The Indians received all they could have asked for and more tonight in an extra inning walk-off 2-1 victory over the visiting Toronto Blue Jays.

Frankie Lindor continued his hot hitting with a leadoff home run in the tenth, giving the Tribe (50-45) their second walk-off win of the season. And he did it in front of a second straight sellout crowd of 34,569. Nights like this make it feel like it’s 1999 all over again.

Most importantly, though, Danny Salazar made his return to the rotation after a seven week hiatus and was absolutely brilliant.

He had it from the very first pitch, a swing and a miss by Jose Bautista on a 95 mile-per-hour fastball. Then a 96 mph heater for another swing and a miss. Then more cheese, this time at 97 mph, for called strike three.

Welcome back, Mr. Salazar!

Salazar struck out the side on twelve pitches in the first inning – all fastballs, all 96 or above after his opening salvo to Bautista. topping out at 98 mph for strike one on Josh Donaldson.

Salazar’s second inning was just as encouraging. He mixed a 96 mph heater with an 86 mph change and a 87 mph slider to go one-two-three on nine pitches.

All told, Salazar pitched seven electric innings allowing just one single, no walks, and striking out eight. The single was erased on a double play, so he actually faced the minimum 21 batters over seven innings on just 86 pitches.

As stock brokers like to say, past performance is no guarantee of future success, but for a Cleveland baseball franchise looking for a kick in the pants to get this team out of the doldrums and create a little space in the division, Salazar’s start was a swift one right where they needed it.

The lone negative of the night came in the 8th immediately upon Salazar’s removal as Andrew Miller was ambushed by Justin Smoak home run on his very first pitch.

It tied the game at 1-1, removed Salazar from a very deserving win (or perhaps just threw a little more shade at the dubiousness of won-loss records in general), and ultimately pushed a crisp-paced game into extra innings. Time of game was still just three hours and one minute, however, and probably did little to dampen spirits downtown tonight.

Game Scores

Using Bill James’ Game Score statistic, we can more readily appreciate Salazar’s performance tonight. The math behind the number is here, but briefly it starts at 50 and anything approaching 100 is excellent.

Salazar’s final line tonight (7 IP, 1 H, o ER, o BB, 8 K) earned a game score of 88.

Using baseball-references play index, we find Corey Kluber has the top three game scores for the Tribe this year. Salazar’s 88 ties Kluber’s second-best start on April 21st against the White Sox (9 IP, 3 H, o ER, 2 BB, 9 K) and falls just short of Kluber’s 92 from June 19th (9 IP, 3 H, 0 ER, 0 BB, 11 K).

Over Salazar’s five-year career in Cleveland, his game score of 88 is tied for the 10th best of any Indians’ pitcher over that time period. The best score, of course, was Kluber’s 18 strikeout game in 2015 against St. Louis. I was there that night and still can’t believe Kluber didn’t get a shot at 20 K’s in the 9th inning.

Kluber, not surprisingly, has 11 of the top 20 individual game scores over the past five years. Kluber and Carlos Carrasco have 11 of the top 13 performances, including Salazar’s gem tonight.

And Salazar’s 88 game score tonight was the highest of his career, or put another way, we just saw the best start of what has always been an intriguing and tantalizing talent.

Where will he go from here in the season’s final 67 games?

 

What about Frankie

Lindor’s home run, his 15th of the season, ties his career high from last year. He hit 12 in his rookie season of 2015.

It was Lindor’s first home run in just over a month. He last homered on June 21st at Camden Yards.

After homering eight times in his first 29 games, and 12 times in his first 50, Lindor has been mired in a funk since June 1st. In 42 games since the beginning of June, he’s slashed .238/.285./.365 with three home runs in 194 plate appearances.

He has shown signs of life recently, however, with four multi-hit games and a .327 average since July 5th.