The Indians haven’t lost a game since Aug. 23, when Drew Pomeranz and the Red Sox defeated them to guarantee at least a series split. Since then, they’ve swept the Royals, Yankees, Tigers, and the White Sox, racking up 15 wins in a row to set a franchise record and earn the longest win streak in baseball since 2002, when the A’s won 20 in a row.
Indians 15-game winning streak is the longest in MLB in 15 years
Friday’s Say Hey, Baseball looks at the Indians winning yet again, Giancarlo Stanton: time traveler, and the Dodgers being bad now.
Photo by Jonathan Daniel/Getty Images
The Indians haven’t just won 15 games in a row: they’ve dominated opponents throughout this stretch. They’ve outscored them 109 runs to 28, giving up fewer than two runs per game while scoring an average of over seven runs themselves. As a team, they’ve put up what looks like an MVP-caliber season during these 15 games: In 552 at-bats, they’ve hit .322/.401/.591 with 33 homers, 39 doubles, five triples, and 106 RBI in this stretch. Every single spot in the lineup has been crushing it: The No. 2 slot has the lowest slugging percentage of any of the nine, and that is still .451.
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Jose Ramirez has been leading the charge, batting .400/.431/.964 with seven homers and 16 extra-base hits in the 13 games he’s played in during the win streak. That’s not just an amazing run tucked away in an otherwise quiet season, either, as Ramirez is leading the American League in doubles, overall extra-base hits, total bases, and has a 135 OPS+ on the season.
The MLB record win streak is 21 games, so the Indians still has their work cut out for them if they are to challenge that. (The longest winning streak ever is technically the 1916 New York Giants, at 26 games, but they have a tie in the middle of that streak so they can get the h*ck out.) If they do manage to get to 21 (or even close to it), they’re going to probably destroy the postseason hopes of the Orioles in the process, considering Baltimore is already eight games back in the division and two back of a wild card race that involves basically half of the AL.
With the way the O’s pitch and the Indians have been hitting, it feels like Cleveland should dispose of them with ease. The counterpoint to that, of course, is “baseball.” So we’ll see. Either way, though, 15 in a row is an impressive feat, and you can repeat that thought if they get to 16, and 17, and so on.
- The first half clouds our second half judgments, so to do away with that, Grant Brisbee pretended the first half doesn’t exist to come up with what we’d be talking about in baseball right now. Spoiler: The Indians are still good in this hypothetical world.
- Hero.
- The Indians’ win streak reaching 15 games means one company has a whole bunch of rebate checks to cut to customers: $1.7 million worth.
- Here’s Talking Chop on the rise of prospect Ronald Acuña.
- Luis Castillo is having himself a rookie season in the Reds’ rotation.
- Giancarlo Stanton would probably still be a stud in the deadball era.
- The chances are still remote, but the Dodgers might end up playing the Cubs in the NLDS.
- MLB Daily Dish is keeping track of which prospects get called up in September.
- The Brewers have not and will not care about strikeouts, so just get used to that.
- This weekend, the Braves are giving away free tickets to anyone who evacuated Florida because of Hurricane Irma.
- This 7-year-old wants to throw out the first pitch at every MLB park, and baseball teams are happy to help.
- Not everything is terrible for the Dodgers right now: Walker Buehler threw two scoreless innings in relief in his MLB debut.
- Drew Pomeranz faded down the stretch for the Red Sox last season. Is there reason to be concerned of a repeat?
- MLB does not have a plan in place for a five-way tiebreaker, so Russell A. Carleton decided to devise one.
- Jeff Sullivan took a look to see where the fastballs have gone missing.
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