CLEVELAND – Home is where the wins have been for the Indians this season.
Thursday night at Progressive Field, it was where poor starting pitching, a lack of offense and shoddy defense resided.
With right-hander Carlos Carrasco running out of steam and his fielders letting him down in a decisive sixth inning, Cleveland limped to a 7-4 loss in the opener of a four-game series with American League West Division-leading Texas.
The Indians led 3-0 through four innings before the Rangers tied it in the fifth, then forged ahead for good with another three-run inning in the sixth.
“We didn’t swing the bats particularly well, and unfortunately, the two things that we have done well, we didn’t do well tonight,” said manager Manny Acta. “We didn’t pitch very well and we didn’t play very good defense.”
Things began well for Carrasco, who didn’t allow a run on just a hit and a walk over the first four innings as he worked with an early cushion,
But Texas caught up to the right-hander in the fifth, sending eight batters to the plate as Carrasco began to unravel.
“He just didn’t make pitches,” Acta said. “He couldn’t keep the ball down. He didn’t have anything to finish hitters off.”
Carrasco said he lost his effectiveness when he went to his change-up in the fifth and sixth in order to show Rangers hitters something different than his sinking fastball.
“In the first four innings, I didn’t throw my change-up,” he said. “Then, in the fifth and sixth innings, I was throwing it but it was a little up.”
The subpar fifth was a prelude to an even worse sixth for Carrasco and the Indians.
With Texas’ Nelson Cruz on second after a one-out double, Mitch Moreland singled to right and was caught between first and second when first baseman Matt LaPorta took the cutoff throw from Shin-Soo Choo.
LaPorta ran at Moreland and had him heading back to first before turning to check on Cruz at third base. That allowed Moreland to make it safely on a tardy flip to Orlando Cabrera covering at first.
“Out of the corner of my eye I thought I saw Nelson Cruz going home,” LaPorta said. “I turned and then I turned back, and by that time, he was already back at first base. You learn from it and you just have to give (the ball) up right away, because they have eyes to see what’s going on.”
A sacrifice fly from Yorvit Torrealba scored the go-ahead run, followed by an RBI triple from Endy Chavez, but the Indians weren’t done with the fielding gaffes.
With Ian Kinsler at the plate, Carrasco uncorked a wild pitch that catcher Carlos Santana chased down. But he hurried a throw to his pitcher despite Chavez not breaking for the plate.
The ball wound up in the infield grass by the pitcher’s mound as Chavez raced home for a 6-3 lead.
“The defense didn’t help us right there, but there were runners on base because we didn’t make pitches,” Acta said, laying some of the blame on Carrasco, whom he singled out for not directing Santana on the wild pitch. “You can’t play stellar defense for 162 games. It’s going to happen. You just have to live with it.”
The Indians scored three of their four runs in the second inning off Texas starter Dave Bush, who lasted just four innings, surrendering the three runs on four hits.
Cleveland put the first four batters aboard in the second, with RBI singles from Travis Buck and Orlando Cabrera and a groundout from Jack Hannahan scoring the runs.
A LaPorta solo shot in the seventh scored the Indians’ final run.
“We had an opportunity to win that game tonight,” LaPorta said. “There were some things that happened and we didn’t come through.”
Contact Chris Assenheimer at 329-7136 or cassenheimer@chroniclet.com. Fan him on Facebook and follow him on Twitter.
