Written by Nino Colla

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I leave for two weeks and when I come back, I'm greeted by... Matt LaPorta? That's like instead of seeing your excited puppy wagging it's tail after your two week vacation, you get a monkey flinging feces at you as you walk through the door. Is that to say Matt LaPorta is a monkey who flings feces? No, but he sure does swing as wildly as the monkey flings feces.

June 3rd, 2012

Minnesota Twins - 6

Cleveland Indians - 3

W: Scott Diamond (4-1) L: Justin Masterson (2-5) S: Matt Capps (12)

[BOXSCORE]

I've been paying attention though as you may or may not know based off my Twitter activity. I tuned into every game I was awake for on the Kindle to lead the sweet soothing sounds of Tom Hamilton and Jim Rosenhaus, which was kind of like being back at home, but most of the time, when the Indians played, I was in bed, making it difficult to listen in.Of course more pressing than that of Matt LaPorta's feces-flinging swing is this sudden spurt of ineffectiveness the Tribe has been on in my absence. I'm not saying I'm the key to all destruction, but it certainly feels like it when you leave the country on May 19th and return on June 2nd and the team has fallen out of first place and is two full games back.

I watched Sunday though and it's kind of clear to see why things aren't exactly going in the right direction with our Tribe. Perhaps it provided me with a microcosm of what has happened in these two weeks.

The headline on the MLB.com recap is that the Indians "struggled" against another lefty. Although I wouldn't exactly count seven hits and the way they got them as struggling but they failed to draw a walk, which is exactly what the Indians were not doing two weeks ago.

Then again when two of your top three walks guys in Santana and Hafner are on the disabled list, it is kind of clear why that is and that is of course, the central problem right now.

This team has been destroyed in two weeks. There is no way Jose Lopez should be a regular starter on this team, but he is.

Diamond wasn't exactly dominant, but he held the Indians in check and got the plays he needed when he had to. Perhaps the first at-bat of the game gave you everything you needed to know when Shin-Soo Choo led off with what looked to be a double. The ball was smacked down the left field line and was headed down in foul territory, until it hit awkwardly off the side wall and bounced right into the direction of an incoming Josh Willingham.

And Willingham made a perfect throw to retire at second Choo and we have our theme to the game. The Indians would even get three errors by the Twins, more opportunities to get what they needed, sure the three runs were scored, but it was just a game of catch up all day. It was a game in which the Indians couldn't seem to catch a break, in addition to everything else that went wrong.

Justin Masterson's outing was one that left a lot to be desired. He gave up just as many runs as Diamond did (although Diamond's were unearned thanks to errors), but it just seemed like every bounce was going the Twins way.

"A lot of balls in the infield and they laid down some nice bunts," Masterson said. "I don't think anybody could really get to those. They tried to hit me with some balls. They tried to get me with a bat. You look up and you think maybe a run or two, but then they got three of those runs in there. It's a hair disappointing, but we kept it close. Our guys were battling."

Masterson stayed in long enough to keep his team in it though, so his performance was not really the problem. I think ultimately you wish the Indians would have taken advantage of the additional opportunities that were not created thanks to mistakes on the Twins part.

But that's expected.

Hopefully this free fall ends soon though. 2-out-of-6 to the Royals and Twins? It completely eliminates beating the good teams and it's again exactly unlike the Indians prior to two weeks ago. Instead of beating the teams they were supposed to beat, they're...not.

Random Details...

Michael Brantley extended his hitting streak to 12 games and what's impressive is that it is his seventh of those games with two hits. That's no cheap hitting streak he's got going on. Maybe he has turned the corner?

Can I just say how crazy it is to watch the Twins? If you don't think the injuries have a profound effect on this team, look at the Twins in this series with Mauer and Morneau. Just a presence does wonders and heck, it's far better than Jose Lopez hitting cleanup. Aye?

Most would think I'm bashing Lopez, but I'm not. And I'm not even bashing the Indians for putting him there. They don't really have any options in a game that they field this poor of a lineup. If Duncan was hitting better he'd be up there. Your top three hitters are hitting 1-3, your fourth and fifth consistent threats are hurt. Meaning that guys who are normally lower, Brantely, Kotchman, Duncan, are moved up and asked for more. I'm not stating anything you don't know though.

I will bash Lopez for that idiotic play in which he let the ball drop in on a bunt. The baserunner led to a run scoring and even though it would have been a foul ball had it not hit the bag, he should have just fielded the ball and attempted to get the out.

[NOW SERVING: SECONDS ON LaPORTA]

I compared Matt LaPorta to a feces flinging monkey to start this Rundown off. I will refrain from an opinion util I see what will eventually happen with him. I'll just say, I'm not on board with this.

Whatever the case may be with LaPorta, he may be here for a few games in the absence of Johnny Damon, or he may be here for a bit longer.

"If it's two days, three days, a week, it doesn't matter," LaPorta said on Sunday afternoon. "I'm up here to hopefully help contribute to this ballclub and help this team out."

"They felt that he was doing the right thing over there," Indians manager Manny Acta said of LaPorta's progress at Triple-A. "He was having success and hitting mistakes whenever they made mistakes on him. But, we'll have to see how that translates up here."

"As I become a smarter baserunner, the numbers will hopefully go up still," Kipnis said on Sunday. "You get to learn pitchers' tendencies. You learn their moves, when they like to pick off, when they like to go home. If you know a guy is a big curveball pitcher in certain counts or something like that, you can use that knowledge and try to steal on that pitch. You pick up little stuff as you go along."

Both Oviedo and Hernandez committed crimes when they entered the U.S. using false names and with false documentation, so even if State Department were to issue their visas under their true names, without this waiver they would be inadmissible to the U.S. and denied entry when they arrive. This waiver is far from automatic, and if this were a random citizen of the Dominican Republic who deceived the U.S. government to fraudulently enter and work in the States, it would likely never be issued. However, Oviedo purportedly has something the U.S. and Dominican governments want; names of others involved. 

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