3 Cleveland Indians takes: Series loss to Pirates brutal, Tribe gains ground

The Cleveland Indians salvaged there three-game series against the Pirates by seeking out a 2-1 victory in the finale on Father’s Day.

Unfortunately, the Tribe squandered a huge opportunity to make up significant ground by throttling a lesser opponent.

1. The dreadful recap: The Tribe was coming into the series hot, having taken two of three from Seattle, while sweeping the dreadful Orioles. The Pirates are just as bad, but the Tribe’s patch-work starting rotation was blasted in the opener, with J.C. Mejia giving up six earned runs in five innings.

The bullpen didn’t help and the Tribe found itself down 11-1 at one point. The offense came back, but fell just short, losing 11-10.

In game 2, Bryan Shaw’s arm went vintage Rockies, as he gave up four runs. His blowup came with the Tribe leading 2-0. Usually, the back-end of the pen has been stellar in preserving those leads. Not this day, though, against one baseball’s worst offenses. Yeesh.

2. Wish he would of: Bobby Bradley had a chance to give the Indians the lead in the bottom of the ninth in the series opener. The Tribe pulled within a run of tying the game, with Amed Rosario on third base, 90-feet away.

Bradley came to dish, and we are all thinking the same thing: One swing, and the Tribe has the lead.

But Bradley chased a couple pitches that would’ve been deemed too high for Shaq to swing at. The early returns on the first baseman have been good (.279 .959 OPS) with four homers and 13 strikeouts in 13 plate appearances.

3. Finally, a break: A team finally slowed down the White Sox, with the Astros winning four straight against the Southsiders. Chicago gets Pittsburgh next, though, so we’ll see if they can do what the Tribe didn’t.

Meanwhile, the Tribe gets a two-game series in Wrigley against the first-place Cubs. The Twins follow at the end of the week, Minnesota is 11 games under .500, but has been playing better baseball of late.