Indians @ Twins, 4/20/08

Okay, let's break it down as the Good, the Iffy, and the Bad:

The Good:

Every game of this series featured a great pitching performance from our rotation. This was Paul Byrd's second quality start, which would seem to support the idea that he's made the adjustment he needed to make after his first two starts. Lee and Westbrook were as great as they've been all year so far. Add to that the fact that Carmona worked out the problems that caused his one bad start, and you have four starters who are just fantastic. If C.C. ever comes around, we'd have the best rotation in baseball.

The Iffy:

Obviously, our bullpen is inconsistent. I mentioned a while back that I thought part of the problem with our bullpen was that there was no structure. When our bullpen was at its best last year, every reliever had a set role. Now it seems completely random. And I think today is a good example of the problem. Perez is a specialist/set up man. He comes in to face lefties or to set up our closer. He's not a middle reliever. And yet today that's what he was, and he clearly isn't cut out for that. You have to wonder if he's throwing differently knowing that he could be out there for three innings of work. We should be trying to get more than four outs from him. And while it would be easy to blame Wedge, he didn't have much choice. He had no idea how long the game was going to go and Perez was pitching well. And he had no idea how long the game would go becasue of...

The Bad:

Our offense is so bad. A lot of people point to various call ups from last season as the main reason we were good. You know what a big part of that was? The Tribe started well. That was a big key last year and it's clearly not one we're hitting this year. But what do we do about it? I stand by my claim that an easy move would be to let Dellucci play every day -- there's no reason to bog down our line-up with Michaels. I think liberally mixing in Carroll is a good move, too. Still, I can't see any big changes happening until we get Shin Soo Choo back from the DL.

We've got three against a tough Kansas City team, then four against the hated Yankees, and then end the month agains the Mariners. Nine games to end the month. We have to go 7-2 to end the month above .500.

That seems like a longshot.