2016 ALCS: Toronto Blue Jays vs Cleveland Indians

http://d2s3dt9f4iyeup.cloudfront.net/images/resized_v1/28bb6163-602e-4eba-80bb-5a1f888f9365.jpg

haha awesome

@NickCaminoWTAM
#Indians President of Baseball Operations Chris Antonetti just told us on @wtam1100 that Trevor Bauer lacerated his pinky repairing a drone.

@jonahkeri
Terry Francona on what happened with Trevor Bauer: "It's pretty self-explanatory. We've all, at some point, had a drone-related problem."

Gnarly movement on a couple of those first pitches by Kluber.

lmao @ drone injury

http://todayinsci.com/Events/Patent/PropellerBeanieAds-Billboard-5Jun1948.jpg

I read somewhere that letting Cy Young winners off the hook in the early innings sometimes comes back to haunt you.

Two runners on base in the first three innings against Kluber and no runs scored.

Xpost well said

Wow, Kipnis

Travis has looked bad ranging to his right on a couple of balls hit up the middle. Obviously his knee is far from being 100 percent.

That seemed to drop about four feet in front of Bautista--couldn't he have made some sort of attempt? (I guess he's still hurting.)

Andrew Miller has some crazy downward motion. There is definitely some similarity to the Unit in watching him pitch.

was thinking the same thing actually

Donaldson totally switched his swing there to be able to get meat on that inside pitch cutting in. They had a feature with him on MLB right before the playoff pregame with him talking about altering his swing to get that pitch.

John Gibbons has an eternal look of "I'm getting too old for this shit" on his face.

Kkkkk

donaldson's a pretty cerebral player

russ martin is schlumping

Who are starting game 2?

Fabulous game

From Twitter today. Funnier now after the game.

Zack Meisel ‏@ZackMeisel

Indians' rotation:
-guy with the hurt quad
-guy with the broken hand
-guy with forearm strain
-guy with the drone injury
-Tomlin

i like the Jays' odds the next 2-3 games.

I'm sure the A's and Braves and Phillies felt like this in '92 and '93 with Alomar--you're on the wrong end of a national coming-out party for an unknown superstar.

Didn't realize "shutdown ERA" was a thing

The Jays are completely hopeless against Miller.

Unhittable.

Lord

God, we're about to go down 2-0 having only given up four runs.

Hopeless.

Forget about Bauer, they should have started Miller in game 3.

The idea on talk radio the before this series started was that our offense was back to something resembling last year. No--we had one big game and one big inning against Texas. We remain mired in the same slump we've been in for the rest of that series, for the wild card, and for all of September. (Don't mean to take anything away from Cleveland's stellar pitching.)

tribe rolling

Yep.

Don't f*** with the formula.

do these playoffs feel more broken than usual or am i just imagining things are different? if cleveland and LAD both win there'll be like 40% of a single actual big league rotation between them.

and beyond that there just seems to be a lack of strong teams this year. like there's the cubs, who are freakishly good at everything, and then every other team has glaring weaknesses. i guess the red sox were pretty balanced. but the giants, orioles, rangers just weren't very good, and the nats and mets and aforementioned teams are broken, and the dodgers aren't built to win championships anyway in this era of the specialist. and then there's a blue jays, who seem like the iffiest team of too-olds and too-youngs.

idk, just feels like the cubs and sox are the only teams that 'feel' like a contender

cubs are super stacked obv
sox didnt/dont have pitching i trust
jays/tribe are decent teams
dodgers are def kinda broken rn but wont be shocked if theyre competitive w cubes

sox were 8th in pitching WAR, had porky and price (and apparently wright if they made the ALCS) and at least a hypothetically great pen. not the best but not horrible, enough to say they're a balanced team

@MLBastian
Bauer brought his drone to the press conference. Said his passion for them was fueled by his love of Star Wars (speeder bikes on Endor).

god where's morbs when you need him

OBAMA'S PASSION FOR DRONES FUELED BY HIS LOVE OF FUEL idk ugh

NORMALIZING OBAMA'S FACELESS MURDER MACHINES

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Cu7W0IUXgAANnPt.jpg

Have I ever told ILX my stories of working at WKNR and getting to listen to all of Hamilton and Score's off-air convos?

Although my favorite Hamilton thing was actually an on-air one. Tribe was playing the Yankees in NY, and at one point during the game, Hamilton said something to the effect of, "We're here at Yankee Stadium in the Bronx. And I have to tell you, Herb, I would no sooner bring my family here than I'd bring them to Harlem."

I have never seen that many phone lines light up that quickly.

party @ napolis

Swollen House Shoes strikes again.

Would have been a good catch, not "spectacular," and I think he should have had it.

Yes, let's zoom in on the blood.

Legitimately feel bad for Cleveland (conceding that the injury's self-inflicted--just the plight of their rotation in general). And if Toronto can't take advantage of this, that'll be sad.

The ball was in and out of Bautista's glove. He should have caught it.

In boxing they have cut men that can close a cut in one minute, Cleveland had three days to stitch or glue up Bauer and couldn't do it? And then they let him start anyway?

All right, Nate Silver has us at 3% to win the World Series--not sure if that's the now-cast or polls-plus. (Has the Indians tied with the Cubs at 38%.)

Actually looked like EE steered the ball precisely in that direction...couple of feet, though, and it's a DP.

Was it necessary to bring in Osuna? I'd give somebody else a baserunner...there's a game tomorrow.

holy shit there is! thought tomorrow was an off day!

who the fuck is R Merritt

He won a fan contest.

like a vox explainer, but not shitty http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/everything-you-need-to-know-about-ryan-merritt/

Fastball sitting 85.9, fastest: 87.5.

Something, anything: sort of looking forward to what kind of send-off Bautista and Encarnacion get in their last AB (even though EE could be back).

That could very well have been EE's last at-bat.

Most depressing Jays post-season series since they got swept by the Twins in '91 (endpoint of their underachieving years).

The Indians are going to the World Series!!!!!

sorry clemenza

Thanks. The Indians are a great story--it hurts, but the fact that they did that without two (or three) starters, no question they're the better team. If it's them and the Dodgers, I'll be rooting for Cleveland; Indians/Cubs, I'm okay with either.

(Had it in my mind the whole series that Cleveland hadn't been in the WS since '54--completely forgot about '97 until the announcer just mentioned it.)

lol and 95!!!

this is clevelands year

Of course, '95 too. Geez...why the hell was I feeling sorry for this franchise?

'95 too! One of the best offensive teams ever! Manny Ramirez batted NINTH!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xzhj2ev0Xwo

Hate the Indians but that's probably wholly because of the name and horrendous, can't believe this is allowed in 2016 caricature hat logo

it is awful and I wish they ditched it

The Jays looked almost exactly like the Tigers did in the 20__ DS/CS/WS.

Jays well and truly bested tho hey,hardly a contest.

guess I'm rooting for the Cubs now.

Wish at least one player would add Cleveland to his no-trade clause, due to the name and logo, and be vocal about it.

"Not having seen him is something that could go either way but, with the experience in our lineup, I'm pretty sure he's going to be shaking in his boots more than we are.

"So, I like where we're at."

http://www.torontosun.com/2016/10/19/blue-jays-bautista-says-indians-merritt-will-be-shaking-in-his-boots-in-game-5

@MLBastian
Someone in mob of players yelled at Merritt: "Were you shaking in your boots?!"

Congrats to the Indians, doing this without 3 of your five best players is incredible.

(xpost) One of the radio guys was all over Bautista for that this morning.

Bautista is a jerk. The thing about 'circumstances' was the last straw, I do enjoy bat flips and showmanship but that kind of talk comes across as not smart.

Speaking of which...

Don't mean to insult any Cleveland fans, and I may regret saying so, but I'm much rather the Jays have to face the Indians if they advance. So I'll root for them.
― clemenza, Thursday, October 6, 2016 2:32 PM (one week ago)

Where's Morbs?

lol

idk, i think bautista was just answering the question and happened to use a catchy, quotable phrase

KC kind of showed that you got a shutdown pen, you can dominate a short series.

Most depressing Jays post-season series since they got swept by the Twins in '91 (endpoint of their underachieving years).

Actually yeah, that's a good reference point. In both cases it should have been an even matchup but the Jays looked completely out of place and were never really in the series.

I was hoping they could at least make an exciting game of it today, but instead they looked terrible at the plate by and large, wasted the few scoring opportunities they had, and got dominated by Cleveland's bullpen yet again.

Miller was unbelievable.

Did he drop his leg kick when he became a full-time reliever?

Can't think of a pitcher with such lousy-to-dominant statistical contrast. I mean... http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/m/millean01.shtml