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Indians continue to roll by toppling Tigers

Aug 27, 2008 - 3:23 AM DETROIT (Ticker) -- Cliff Lee became the American League's first 19-game winner, but the Cleveland Indians' offense stole the show.

Ben Francisco homered twice and Jamey Carroll drove in two runs as the surging Indians extended their winning streak to a season-high nine games with a 10-4 triumph over the Detroit Tigers on Tuesday.

The Indians finally have found a groove of late, winning 15 of their last 18. Their offense, missing injured sluggers Victor Martinez and Travis Hafner for much of the season, has averaged 6.1 runs in that span.

"You score runs like that in an inning and Cliff on the mound, you've got it going for you," Carroll said. "The consistency of what he's done this year is impressive. He's fun to play behind. You know what you're going to get."

Lee (19-2) cruised through 7 2/3 innings, allowing two runs and six hits. The Cy Young Award candidate, who has pitched at least seven frames in 16 of his 26 starts this season, is one away from becoming the first Indians pitcher to reach the 20-win plateau since Gaylord Perry went 21-13 in 1974.

"I just want to get as deep in the game as I can, give the team a chance to win and put up as many zeros as I can," Lee said. "I wanted to make sure I continued to pitch and not get away from my game plan with a big lead."

The lefthander also joined an elite class of pitchers to have won 19 of their first 21 decisions since 1920. The other seven to accomplish the feat are Roger Clemens (2001), Greg Maddux (1995), Ron Guidry (1978), Perry (1966), Whitey Ford (1961), Preacher Roe (1951) and Lefty Grove (1931).

"Just to be mentioned in the same sentence with those guys is an honor," Lee said. "I don't put any more thought into it than that."

Lee's counterpart was not nearly as sharp in his major league debut.

Summoned from the minors earlier in the day, Detroit's Chris Lambert breezed through the first two innings before getting tagged for six runs in the third.

"He got a little fastball-happy there and we didn't help him much," Detroit manager Jim Leyland said. "It shouldn't have been as bad as it looked. I feel bad for him. We had a couple tough plays there we didn't make."

Carroll and Kelly Shoppach opened the frame with back-to-back homers and Asdrubal Cabrera scored after Franklin Gutierrez reached on a throwing error by third baseman Ryan Raburn.

Jhonny Peralta and David Dellucci laced consecutive RBI base hits to increase the Indians' bulge to 6-0, and Carroll capped the rally with a run-scoring single, knocking Lambert (0-1) out of the game.

"You've got to pitch through that," Lambert said. "The first two innings, I felt really good. After that, I kind of got a little antsy, tried to do too much instead of staying with my game plan, which I was doing the first couple of innings. Kind of got away from it, and it just didn't go well."

Francisco added two-run homers in the fourth and seventh for his second career multi-homer game and four-RBI effort.

"(Francisco) did a great job for us in terms of tacking it on," Cleveland manager Eric Wedge said. "I just feel like we're finding different ways to win ballgames."

With the victory, the Indians (64-67) moved ahead of the Tigers (64-68) by one-half game for third place in the AL Central. However, they are 11 1/2 games behind the division-leading Chicago White Sox (76-56).

"We just haven't been swinging the bat," Leyland said. "Pretty much all year long, we've gotten in these little streaks. It appears like we might get something going, and then all of a sudden, we go in a funk. For two or three games, we just look terrible. It's hard to explain, really. I can't figure it out."