle toward the showers so he could cleanse himself of seven fat runs.
The 7-2 lead didn't last long. It was one of those games in which a team explodes early for a seemingly unassailable advantage, only to fritter it away little by little.
That's where C.C. Sabathia and Jim Thome entered stage left. Left because Sabathia throws with his left arm, and Thome bats from the left side. Left-handed hitters are not supposed to own southpaw pitchers, and Thome came into the game 0-for-11 lifetime against Sabathia.
The former Tribe third and first baseman hit a two-run homer off Sabathia in the first inning and another in the third.
''C.C. threw a couple of balls right down the middle, and Thome hammered them; a good hitter will do that,'' said catcher Kelly Shoppach, who was rushed into the fray when Victor Martinez got hurt in the second inning.
From that point until the eighth inning, the game kept slipping away from the Tribe, which found itself in a tie after the White Sox batted in the seventh.
Even before Blake officially won the game, two striking plays in the eighth saved it.
Shoppach swings to action
If the White Sox miss the playoffs by one game — and even if they don't — they will remember the inning, which began with Joe Crede and Juan Uribe ripping consecutive doubles off Rafael Betancourt with nobody out.
Chicago should have taken a lead then, but Crede only reached third after hesitating at second to be certain Jason Michaels didn't catch Uribe's liner in left. Betancourt followed by intentionally walking Nick Swisher to load the bases.
So with the infield pulled in to cut off a run at the plate — more a hope than a statistical probability — Orlando Cabrera slapped a slow hopper to Jhonny Peralta at short. Peralta rushed his throw to the plate and Shoppach was forced to make a swinging tag of Crede, who was certain he was safe.
Umpire Gerry Davis ruled otherwise, and replays were inconclusive.
That brought up Thome, who broke his bat hitting a bouncer to second baseman Asdrubal Cabrera, who needed to turn a double play to keep the Tribe from losing the lead. Cabrera flipped the ball to Peralta for the force on Orlando Cabrera, who slid into second, catching the edge of the bag with his left foot while doing a wide scissors move with his right and grabbing Peralta's leg with his right hand.
The purposeful slide succeeded in keeping Peralta from making a throw, but umpire Bruce Dreckman called interference and gave the Indians their double play to end the inning.
Manager Eric Wedge didn't think his team's good fortune was totally accidental.
''You have to put yourself in position to make plays,'' he said. ''And you have to put yourself in position to get the breaks.''
Masset looks tough
Maybe the first question is why did the Tribe offense shut down so early? The answer: reliever Nick Masset, who gave up only two hits — both by Gutierrez — in 41/3 innings.
''The kid Masset shut us down,'' Wedge said. ''The separator (after a team falls several runs behind early) is the next guy that comes in.''
Shoppach and Peralta singled ahead of a two-out walk to Gutierrez to set the stage for Blake's game winner. Not only did Shoppach make an important tag at the plate, but he also contributed a big hit.
So does a backup catcher summoned in the midst of a game start thinking he has to hit like one of the premier offensive catchers in the game? ''I think like that all the time,'' Shoppach said. ''Anybody who says otherwise is lying.''
Sheldon Ocker can be reached at socker@thebeaconjournal.com.
CLEVELAND: Take that, you Negative Nellies and Dubious Dudes in Cleveland and everywhere else Indians fans occasionally take Casey Blake's name in vain.
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