Last Night's Opening Game

 Short post on this one.

Opening Lineup: Very interesting as Francona stacked his lineup in 3 lefties in order followed by two righties.  An examination of the Mariner's roster shows they have no lefties in their bullpen which makes, once again, Francona a genius.  

As far as the game:

• Very little offense.  
• Notable was Ramirez screwing himself into the ground trying to hit a pitch that almost hit him in the knee.  He is a great player but the fact that he keeps doing this year after year shows me that he is not maturing as a hitter.
• Bell hitting two weak groundballs before his hard groundball basehit which, last year, would have been an out.  So the lack of shift may help him.
• Castillo was tough.  Kwan worked the count in the first inning to the max but on the decisive pitch which Kwan excels at (last year .892 OPS with a full-count), Castillo got him to pop out in foul territory to third base.
• The rest of the lineup looked like they were facing a really tough pitcher.  Just one of those nights and not untypical for recent Cleveland teams on opening day.
• Pitching
• Bieber was supposed to be stronger this year.  Last night he looked like Bieber the 2022 version.  Struggling to get his velo over 91, working out of jams, looking like a great competitor.  And Frnacona kept his pitchcount reasonable.
• Stephan looked good
• De Los Santos looked great coming in in the middle of an inning.
• Karinchak sucked but, hopefully, that was an aberration and not a sign of things to come.

Tonight the rookie Gaddis pitching against the former Cy Young winner Robbie Ray.  Whenever things like that set up many times the result turns out to be the opposite of what you would expect.  Go Guardians!