#188---NYA @ CLE, 7/8/2003

Remember the time that all that stood between Billy Traber and a perfect game against the eventual pennant-winning Yankees was a third inning John Flaherty single? It was undoubtedly the highlight of Traber’s career and probably the best thing that came out of the Indians/Mets Robbie Alomar swap for either side. The presence of Enrique Wilson, Todd Zeile, Ruben Sierra, Karim Garcia, and some shortstop named Almonte filling in for Derek Jeter (who flied out as a pinch-hitter in the ninth) suggest this wasn’t the Yankees’ A-team, but no matter.

#187---NYA @ CLE, 7/14/2002

Mike Mussina v. Chuck Finley seemed like a decent matchup, but the Yankees led the Indians 7-0 after five, with the Moose having yielded just three baserunners. In the sixth, Jim Thome hit a three-run blast to cut it to 7-3, with Mussina departing after that frame having made 110 pitches. A two-out double from Omar Vizquel off Ramiro Mendoza in the seventh made it 7-4. Meanwhile, in relief Chad Paronto, Mark Wohlers, and Ricardo Rincon had unspectacularly (except maybe Rincon, who retired all five batters he faced) shutout New York for 5 2/3 innings.

Still, Mariano Rivera loomed with a three-run lead in the ninth. But John McDonald, Eddie Perez, and Omar Vizquel all singled (with a Chris Magruder comebacker mixed in) before Ellis Burks doubled. Now, with one out, it was 7-6 and the winning run was on second. So Joe Torre ordered Thome intentionally walked, and Rivera struck out pinch-hitter Travis Fryman on three pitches. That left it up to journeyman Bill Selby. Who hit a walkoff grand slam to right.

#186---PHI @ BOS, 6/9/2001

This is a scoresheet of a game in which Omar Daal outpitched Pedro Martinez. Martinez started strong, setting down the first seven and through five had allowed just one hit, one walk, and had fanned eight. Marlon Anderson took him deep to leadoff the sixth, but he retired the next six Phillies. It was in the eighth that it fell apart, as the five batters he faced all reached, with Jimmy Rollins’ two-run double the coup de grace. Rolando Arrojo (!) finished the inning.

Daal pitched seven, walking and fanning two.

#185---CLE @ KC, 6/29/2000

Earlier in this blog’s run, I posted a game (#134) in which Jose Rosado made 123 pitches for the Royals in 1998 and noted that under the circumstances this would never happen in today’s game. Perhaps Tony Muser was just interesting in slagging arms, as here’s a similar case – future Indian Chad Durbin, 23, making a whopping 132 pitches in pursuit of a shutout. When Russell Branyan doubled with two outs in the ninth to push across Cleveland’s first tally, Muser finally pulled the plug, summoning Ricky Bottalico to face Alex Ramirez and make two pitches to get the final out. Durbin stuck out six and walked five, so this wasn’t exactly a masterpiece.

His opposite number, Bartolo Colon, had a rougher time of it, walking the first four Royals and then yielding two more runs on the first outs he recorded. In the fourth he was taken deep back-to-back by Joe Randa and Carlos Beltran, and when he followed that up with a sixth walk, he got the hook after eighty pitches. As always with 2000 Indians scoresheets, the names of pitchers that follow are fun – Andrew Lorraine worked 2 1/3, yielding another Beltran dinger, then a familiar name in Paul Shuey for an inning, followed by Jamie Brewington.

#184---CLE @ HOU, 7/18/1999

Mike Hampton shutout the Indians on four hits and two walks with eight strikeouts. The Astros scored off Jaret Wright with a two-out rally that included a walk drawn by Hampton, then tacked on a tally off Paul Assenmacher in the eighth. They didn’t call them the Killer Bs for nothing: see Biggio, Bagwell, Berkman, Bell, plus Bako, Bogar, and Barker. I have to look up the latter as I didn’t remember Glen Barker, who had an interesting rookie stat line over 90 PA in 1999 - .288/.384/.356, which was only good for a 90 OPS+ because a) late 90s baseball and b) OPS+ hates walks.