Jason Kipnis shows he still has the power

I think I'll skip the jokes about how there were more fans at Camden today than at Progressive and get straight to the news and notes:

Yesterday's game: Indians 7, Royals 5

Hey, they won a game! It's not impossible! Danny Salazar was sort of alright, but kind of not great. But hey, the offense scored a whopping seven runs, including four driven in by Jason Kipnis. There aren't too many better signs than Kipnis coming alive. Roberto Perez had a great night, too. So are you saying there's still a chance?!

• LGT recap (Ryan)
• Cleveland.com recap (Paul Hoynes)
• Indians.com recap (Jordan Bastian and Jeffrey Flanagan)

Indians news & notes

Kipnis shows Indians, himself he can still go deep | Cleveland.com - Kipnis' three-run bomb yesterday wasn't just huge for that game, it was huge from a personal standpoint. It was his first homer in 67 games. Kip describes it as a weight off his shoulders, and we can only hope it leads to more good things in the near future.

Francona takes responsibility for bullpen issues | Indians.com - Terry Francona says that if the bullpen's struggles are due to being overworked, that's on him. *If* the struggles are related to being overworked. It's one of the most non-committal admissions of guilt I've ever heard.

Joining the red-headed league | Did The Tribe Win Last Night? - Clint Frazier impressed in his strong second half in 2014, as well as his time in 2015 spring camp. DTTWLN profiles the redheaded future phenom (hopefully).

Dman's notes: Perez, Salazar, and Kipnis | Cleveland.com - Sharing this mostly because of the ridiculous factoid that all 28 of Salazar's strikeouts this season have been swinging strikeouts. Craziness.

Hot start could send Brantley back to All-Star Game | Indians.com - Because the voting has already started, for some god-forsaken reason.

Tidbits from around MLB

Homefield advantage with no home crowd | Fangraphs - With the Orioles and White Sox playing in front of an empty Camden Yards, FG examines the effects of homefield advantage in baseball. Not surprisingly, they conclude that it's not as important as in other sports.

That empty feeling | Sports On Earth - Will Leitch submits a contemplative piece about what it means to play baseball when no one is watching.

Batted balls: it's all about location, location, location | Fangraphs - This articles explains a bunch of really intricate graphs and calculations attempting to figure out a way to predict BABIP for pitchers.

Nats GM Rizzo hates the DH | CBS Sports - I guess this is what you'd expect an NL GM to say, right? Note that this is in stark opposition of his ace Max Schezer.