Final Score in Cleveland: Angels 5, Indians 4
In the words of the bassist from the band Spinal Tap, HELLO CLEVELAND! Rookie Trevor Bell pitched into the 6th inning of his 2nd major league appearance and got his 1st Big League W.
The Angels had a sloppy game with the bats, some long innings on the mound but a sparkling bit of infield leather helped walk the AL West leaders to the finish line as the go-ahead run lined out in the bottom of the 9th to give Brian Fuentes his 35th Save of 2009.
Middle Reliever Kevin Jepsen came into the game with a man on and nobody out in the 7th inning and got out of it only surrendering one run and then had a 1-2-3 9th inning. The inning went by so quick that for a second or two there I could have sworn it was Scot Shields.
Bell's line on the night: 5.1 IP, 2 BB, 9 H, 3 ER, 2K. For a fifth starter in the American League, not bad. For a 22-year-old kid from Southern California... pretty great.
The Angels got a run in the 1st on a double play and a run in the 2nd on an error by the Cleveland 1Bman, but there were enough baserunners for the team to score a few of them with singles. Five runs scored but only three RBIs were credited in the game, one each to Erick Aybar, Bobby Abreu and Kendry Morales, Klutch Kings on the well-timed singles tonight to be sure!
At one point in the game, every Angel in the batting order was batting .300 or better for the season. At the end ofthe game, the benchmark had been held:
Figgins - .308
Abreu - .310
Rivera - .310
Guerrero - .313
Morales - .303
Hunter - .307
Izturis - .300
Napoli - .300
Aybar - .313
All of those players besides Vladimir Guerrero have over 300 Plate Appearances, meaning one thing: We Will Win With What We Got.