Written by Adam Burke

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It was anything but a home sweet home for the Indians tonight in their return to Progressive Field for the first time in nearly two weeks as they were thoroughly beaten by the Baltimore Orioles 10-2. The Orioles scored six runs in the third inning and that was more than enough. Derek Lowe gave up seven hits, every one of them for extra bases, walked five, and lasted just three innings as his tailspin continued.

Lowe’s ERA climbed over 5.04, a far cry from when he led the league in ERA way back in mid-May. Lowe’s ERA over his last 10 starts is now 8.30 and he’s been the winning pitcher in just two of his last 11 starts. Lowe’s problems started in the first when he gave up a run on a double, a groundout, and a wild pitch. He only gave up one run, but it clear that Lowe had no command and didn’t have his best stuff.

After Asdrubal Cabrera homered to get that run back for Lowe, he worked out of a second inning jam. Lowe walked the leadoff man and then gave up a double to Chris Davis to put runners on second and third with nobody out. Lowe gutted his way through that with a groundout and a couple of pop outs with an intentional walk in between. In the third inning, however, Lowe fell off the cliff.

The third inning looked like batting practice, though it was exacerbated by a Cabrera mental error. Former Indian Jim Thome led off the inning with a double and scored on a groundout and a fielder’s choice, where Cabrera ranged to his left to field and tried to fire a throw home to get the sloth-like Thome. The throw was offline and the run scored easily. Instead of getting the sure out at first, Cabrera’s blunder opened up the floodgates. The next four hitters went double, intentional walk, double, and home run to drive in five runs and leave Lowe reeling. The home run was hit by Ryan Flaherty and was just the third home run of his career.

For whatever reason, Lowe came back out for the fourth and gave up a home run to Thome and walked Adam Jones. The Jim Thome home run was his 610^th in his career, passing Sammy Sosa for seventh place on the all-time home runs list. Indians manager Manny Acta had seen enough and Cody Allen came in to make his Major League debut. Allen allowed the inherited runner to score, closing the book on Lowe, who got rocked to the tune of nine runs on seven hits, with five walks and not a single strikeout. Lowe got just two swings-and-misses out of his 82 pitches. Just 37 of them were strikes.

For good measure, the Birds added an extra run in the sixth to get to 10. The Indians picked up a solo home run from Jack Hannahan, but struggled again with runners on base. The Tribe left nine men on and stranded the bases loaded twice. Six of those nine were left in scoring position. The Orioles even beat the Indians in men left on base, stranding 10 of their own.

With the loss, the Indians didn’t lose any ground on the first-place White Sox, but they are now 2.5 games in back of the Tigers with a 47-46 record. The Tigers beat the White Sox to move within a half-game of first place. Derek Lowe dropped to 8-8 on the season and Miguel Gonzalez improved to 2-1.

Stat of the Night: Derek Lowe’s WHIP now sits at 1.63 for the season. His previous career high was 1.62 back in 2004, easily the worst season of his career. He was 14-12 but had a 5.42 ERA.

Stat of the Night Pt. 2: Derek Lowe faced 22 hitters. He fell behind 2-0 on 11 of them.

Player of the Game: Johnny Damon. Damon had three hits on the night and made a spectacular catch down the left field line, leaping into the stands to catch a pop up during the six-run third.

Tomorrow’s Game: The Tribe will try to bounce back tomorrow night with Zach McAllister on the mound against Chris Tillman. First pitch is at 7:05 p.m.