Deja Vu All Over Again

Another close game, another loss. You could almost just take what I said yesterday and plug it in here, except the bullpen allowed the Rays to pull away in the eighth inning. Eddie Bonine pitched better than his line would indicate, I think. He had some bad luck in the fourth inning where he kept inducing weak ground balls, but they were almost too weak because the Rays kept beating them out for infield singles or the Tigers couldn’t turn the double play. I daresay Bonine pitched better than Brad Thomas, and Thomas didn’t give up any runs. The offense managed to score more runs against Niemann than most teams are able to. Meanwhile, Brennan Boesch seemingly has inherited Gerald Laird’s lineout curse, because for the second straight game he hit an absolute scorching line drive that was caught. He was also victimized by the Rays walking Miguel Cabrera again to get to him. He made contact this time, but it wasn’t enough.

The Tigers will try to get a win today behind Rick Porcello. He pitched decently last time (not as good as he was in Cleveland), but still took the loss. He’s faced the Rays once before, going 5.2 innings and only giving up one run. That was at Comerica Park. I’m not sure Tropicana Field will be as friendly. If he’s on, he’ll get lots of ground balls, and we all saw last night what happens to ground balls on that artificial surface. If he’s not on, the Rays will find other ways to score runs against him. David Price will start for the Rays, and he’s had a hell of a season. He started the All-Star Game, and his ERA is under three. He beat the Tigers last year the only time he faced them (I’m pretty sure I did not see that game; I do remember it being a big Fox game). There’s nothing that impressive in the individual matchups, either. They haven’t posted the lineup yet, but I’d be surprised to see Jhonny Peralta in there. Jason Beck mentioned on Twitter last night that his plane was supposed to land at the Tampa airport at 11 AM and this game starts at 12:10.