SI Curse Strikes Hot And Fast In Cleveland

The moment every Cleveland Indians fan saw the cover of the Sports Illustrated ahead of the 2015 baseball season, you could hear the collective hope being sucked from their souls. With good reason too. The SI Curse is real and is a thing. Seriously. Go Google it. I’m not going to explain it here. I’m not holding your hand.

Knowing full-well that who they put on their cover would have a most tumultuous season, the higher ups at SI showed no mercy and spared no feelings by putting the Cleveland Indians Cy Young winning pitcher Corey Kluber and left fielder Michael “Dr. Smooth” Brantley on one of their four regional covers. Here’s what I posted when I saw it.

Welp. We’re fucked. #SIcurse #RollTribe #Indians

A photo posted by ThunderTreats.com (@thundertreats) on

See? I knew it as soon as I saw it too.

Michael Brantley, who was a walking-billboard for the base hit in 2014, has played in exactly two of the Indians first seven games. He apparently has come down with a nagging back injury that just can’t get him back into the lineup. SHOCKER.

In his absence, though, we got to see Jerry Sands hit two homeruns against the Tigers. Coincidentally, that was the only good thing any Indians fan saw throughout the entire opening weekend in Cleveland.

Corey Kluber, on the other hand, is healthy. He has recorded 17 strikeouts in his first two starts and is rocking a 2.43 ERA. What has The Klubot got in return? An 0-1 record because his teammates hate hitting more than they hate scoring. If he wasn’t on the cover, I would say he had a shot to win some games and have a respectable year. But being on the cover? He’s toast. I just hope he can stay healthy since he signed that nice, new, fat contract.

Catcher Yan Gomes, though he wasn’t on the cover with the two aforementioned players, still has taken the brunt of the curse. On Saturday against the Detroit Tigers, Rajai Davis slid into Gomes right leg and he suffered a MCL sprain that will sideline him for six-to-eight weeks. The best part? It was a clean slide! God really hates us.

As if all of that wasn’t enough, pitcher Carlos Carrasco — who also still has wet ink on his contract — took a line drive off the face today in the first inning against the Chicago White Sox. Melky Cabrera rocketed a comebacker to the mound where Carrasco was late trying to shield his face and it looked like he took one off his left cheek. He would leave the game on a cart and not return. Updates as of posting say that he is being treated for a jaw contusion and is not exhibiting any concussion symptoms. Finally a break, amiright?

This is the part of the story where I would sit here and preach about how teams and players should refuse to be on Sports Illustrated but that would sound just as ridiculous as blaming a periodical for how a season turns out for a team.

BUT.

Since it’s sports, it’s not crazy.

Get well soon, guys.

Posted in