Cleveland Indians narrowly avoid being no-hit in Wednesday’s loss

The Cleveland Indians picked up a single hit on offense in Wednesday’s 3-1 loss against the Tampa Bay Rays. The magic number remains at three.

There is one positive takeaway from today’s game for the Cleveland Indians. That is Jose Ramirez‘s 38th home run on the year.

Other than that it was not a fun game to watch. Ramirez’s home run was the only hit of the game for the Indians. The ball drilled a fan in the face, symbolizing the kind of day it was.

It is interesting to see a team like the Rays employ a “bullpenning” system while also having Blake Snell in the rotation. He picked up his 19th win on the year and dropped his ERA to 2.03.

Carlos Carrasco had himself a nice day, even though he did allow three earned runs. The combination of him and Andrew Miller went eight innings and struck out seven batters. But it was clear the offense wasn’t going to provide any help.

Snell even had a no-hitter going into the seventh inning before Ramirez’s blast.

The starting outfield in this game consisted of Brandon Guyer, Rajai Davis and Melky Cabrera. Roberto Perez filled in behind the plate and Erik Gonzalez got the start at third. All this against a Cy Young contender meant bad news from the start.

The magic number stands at three right now and the Minnesota Twins are in action tonight. If they lose it is down to two and while the Indians are off Thursday, the Twins are playing the Royals. Losses in both games means the Indians could clinch with a win on Friday. That can also happen if the Twins lose once in the next two games and on Friday as well.

That remains the focus now. Players are beginning to get rest and the team is in full playoff preparation mode. Now that Josh Donaldson is here and the division is about to be clinched, it sure would be nice to see Trevor Bauer return soon.

Just trying to find things to keep everyone interested as the season wraps up. Games like the one today don’t quite accomplish that.