Or i would like to see the Indians Part ways and release both of these guys. With 1/2 the season gone it would be insulting to Indians Fans to see them on the field just to say they are healthy for a Free agent year. Release them and forget it. Thanks for the frustration! When you get good and kick our butt... build us another casino!

Hafner is about to return and as frustrating as the injuries have been for both, the Indians could use Hafner back in this lineup.

Whether Hafner is productive or not, he is the calm for the Indians, hitting cleanup. Everyone else can move down the order. It's bad when Johnny Damon is hitting 5th...LOL

I agree. Though Hafner isn't the player he used to be, at this point I welcome him back to the lineup. Damon batting 5th and Santana batting cleanup hasn't put up the points lol.

Simply can't argue that Santana is a better hitter when he's in front of or behind Hafner. Even when Haf isn't going well, his presence is still felt in this lineup. I'm really looking forward to getting those two back, especially since the rest of the offense has been picking up the slack these past 5 games.

It's one of the key down the stretch, the offense is better with both players, obviously. But seeing the other guys step in has been nice to see the last 5 games. Where would the Indians be without Jose Lopez this season? You'd never thought that would be the biggest move this offseason, but it has been.

I would say that there Hafner and Santana are probably the most important keys for this team in the second half of this season. I think the Tribe would be wise to use Lopez at DH pretty regularly when there's a lefty on the mound, but if Carlos can hit anywhere CLOSE to what he did in the second half of last year, we're going to be pretty solid 1-7 in the order.

Yeah I am not saying rest Hafner every time a lefty is pitching, but rather mix and match. Lopez can be very useful on this team now we know what he can do. I agree with Carlos, maybe this injury was a blessing, in disguise, if there was an injury...LOL

Hafner, Kotchman, and Hannahan all struggle against lefties, so yeah Lopez definitely has value on this team if we don't make a move to upgrade the bench.

hate to agree, but i believe you are right. Guy just fills in that middle of the lineup for us. Allows people to be moved where they should be and such.

I can't believe it, because at the time I hated the pickup of Lopez, but now I see how wrong I was in the winter time.

I wasn't crazy about him either, and I personally wanted to see Donald take the utility job and run with it so that Lopez would never see Cleveland...but he does exactly what we need, which is hit lefties well.

Yeah, and one thing we can see is a young player should rarely be the utility guy. I just am not sure Donald can handle playing once or twice a week. So we know Lopez can.

Wow I didn't realise Hafner is so important to the line up. Antoinetti better get on the stick right now and get that extension drawn up I would think 6 years at 20 million should do just fine. Oh yeah then they could build a statue of him instead of Thome since Hafner is definately the best Player to have ever played for the Indians because of CALMING influence on the other hitters. That is much better than actualy hitting. Yeah buddy every team wishes they had a guy making 13 million dollars hitting.200 with 5 HR'S having that exceptional CALMING influence on the other hitters. What are the sabermetrics on that stat??? You could calulate that and become publiahed on Saber world.

Just having some fun. Get hafner and Santana out of here ASAP. bLOW IT ALL UP AND START OVER with baseball men running the FO. Then the fans will show up. NOW IF aNTOINETTI AND sHAPIRO ARE STILL HERE you must just keep loping along. THESE GUYS CAN;T BE TRUSTED to do it right They have poor eval skills.

The fans won't show up, until the Dolans sell the team.

I am projecting about 30,000 tonight, Now that is just me and my projections though.

It would be nice to see that. The more fans, the better.

Looked like GREAT croud for a monday night game buddy. I think I was close didn'y hear the announced paid attendance though

Chuck just said there was 22k. Not great but not terrible. If a move or two was able to be made and prove that this team is serious about contending, a few more people will show.

22,000 is a good number for a monday night. I am Happy with the attendance. Now we jusr have to wait and see if Perez has any comments he is the official attendance captain of all the games.