Carlos Carrasco has an almost enviable task this afternoon when the Indians take on the White Sox at 1:05 in game two of their three-game season-opening series.
Carrasco can hardly have a more dreadful start to his season than Tribe ace Fausto Carmona had yesterday. Pressure should be off then, one would think, besides the jitters of a personal opening day. If Carrasco can get through the first couple of innings without being rocked, as Carmona was, Carlos will look like a veritable -- why like a veritable number one starter, which Manny Acta claims ALL of his starters are on their game days.
The Sox will counter with Edwin Jackson. Jackson went 6-10 with an ERA over 5 last year for the Arizona Diamondbacks and then went 4-2 with the White Sox after the Sox acquired him at the end of July, with an ERA of 3.24. Jackson has kicked around some in his career: Chicago is his fifth team in this, his ninth big-league season.For his career, Jackson is 48-51 with a 4.62 ERA.
Carlos Carrasco has a career mark of 2-6 and a 5.51 ERA, but in fairness, those numbers reflect only twelve big-league games. Let's not be daunted by the high ERA, at least at this stage of the game.
And, Indians' fans, before we get too worried about being blasted on Opening Day (before a late and ultimately futile comeback) -- the defending World Series champion San Francisco Giants are 0-2, with both of those losses coming at the hands of their hated rivals, the Dodgers.
It could be worse. Hopefully, it won't be.
Look for lineups and game-time conditions in a later post.