CLEVELAND: The Indians wrapped up an 11-game homestand on Sunday, and it included a stretch of come-from-behind wins and a few thrilling finishes in the bottom of the ninth inning.
On Thursday, the Indians clawed their way back from an early deficit to win on Tyler Naquin’s walk-off sacrifice fly in the ninth after Danny Salazar allowed three first-inning runs to the Chicago White Sox.
On Friday, the magic was turned up. Trailing 2-1 in the ninth to the Toronto Blue Jays, Jose Ramirez tied it with a solo home run and Naquin won it with a walk-off, inside-the-park home run — the first for an Indians player in roughly a century.
It continued on Saturday, when the Indians fought back from a 5-0 deficit to tie it 5-5 with a five-run fourth inning before ultimately losing 6-5. And finally, on Sunday, Ramirez drilled a two-run home run in the eighth to lift the Indians to a 3-2 win.
After Friday’s wild ninth inning, Trevor Bauer, that day’s starter, was almost at a loss for words on what had just happened, and how. But he still never thought they’d lose that game.
“I think it’s just the confidence,” Bauer said. “Everybody believes we’re going to win. There wasn’t a second in that game where I’d feel like anybody thought we were going to lose, even though we were down the whole game. Confidence is a big thing.”
To Lonnie Chisenhall, it’s always been there.
“Since I’ve been here, we’ve had it,” Chisenhall said. “Even two years ago, three years ago when we weren’t even in it, we were still coming back in games and not giving up. That’s something to have. You don’t want to roll over, especially when you’re trying to pick up games or extend a lead or just make your organization proud. You go out there and you fight until the ninth and then come back and get them tomorrow.”
Indians manager Terry Francona essentially agreed. He didn’t need the week’s heroics to prove anything.
“I think I already [knew],” Francona said. “Just because some nights when you don’t win, it doesn’t mean — I think the guys play until it’s time to go home. We’ve done that all year. It’s one of our qualities that I admire about our guys.
“I say it a lot of times when we come in here after a tough loss, ‘We can win some of those games.’ [Friday night], we did. They’re hard games to win, but every once in a while, you might win one of those.”
It’s a trait of many first-place teams around the league. It just so happened that the Indians packed a good deal of it into this most recent homestand.
Heading into late August and nearing the Sept. 1 roster expansion, the Indians have shown as much fight as any contender in the American League.
Ryan Lewis can be reached at rlewis@thebeaconjournal.com. Read the Indians blog at www.ohio.com/indians. Follow him on Twitter at www.twitter.com/RyanLewisABJ and on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/RyanLewisABJ