What We Learned:
It’s less than a week into the season, so almost nothing. But here are the things that stood out from the season’s first series.
–Progressive Field in Cleveland set consecutive low attendance records on Saturday and Sunday.
After an opening day sellout, the Indians sold 9,853 and 8,726 tickets over the weekend. I watched the games and there might have been a third of that many people actually in the stadium. This is after the Indians finished last in baseball in average attendance last year.
–The Rays may be in Trouble.
I was actually pretty surprised how highly many writers chose this team coming into the season. After losing Crawford, Carlos Pena, Matt Garza and virtually an entire bullpen–Joaquin Benoit (60 IP, 1.34 ERA), Rafael Soriano (45 SV, 1.73 ERA), Grant Balfour (55 IP, 2.28 ERA)–and replacing them with a group of has-been hitters and journeyman/never-was pitchers, many still considered Tampa Bay as division contenders or wildcard favorites.
Who knows, it could still turn out that way, but a team with Manny Ramirez as its cleanup hitter in 2011 is going to have trouble scoring runs. A team relying even moderately on Kyle Farnsworth as a closer is going to have trouble protecting leads. And even though everyone was worried about the Yankees starting pitching coming into the season, their five can probably match up decently with Tampa’s and they are going to score a lot more runs.
Oh and Evan Longoria is now on the DL.
–The Players who Stunk:
Manny: 12 AB, 1 H, 1 TB
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