Tomlin pitches outstanding outside of first inning homer, Three Takeaways from Indians 1-0 Defeat

CLEVELAND, Ohio - On an unusually chilly May Friday night. The Twins and Indians began a 3-game series. The Indians came into the game with a record of 18-15

CLEVELAND, Ohio - On an unusually chilly May Friday night. The Twins and Indians began a 3-game series.

The Indians came into the game with a record of 18-15 and the Twins came in with a record of 17-14 on the season.

On Friday night both teams did not come away with many runs. Both teams only scored one combined run and that was the Twins in the first inning with a Miguel Sano opposite field homer to right field.

With the 1-0 loss, the Indians fall to 18-16 on the season and the Twins improved to 18-14. With the loss, the Indians are now 1 game behind the Twins for first place in the American League Central.

Here's our three takeaways from the Indians 1-0 defeat.

1.) Tomlin Turnaround 

After a rough start to the 2017 MLB season, Josh Tomlin has been tremendous. After dealing with a no-decision in his previous start against the Kansas City Royals, Tomlin was looking to get back into the win column. Unfortunately, Tomlin was not able to do that tonight but nevertheless, Tomlin pitched excellent.

Tomlin pitched 8 innings, gave up 6 hits, 1 earned run, 1 walk, and 7 strikeouts. Tomlin's only mistake was three batters into the game when he gave up an opposite field homer to Miguel Sano which gave the Minnesota Twins the early 1-0 and that's all they needed.

Tomlin also went into Friday's game with an ERA of 7.12 (Tomlin's ERA has been going down every start since his second start of the season) and at the end of the night, his ERA went down to 5.87.

Indians manager Terry Francona had this to say about Josh Tomlin's performance Friday Night:

"He was tremendous, the third hitter of the game hits a first pitch fastball for an opposite-field home run. The Twins made it stand up. He has been pitching good and he knows that his numbers won't be the prettiest for a while but if he keeps pitching like that and keeps changing speeds, keeps hitters off balance and keeps took the sting out. Sano is turning into a good and dangerous hitter."

2.) Edwin Encarnacion struggles with Runners in Scoring Position

Following Friday night's game, Edwin Encarnacion fell to 3-28 with runners in scoring position and struck out 12 times but has also walked 9 times. Encarnacion is hitting .107 with runners in scoring position with one homer and 6 RBIs.

Last season with the Toronto Blue Jays Encarnacion, was 41-164 with runners in scoring position. Encarnacion had an average of .250 with RISP with 9 home runs and 80 RBIs. He struck out 45 times and walked 24 times in the 2016 season in this situation.

It is still early in the season but it will be a big help if Encarnacion turns around his success with RISP.

3.) Attendance Impressive on a Cold Evening

As planned since the Edwin Encarnacion signing in the offseason, attendance numbers have gone up. On Friday night's game, the temperature at first pitch was 54 degrees and the final attendance number was 24,452 which to put into perspective from last year the Indians had 17,803 on May 13th of 2016.

On May 14th of 2016, the Indians had 15,428 and drew 13,236 the following day to close the series, ironically enough against the Minnesota Twins.

You can compare the numbers following this series in 2017 but I assume that you will easily 5,000 to 10,000 more fans this upcoming weekend compared to last year at this time.

Factor in the weather from that weekend series around this time last year on May 13th an estimated first pitch temperature was around 65 degrees, which is ten degrees warmer than Friday's first pitch temp.

Great sign that the Cleveland Indians fans appear to back the team no matter what the weather is so far.

Saturday's game will be at 4:10 PM EST and the Indians will be sending Mike Clevinger to the hill for his second start of the season and will be opposed by the Twins' Jose Berrios.