Indians Prospect Insider

The first half of the Carolina League season came to a close on Sunday night as the Carolina Mudcats lost to the Myrtle Beach Pelicans 7-5. The Mudcats lost for the 11th time in 12 games to bring their first half record to 22-48.

Corey Kluber escaped three no-out jams with no damage and the Cleveland offense provided just enough support, as the Indians beat the Nationals 2-0 to win the three-game series.

Join Jim Pete and Steve Orbanek for tonight's episode of Cleveland Sports Insiders at 9:00 P.M. Tonight, they'll talk Corey Kluber, the latest streak, the next few weeks, and many other Tribe topics of note. They'll also jump into some Cleveland Cavaliers basketball, and focus squarely on the rumor mill. There are rumors that the CSI duo will announce their latest finishing move! Tune in at 9:00...

The Mudcats offense continues to hit the cover off the ball. Unfortunately, it's rarely with runners in scoring position, and rarely makes much of a difference in the overall scheme of things. The Mudcats pitching continues to dive into mudholes, and runners continue to get stranded. Join Jim Pete as he goes fishing for those missing runs.

Left-handed Shawn Morimando has enjoyed a successful first half of the season at High-A Carolina. With the All Star break here, the IBI's Jacqueline Kantor had a chance to catch up with him to see how his first half went and what adjustments he has been working on that have helped him improve this season.

Lake Erie (10-16) dropped a wild one to Rockford (6-19) Saturday night with a final score of 18-17 in 13 innings. No lead was safe for either team as the Aviators finally got the winning run across in the bottom of the 14th off Dave Middendorf well into the morning.

Cleveland Indians President, Mark Shapiro often talks about his love for the game of baseball and how it all stems from his relationship with his dad. He could have been talking about DJ Sebastian and his dad. As we celebrate Father’s Day, DJ shares the story of how he and his dad shared a love for the game of baseball.

For the Indians, Saturday was a tale of the bad, the good, and the ugly. Cleveland was left stunned on Saturday night as the Washington Nationals scored twice in the final two innings to secure a 7-6 victory over the Tribe. This came after the Indians offense battled their way back from a 5-0 deficit to be up 6-5 with two outs in the bottom of the eighth inning. Jim Berdysz shares his second thoughts...

The Captains and the Loons played a double header Saturday night, with The Captains taking both games with finals of 5-2 and 4-3. Both games played were seven innings with the second game being a makeup from a postponed game on April 19th.

After splitting a doubleheader Friday night against the Charlotte Knights, the Columbus Clippers snatched a win Saturday night, 4-2. Columbus’ offense boomed in the first inning scoring all four of their runs, while Charlotte was unable to make up for the deficit throughout the game.

It was business as usual down on the farm for the Indians on Saturday night. Cord Phelps remained hot, Lonnie Chisenhall is making it very difficult for the Indians to keep him in Columbus, and more. The IBI's Michal Hattery chimes in with his thoughts on the action in the minors.

After the Cleveland offense mounted a five-run comeback against Washington ace Jordan Zimmermann, the Tribe bullpen allowed lead-changing solo homers in the eighth and ninth as the Nationals beat the Indians 7-6. The Indians were unable to get lockdown performances from their bullpen mates, and on Sunday they will focus on starting a new streak.

The draft has come and gone, and now it is time for IBI draft guru Jeff Ellis to post his annual post-draft review. It was a very interesting draft and as always had a lot of trends that he found while following it. He touches on the Frazier pick and why the negatives on him are a bit overstated right now, the Indians approach in the draft with selecting several smaller sized players, and their "safe" approach with their bonus pool to maybe save money to strike and sign later round guys.

Basking in the Indians third consecutive win, a quick rebound from an absolutely horrendous stretch, the Indians peak and valley tendencies have shown their ugly head. And as with many streaks, when it rained it poured, something which we can actually see manifested statistically in BABIP. The IBI's Michael Hattery takes a look at the statistical trends at third base with Mark Reynolds and wonders when Lonnie Chisenhall will be called up.

The IBI Digest catches you up on anything you might have missed over the past week at Indians Baseball Insider and also notes some of the more popular columns posted at the major news sites and blogs.

Lake Erie dropped its second game in a row Friday, falling to Rockford (5-19) to a final score of 5-2. Starter Matt Rein, who had been strong in his last few outings, struggled in spurts on Friday. Letting in a pair of runs in the fourth inning and three runs in the sixth, Rein pitch 5.2 innings and was handled the loss.