It all ended when CC left

The Indians’ season was just like their record, half good-half bad.

CLEVELAND (AP) — CC Sabathia stood on the airport’s tarmac, his head spinning like one of his biting curveballs.

Moments after the Indians’ charter flight had returned to Cleveland from Minneapolis July 6, Sabathia said good-bye to teammates he never imagined leaving. He had broken into the big leagues with many of them. This was his baseball family and Sabathia had been traded to a new one, the Brewers.

At that moment, the left-hander’s career shifted. And the Indians’ season unofficially ended.

“It was weird having to say goodbye to some of the guys I’d played with my whole career, been friends with my whole baseball career,” Sabathia said last week. “It was tough. But at the same time, I was excited to get a chance to see what was going to happen, to be in the middle of a pennant race. It was mixed emotions, really.”

For the Indians, it was a mixed season. Their 81-81 record perfectly reflected a sometimes-good-sometimes-bad year.

After coming within one win of the World Series in 2007, Cleveland’s high hopes in ’08 were quickly dashed by injuries to All-Star players, a combustible bullpen that didn’t settle until it was too late and not enough production by young players the Indians were counting on at key positions.

General manager Mark Shapiro’s biggest fear heading into the season was that it wouldn’t go as planned and that he would be forced to trade Sabathia, the club’s ace and the franchise’s face who had rejected a four-year, $72 million contract extension during spring training and was poised for free agency.

In early July, Shapiro’s anxieties were realized.

Designated hitter Travis Hafner, catcher Victor Martinez and right-hander Fausto Carmona were on the disabled list, starter Jake Westbrook was out for the season following surgery and the Indians were in the midst of a 10-game losing streak that would eventually drop them season-high 16 games out of first place in the AL Central. Shapiro had no choice but to begin planning for the future.

He dealt Sabathia to the Brewers for prospects and later sent third baseman Casey Blake to the Los Angeles Dodgers and right-hander Paul Byrd to the Boston Red Sox. Even more painful for the Indians was that all three players reached the postseason with their new teams.

Like Sabathia, Blake dreaded his Cleveland exit.

“Injuries are tough for a team, no doubt,” Blake said. “We had like four key guys hurt. That just killed anything we had going. I think in a perfect world and [if] everybody stayed healthy, it would be a different story.”

It almost became one anyway. The Indians, who were 37-53 July 9, went 44-28 the rest of the way, and their record from July 10 on was the AL’s second-best.

The surge was fueled by left-handed Cy Young favorite Cliff Lee, as well as outfielders Shin-Soo Choo and Grady Sizemore, the league’s only 30 homer, 30-steals man; catcher Kelly Shoppach; first baseman Ryan Garko; and second baseman Asdrubal Cabrera, who had been sent back to the minors to work on his game and returned a more complete player.

The Indians ended up finishing third in their division and just seven games out of first, a respectable spot but not where they wanted to be.

“We damn near put ourselves back in the mix,” said manager Eric Wedge, who may have done his best work in six seasons with Cleveland. “I don’t think there’s anybody on this planet who thought we’d have a chance to be .500 from where we were. We’ve had bad days here and there but we played good, hard baseball and put ourselves in a position to get better. I’m proud of the way these guys have stuck together and played the last three months.”