Well, That Sucked

Yeah, every team’s gonna have “those” games where the pitching, offense, and defense all fail. You just kinda wish they wouldn’t happen against teams in your own division, particularly the ones projected to be bottom feeders (though I’m still not convinced the Indians are that just yet; they easily could’ve won their last four games). At any rate, I still haven’t seen Max Scherzer pitch for the Tigers. He was gone before I got home. Somehow, the Royals developed the Red Sox-esque ability to foul off pitch after pitch, particularly Jose Guillen (although the Royals actually put up quite a few hits against the Red Sox over the weekend). Errors and late walks did not help matters. There was something else I noticed while following on Gameday. On Sunday, I know some of the Tigers fans online got concerned when Verlander’s velocity seemed to drop to the low 90s after his rocky first inning. I don’t know if it went back up at any point because I didn’t see much of the game, so I’ll have to take their word for it. However, Gameday had Scherzer’s velocity below normal yesterday. I think I saw 93 go by once, but for the rest of his time on the mound, his fastball was at 89-91. Maybe one of them is suffering from a loss in velocity, but not both of them. Something screwy’s going on.

Though the offense had some issues again with stranding runners, when you score five runs, you should probably win. They finally got to Luke Hochevar, but the problem was that suddenly they lost their ability to score against opposing bullpens. Other than that, there’s no new developments save for the Guillen home run.

I had a very bizarre dream the other night. I dreamt that Alex Avila was hosting Saturday Night Live. They were doing a sketch that was a spoof of Star Trek (original series) and Avila was playing Spock. Then I dreamt that I was some Zorro-like vigilante and one of the other Tigers (don’t remember who) was my sidekick. What the hell did I eat before going to bed?

Jim Leyland is right about one thing, though: The starters have to go deeper into games, especially since Bonine, Thomas, and Ni are probably all unavailable today. If you needed to turn to a guy to give you some innings, I’m not sure Dontrelle Willis would be your first choice, but that’s the hand we’ve been dealt. He put up a good outing against the Royals a week ago, but as Max Scherzer proved, seeing a team again in such a short time span is not easy. Plus, there’s that small issue that he could have a meltdown at any time. And on the flipside, you all know Brian Bannister and his numbers. He generally pitches well against the Tigers, he generally pitches well in day games, and his ERA at Comerica Park is 0.45. So why couldn’t this be a night game?