Well it hasn’t been pretty but it still is positive Indians fans. For a change, the offense has not been offensive and causing us to lose. The Indians are competitive and were in all of the games on the homestand. Now the team takes their game on the road again out to San Francisco to begin a three city, 9 game road trip in the National League.

The bad news about this is that Travis Hafner will not be allowed to use Travis Hafner in the lineup except for the role of a pinch hitter. Last night Manny called this fact “sad.” I agree. After all Indians fans know this glaring fact in 2011. With Travis in the starting  lineup, the Indians are 22-13. Without him starting, they are 18-20. For the next 9 games he will not be starting. The team will have to find a way to win without him in the starting lineup.

I had a fan tweet me asking why he could not play the field. As Paul Hoynes of the Cleveland Plain Dealer pointed out, the operation he had on his shoulder won’t allow it. He had trouble swinging a bat from it and throwing is too risky for the shoulder on top of swinging the bat.

This is why the Indians are expected to call up Shelley Duncan once again since Travis Buck was sent down to AAA Columbus once again yesterday, to add “umph” to the lineup with Hafner out. I look forward to seeing how Acta uses match-ups creatively to help score more runs against these Giants. Also I think more will be expected from Choo and A. Cabrera to move the runners and drive in runs starting tomorrow night.

The Giants come into the series 26-29 vs. righties and  5-4 in Interleague play so far in 2011 while the Indians are 11-9 vs. lefties  and 7-2 in Interleague play in 2011. It will be this type of matchup when the Indians face the Giants tonight. The Giants just took 2 out of 3 against the Twins and the Indians just lost 2 out of 3 to the Rockies. Interestingly, the Indians are 14-10 in 1-run games and the Giants are 20-11.

I just hope I see a smart well-played, fundamentally sound game where the Indians can play with a lot of heart and a never give-up attitude offensively and a sound job pitching trying to keep us in the ballgame in attempting to shut them down ourselves. Carrasco is the right pitcher to help advance Cleveland’s effort to pull out a win as he has shut down the opposition to 1 run in 22 2/3 innings in his last 3 starts. Let’s hope this effort continues in San Francisco.