Cleveland -105:
Cleveland after having been in a horrible slump for about 2 1/2 weeks, is again playing very good fundamental baseball and is playing with a lot of confidence once again.
Cleveland has won 3 in a row and has a very good chance of getting some easy wins this month vs mediocre at best teams.
Cleveland is very focused defensively after having just an aweful stretch of bad fundamental ball which included tons of unearned runs due to errors, etc. This team has not made an error in 5 games now....looks like Charlie Manual's "screaming" closed door meeting has paid some dividends.
Offensively, this team has finally got it going again. In their 3 straight wins, they've pounded out a total of 38 hits. They are also starting to get those runs in, scoring 9 in each of their last 2 games.
Ponson, who's pitching for the O's has never faired well vs the Tribe in his career. He's made 7 career starts and is 0-5 with an ERA of 9.95. In 38 total innings pitched, he's given up 56 hits and walked 28. When a pitcher has struggled that bad in his career vs a certain team, it tends to put a lot of pressure on him mentally, even if a lot of the players have changed teams since.
The current Cleveland players going against Ponson today do have a combined .307 career average vs him. This includes Jim Thome who has hit 3 Home Runs off Ponson in just 8 At Bats. What makes this even more interesting is the fact Thome is really starting to heat up. Thome has 6 RBI's in the last 3 games, so some major damage could possibly be done vs Ponson today.
Chuck Finley is going for the Tribe today and I fully expect him to pitch a good game today. Finley has faced 7 batters in this Baltimore lineup in his career and has had very good success. They have just a combined .217 average in their careers vs him(15 hits in 69 AB)
Finley has had some very unfavorable Home Plate Umps this season so far, but look for plenty of help today with Home Plate Ump Steve Rippley. Finley's a pitcher that needs to get the corner and low strikes called and should really benefit today with Rippley behind the plate.
Some evidence of this is the fact that Finley does have a couple starts the past 2 years with Rippley behind the plate and in those starts he is 2-0
Also helps that Cleveland is 5-1 the past 2 years when Steve Rippley is the Home Ump.
Cleveland has also won 6 of the last 7 meetings with Baltimore.
Good luck today
