Ass-Drubal Out

Asdrubal Cabrera is going to be out for probably six to eight weeks after fracturing his forearm on this play during last night's Indians/Rays game. (Refresh the page to get away from that advertisement and just see the play.) What you see is Peralta at the short stop position, Cabrera at second, and the ball rolling up the middle. Cabrera dives for the ball, and then Peralta appears to run into him and breaks his arm.

I first saw this last night on WKYC Channel 3's Sports Report during the 11 o'clock news and my first thoughts were, why the hell was that fatass Jhonny Peralta playing short stop? Did Manny Acta all of a sudden forget how to manage his baseball team? It figures that the one time Acta would put him at short, Peraltass would do something like this...

However, upon further investigation, I found out that Hank Blalock was at the dish with a runner on first so Acta decided to employ a infield shift. That takes him off the hook for why we're without our leadoff hitter for the next six to eight weeks. And then I read several reports which said that even thought it appears Peralta ran into Cabrera's arm, he actually did not. To paraphrase one article that I read about it today (and I apologize for not remembering the article and writer), there is a hell of a lot we can blame Peralta for in terms of his performance on the field, but this is just not one of them. So, to set the record straight, Peralta and Cabrera were trying to avoid each other and Cabrera was the one who got the raw end of the deal.

Where does that leave the Tribe? Well, they've called up Jason Donald, a middle infield prospect acquired in the Cliff Lee trade last season. He was having a pretty solid season at the plate in Columbus, hitting .277 with 2 HR, 17 RBI and 10 doubles. He also stole 10 bases with only being caught twice. I think it was getting to be time that the Indians called him up anyway, I just wish it could have been to replace Luis Valbuena, who is strugg-a-ling at the plate.

Cabrera will most likely have surgery on his forearm, but the Indians should release more on that situation after Cabrera has been examined by a specialist in Baltimore tomorrow. In either case, I wish Cabrera a speedy recovery. His offense, defense, and stability at the top of the lineup will certainly be missed until he gets back.

~MAS