Hehehehehhhh.... Nervous laughter creeping in. It was a ticking time-bomb of nervousness last night. The senses were heightened though because it went from completely not a game, to a really scary moment, especially since the Twins had the ability to walk off.

That shouldn't have happened, but it did. So it happened and you'll have to live with it. The only important thing is the Indians won. Well, not really, because there is a lot of importance of what happened, because it impacts this team going down the stretch.

INDIANS - 6 | TWINS - 5

W: Bryan Shaw (7-3)

L: Andrew Albers (2-5)

S: Joe Smith (3)

[BOXSCORE]

I had some people, telling me to defend Chris Perez after "that one." As if I'm his defense lawyer and he just committed a grade-one felony. Look, I don't revel in defending him. And I don't do it because I'm a Chris Perez apologist or because I enjoy it, or because I want to. I've defended him when it has been necessary and right to defend him, and I've bashed him and criticized him when I've felt it necessary to do so.

There's no defending a horrible outing either. A complete meltdown if you will. What happened Tuesday? That wasn't even close to a meltdown. That was a blown save, and that was bad. It wasn't boo-worthy, despite what you may think. And neither was last night, because we've been over what is boo-worthy in my book.

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(Shouting) “Live music is better; bumper stickers should be issued.” – "Union Man", from Hawks and Doves, Neil Young, 1980. 

You may know - or recall -  that on one glorious afternoon in 1954, the Cleveland Indians drew 80,000+ fans to a late summer doubleheader vs. the New York Yankees. Since a constant theme throughout this 2013 season has been lagging attendance, today we are going to shine the light of day on perhaps the darkest era in Cleveland baseball fandom.

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Every playoff race has its moments. Tuesday night, the Indians had their moment.

Jason Giambi’s walk-off home run in the bottom of the ninth inning might have been the single most important hit for the Indians as a franchise since Tony Fernandez lofted an extra-inning solo shot over the right field wall at Camden Yards in Game 6 of the 1997 ALCS, providing the Tribe with the run that sent them to the World Series.

Yes, it was that important.

Sure, there have been other memorable hits in memorable games since 1997. In 2001, Omar Vizquel lined a three-run triple into the right-field corner, driving in the tying runs during the Indians’ epic 12-run rally against Seattle. In September 2007, Casey Blake all but sealed the division title with an 11^th-inning blast against Detroit. In the 2007 playoffs against the Yankees, Travis Hafner wrote the final verse of what has become known as the “Bug Game” with an extra-inning RBI single.

But none of those hits carried the gravity that came with the situation Giambi faced when he stepped into the batter’s box with a 4-3 deficit to the last-place White Sox, two outs, Michael Brantley on second and the smog wrought by a Chris Perez blown save still thick in the air.

It was a fork in the season road. The Indians were wedged in between Tampa and Texas in the wild card standings, one game’s worth of room on either side. Hundreds of miles away, those teams were winning their games. And the number of games left on the schedule was slipping away like fall’s evening daylight. The Indians had five more games after Tuesday.

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I was watching the Tribe game the other night with a buddy when Michael Brantley came up to bat. We both agreed that Brantley was a very valuable player for the Indians, noting how he’s a well-rounded player who does a little bit of everything to help his team win. My buddy went a little further to note that Brantley’s “timely hitting” has been a huge boon to the Tribe’s success this season.

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