A Mess in Texas

That was almost like playing a west coast game, what with all the strange things that happened. There was sloppy play by both teams, but in the end, the Rangers’ bullpen outlasted the Tigers’. Jeremy Bonderman seemed to be fighting himself from the get-go, but looked as though he’d found somewhat of a rhythm when the first of two really questionable umpiring calls happened. David Murphy hit a long fly ball that to me (in real time) looked as though it hooked just foul and bounced off the facing of the upper deck in foul territory. The numerous replays they showed us on Fox Sports Detroit seemed to confirm what I initially saw. However, the umpires upheld their call of home run, saying that it went over the foul pole before it hooked foul. I can’t see any point at which it did that, but regardless, either the call or the long delay seemed to fluster Bonderman because he fell apart after that, hitting Vladimir Guerrero and allowing two more runs after that (Inge made an error that scored the tying run, but Bonderman didn’t help his own case since he had the hit batter and two walks). Robbie Weinhardt became the victim of a Will Rhymes error and ended up being the losing pitcher. He was also victimized by the other really bizarre umpiring call. Ian Kinsler took what appeared to be a pitch down the middle for strike three, so much so that he started walking back to the dugout, but it was ruled a ball (it was a really strange strike zone all night). He promptly singled in a run on the next pitch. Eddie Bonine gave up four runs on a bloop single, two consecutive bunt base hits, a bases-clearing double, a groundout, and a sac fly, but the strange thing is that each of those occurred on the first pitch of the at-bat, so the four runs happened very quickly.

Derek Holland (who I forgot to mention is from Newark, Ohio, which is right near where I went to college) had some wildness problems of his own. For the most part, the Tiger hitters were patient, made him throw a lot of pitches, and scored a few runs off him (a lot of them were of the manufacturing variety). But once Dustin Nippert came in, the offense shut down. They really could not get anything going against him. Miguel Cabrera had a particularly rough night at the plate, going 0-for-4 with two strikeouts (he was also not happy with the strike zone). The lone bright spot of the night was that Casper Wells had four hits, although Scott Sizemore looked pretty good at the plate as well before getting pinch-hit for in the sixth. The Rangers had some defensive issues, too, but theirs ended up not hurting them as much.

I would have a discussion of this in its own post if not for the fact that school is getting in the way of blogging, but next year’s schedule has been posted. For the first time that I can remember (and one way or another, I’ve learned all the Opening Day matchups since 2004), the Tigers will face an opponent other than the Royals or Blue Jays on Opening Day. And it won’t be on a Monday. Instead, they’ll open the season on Thursday, March 31^st at Yankee Stadium (with all the stress that causes, at least they’ll get it out of the way early). The home opener will be April 8^th against the Royals. Their west coast trips are rather spread out, unfortunately. The Interleague schedule is largely against the NL West, with the Pirates and Mets thrown in just for fun. The Tigers will be paying a visit to PNC Park, Coors Field (shame it’s not the other way around), and Dodger Stadium, while the Diamondbacks, Mets, and Giants will come to Comerica Park. The Tigers will get the “long” All-Star Break again, and will be on the road a LOT in August (they’ll only be home for one Saturday in August, much to my frustration). However, they’ll be at home quite a bit in September, and they do end the season at home (on a Wednesday, which seems wrong somehow). I will go into a deeper analysis of the schedule if I can, but it’ll have to wait until my workload gets a little lighter.

This short two-game series concludes tonight. Colby Lewis will start for the Rangers. He’d struggled somewhat in the second half, losing seven consecutive decisions before bottoming out and giving up nine earned runs to the Twins. However, he was very good in his last start, going 6.1 innings against the Blue Jays, giving up only one run and striking out eight. He’s pitched against the Tigers twice this year already and has a win and a loss. In both games, he gave up four earned runs. Meanwhile, Rick Porcello was supposed to start tonight, and probably could have, but with the injured tendon in his finger, they are holding him back until Monday as a precaution (much to the chagrin of the Fox Sports Detroit programming people, who had a story about Porcello’s season for the pregame show tonight). Instead, Armando Galarraga (who was supposed to be skipped) will get the call. He’s coming off a start against Baltimore in which he pitched well but ended up with a no-decision, and this has left him increasingly frustrated (His lament over his lack of wins has drawn the ire of some of the folks at Bless You Boys, which I think was somewhat of an overreaction on their part, and they are now trying to turn it into a running gag, which I don’t appreciate, but I have found over the years that one of the best ways to piss off a sabremetrics geek is to place any sort of value on wins or saves; meanwhile, all the other news sites and blogs have seemingly moved on). It’s true that the Tigers have not scored many runs while he’s been the pitcher of record (though there have been many games where they’ve scored late in a tie game to give a reliever a win or they’ve bailed him out of being the tough-luck loser). I, for one, sympathize with him, but I’m concerned that his frustration over lack of run support will cause him to try too hard to pitch a shutout, which would probably end in disaster. And his old team has given him a somewhat tough time the last couple times he’s seen them. He’s faced them once this year. He went 7.1 innings and gave up four earned runs, although three of those runs came very early and he did settle down and pitch well after that. But the Rangers lineup is red-hot right now and it’s not easy for any pitcher to get through them. He can’t be timid, he has to trust his stuff, he has to go right after the hitters, he can’t pitch to “prevent” runs, he can’t get frustrated over giving up home runs (because odds are he will give up one or two in that ballpark) and he can’t start overthinking (this guy is quickly becoming the poster boy for the impact that psychology can have on one’s baseball ability).    

Miguel Cabrera is a Beast and Justin Verlander is the Man

Photo: AP

First of all, I’d like to thank the Tigers for timing their rally so that it happened during my lunch break, so I at least got to listen to it on the radio. I sort of watched the archived game last night, so I have a general idea of what went down. Justin Verlander was “his bad self,” to paraphrase Rod Allen. He had eleven strikeouts and it looked as though all his pitches were working. The fastball was blazing, the curveball was diving, and the changeup was baffling. His only mistakes were an RBI triple to Jake Fox (who I didn’t think could run that fast) and a wild pitch. Leyland said that Verlander had “shutout stuff.” I can’t say I disagree.

For most of the game it looked like Verlander would suffer the same fate as Armando Galarraga and Max Scherzer: Lack of run support. The Tigers only managed one hit off Chris Tillman, although they did draw six walks (three to Brennan Boesch and surprisingly none to Miguel Cabrera). I have no idea what made him so effective, since I only kind of half-paid attention to the archive and they didn’t really talk about him after the game (I did watch the replay of the postgame show this morning). However, once Tillman was out and the bullpen came in, the bats woke up (sounds like the beginning of the season). Will Rhymes and Ryan Raburn led off the bottom of the eighth with a single and a double, respectively. The key at-bat was the walk to Austin Jackson (and the 3-2 pitch looked close enough to me that it might have tempted him). That loaded the bases with nobody out for Miguel Cabrera in a one-run game, meaning they had to pitch to him. And Cabrera came through by hitting a bases-clearing double into the gap (the funny thing was that I somehow knew he was going to swing at the first pitch). Brandon Inge later hit a two-run homer to tack on some insurance.

This is a really weird week in which the Tigers have two off-days, today being the first. Tomorrow night marks the start of a brief two-game series in Texas, where the Rangers are red hot after sweeping the Yankees. There is some question as to whether Rick Porcello will actually start on Wednesday (he has an injured tendon in his right index finger), but we’ll deal with that when we come to it. In the meantime, Jeremy Bonderman is coming off a really good start against the White Sox in which he went eight innings and gave up only one run. He’s made two starts this year against the Rangers, and neither went all that great. He gave up four runs in 5.2 innings in Arlington back in April, and then gave up five runs in 5.1 innings at Comerica Park in July. He’s handled Vladimir Guerrero in his career, though. Vladdy’s only 5-for-26 with ten strikeouts against Bonderman. On the other hand, Ian Kinsler is 4-for-7 with a double and a home run. Lefty Derek Holland gets the start for the Rangers. He’s bounced back and forth between the rotation and the bullpen, but he’s pitched decently for the most part. He’s coming off a win against the Blue Jays in which he struck out eight in five innings. The only Tiger who has faced him before is Johnny Damon, and he is 0-for-4 with three strikeouts.

Counterintuitive Pitching

Sorry, I don’t have a song for you this time. Suffice it to say, Max Scherzer really didn’t have it this time. He was able to dance around danger for five innings, but the Orioles are hot right now, and you can’t get away with that against a hot team forever. He threw plenty of strikes, but he had problems putting guys away, outside of a span of batters in the fourth and fifth innings. Twelve hits is the most he’s given up all season, and that includes his pre-Toledo struggles. Meanwhile, the offense couldn’t get anything going against Jeremy Guthrie. Guthrie fell behind a lot, actually, and they still couldn’t get good swings off him. They did mount a rally in the bottom of the eighth, scoring three runs, but the deficit was too much to overcome, I guess. Peralta was the big offense highlight with two hits including a 2-run double. Don Kelly had the other RBI.

The series and the homestand concludes today. Justin Verlander is coming off a spectacular performance against the White Sox (which I didn’t see). He hasn’t faced the Orioles yet this year. He’s had some difficulty with them in the past, most recently at Comerica Park last year where he gave up five runs early but stayed in the game and settled down from there. He is not immune to Luke Scott, either. Just a word of warning. Meanwhile, the Orioles are starting Chris Tillman, who has a very high earned run average but that’s inflated because of two really bad starts he’s made. Apparently he’s one of their more highly thought of prospects. He nearly no-hit the Texas Rangers back in July. Looking at his game logs, his tendency is to follow up a good outing with a poor one. He had a good outing in his last start, so let’s hope that pattern holds true.

Doing What I Always Said I Would and Yet I Feel I Haven't Won at All

In case you don’t know, that’s a line from a song, and oddly enough, I was going to use it for Mood Music last night but I couldn’t find a decent version of it on Youtube (the song is called “Where I Want to Be” and it’s from the musical Chess; it’s a good song from a good musical; you should try looking it up yourself and see if you have better luck than I). Shame, because it would have been a very appropriate song to describe what Armando Galarraga seems to be feeling right now. He pitched well last night. The only mistake he made was a hanging changeup to Jake Fox, who did what you’re supposed to do with hanging changeups and hit it a long way. Other than that, he did a good job, but only came away with a no-decision for his efforts. After the game, he lamented the fact that he only has four wins despite being in the rotation since mid-May and pitching fairly well in that span, especially recently. I know (and he probably knows) that wins aren’t all that important when you look at raw stats, but at the same time, they’re given quite a bit of weight by the mainstream media and the average fan. Plus, they serve as a sort of reward or recognition for your efforts. It’s probably not the correct way to look at it, but it is the conventional way. Maybe he was being a little selfish in his laments last night, but I can’t say I blame him, especially when he had just watched his teammates strand a leadoff triple in the bottom half of his final inning of work. Galarraga has eleven no-decisions this year in twenty starts, and a lot of those no-decisions are due to a combination of very little run support and the bullpen blowing late leads or ties. If the Tigers had been winning those games, he probably wouldn’t be so depressed about it. But in his last four starts, he has left either in a tie or with the lead, and the Tigers have lost all four, largely in part to bullpen meltdowns. So I understand his frustration and I think he just felt the need to vent a little. Once he got that off his chest he seemed much more relaxed in his postgame interview. I just hope he continues to pitch well and do what he needs to do to claim a spot in the rotation for next year. That’s all he can control right now. Galarraga’s comments did leave me wondering who holds the record for most no-decisions in a single season. I wasn’t able to find an answer on a source like Baseball-reference or the Baseball Almanac, but I did find one website which mentioned that Bert Blyleven had twenty no-decisions in 37 starts back in 1979 (He went 12-5 that year), so I’m going to go with that for now.

The offense has been odd recently. They surprisingly chugged along just fine without Miguel Cabrera for two games (actually, three, since he didn’t contribute much in the game where he left with the biceps tendinitis). Last night, Cabrera returned to the lineup and he basically WAS the offense. It was nice to see him back in there producing, though. He hit his first home run at Comerica Park since July 19^th (another welcome sight). Outside of that, though, there wasn’t a lot going on. I already mentioned stranding the leadoff triple by Austin Jackson (who had three hits, actually). Will Rhymes struck out on a bad pitch to swing at. Johnny Damon popped out (though, in fairness, I thought that ball would bloop into shallow left; then again, my depth perception sucks). Then, after an intentional walk to Cabrera, Ryan Raburn had an absolutely terrible at-bat, swinging at two pitches that bounced into the left-handed batter’s box (And I’d have the same opinion of that at-bat no matter who was hitting). They also had a situation earlier where they had runners at second and third with one out and couldn’t get the run home. And I suppose I should mention that the Jim Joyce thing was a non-issue, just as I expected. I’ve always enjoyed his strike call, and I don’t remember ever taking issue with his strike zone. I honestly do think he’s one of the better umpires in the league, despite the blown call heard ‘round the world. Not that I familiarize myself with all the umpires in baseball.

The series continues with Max Scherzer taking the hill for the Tigers. He hasn’t fared much better than Galarraga in terms of getting wins recently, despite being one of the best pitchers in baseball since the All-Star Break. He’s got a 1.98 earned run average in that span, but the Tigers are only 4-6 in his starts. He’s coming off two consecutive no-decisions in which the Tigers have lost the game. He wasn’t as sharp as he has been in his last start, where he gave up four runs to the White Sox, but he lasted into the eighth inning. He’s beaten the Orioles already once this year, but as I’ve mentioned, the Orioles have been playing much better recently. Their starter tonight is an example of that. Jeremy Guthrie has pitched almost as well as Scherzer in the second half, to the tune of a 2.10 ERA. And so we’ve got two hot pitchers opposing each other. Something’s gotta give.

Another Speedy Victory

Photo: AP

The Tigers were very obliging in winning this game before I had to go to work. Rick Porcello was once again very good, making it two good starts in a row against a team that had previously beat him up. During the postgame interview, Leyland seemed to think that Porcello had lucked out a little, in that he left some balls up but for the most part the White Sox hitters swung through them or popped them up or whatever (I suppose that makes up for him getting blooped to death against Kansas City). The only damage to him came from an Alex Rios 2-run homer and a series of wild pitches or passed balls (not sure what the ruling was) that scored Paul Konerko. And apparently Jose Valverde was unavailable with elbow soreness (and I know Jason Beck has said that’s a recent thing, but I still wonder), so Ryan Perry got the save.

For the second game in a row, the Tigers managed to score a respectable number of runs without the help of Miguel Cabrera. The stars of the show were Johnny Damon, Will Rhymes, and Jhonny Peralta. Johnny Damon had four hits, Will Rhymes had three hits, and Jhonny Peralta had two RBIs. Peralta’s name has been popping up a lot in the discussion for next year recently. Most of the online Tiger fans (and I’m not talking about those morons on Facebook or MLive comment section) don’t seem to be all that enthusiastic about him. I’m actually not sure what I think of him. Once he moved back to shortstop, I was expecting a redux of Edgar Renteria, but it really hasn’t been like that. He doesn’t have the greatest range in the world, but he’s made nearly all the plays and Brandon Inge makes up for the range issue. Whether he’s the best man for the job next year probably depends on what shortstops are available in the offseason, although I have grown somewhat trade-weary. Therefore, at this point, I am undecided.

So as it turns out, the Tigers were a hanging slider away from sweeping this series, but taking three of the four is nothing to sneeze at. Now comes a three-game series with the Orioles, who have been playing a lot better now that Buck Showalter is their manager (they are seven games over .500 since he took over; I’m not sure if he has anything to do with it or not, though). They just took two of three from the Yankees at Yankee Stadium, not an easy thing to do. The Tigers swept them back in July, but it was a really hard-fought sweep. Tonight’s starter for the Orioles, Kevin Millwood, pitched in that series and only lasted an inning (that game turned into an absolute slugfest on a VERY hot day). He’s currently got a 3-15 record with an ERA over five. Now, I’d definitely say he’s overpaid and was a little overrated in years past, but he’s not THAT bad. I’ve seen him pitch some games against the Tigers where he’s totally shut them down. I’ve also seen games where he got lit up by the Tigers. There doesn’t seem to be any in-between. Armando Galarraga also pitched in that series. It was a fairly decent start, but he was pitching through traffic for his entire outing before finally yielding a two-run homer to Nick Markakis. Prior to that, he had not had good numbers against the Orioles. He is coming off a shaky start in which he walked five but gave up only one run to the Royals (and that was only because a ball in the outfield was misplayed), although after the game he said he got lucky. It’s a distinct possibility that the command problems were related to elbow soreness and stiffness he was experiencing. He says his elbow feels fine now, and I hope he’s being honest (after all, he hid an elbow injury for a significant portion of last season), because he’d pitched very well in the previous three starts and I want him to finish the season strong in order to have a fighting chance at being in next year’s rotation. He’s not going to get that many chances to prove himself, though. Leyland has already announced that because of the two off-days next week, Galarraga’s next start after this one will be skipped (although I have not seen the specific reasoning; it could be from injury concern or it could be the “skip the fifth starter if you can” mentality). Not surprisingly, I’m not happy about this, for two reasons. One, I like watching Galarraga pitch. Two, I have missed Verlander’s last two starts due to work. I will miss his start on Sunday due to work. And now, thanks to skipping Galarraga, work will cause me to miss the start after that one as well. That will make FOUR consecutive Verlander starts I won’t see. That’s a long time to be deprived of Justin Verlander. Don’t get me wrong, I like Porcello and Scherzer (Bonderman I root for because he’s a Tiger, but that’s about it), but it gets old seeing only them over and over at the expense of two pitchers that I like better. But I suppose that’s something to complain about later. And in case you wanted some more intrigue, well, Jim Joyce will be the home plate umpire tonight. The media has certainly taken this story and run away with it (I saw one Free Press headline that made it sound like Galarraga and Joyce were members of a band on a reunion tour). Jim Joyce has been quoted as saying he’s glad he’s scheduled to work home plate and not first base. Galarraga has said it’s no big deal. And yet tonight’s game has kind of spurred a retrospective of sorts. Hopefully this one has a positive outcome.

Now That's Making Quick Work of It

Photo: AP

I can honestly say that was one of Jeremy Bonderman’s best performances this season. And it was certain one of the quickest of his entire career. That game absolutely flew by. I do believe it was the second-shortest game the Tigers have played this year (Who could forget the shortest?). The only White Sox batter who really did any damage to him was Omar Vizquel (who is 168 years old, according to Ryan Field). Other than that, he made it look effortless, really. It was the type of performance one has come to expect from Justin Verlander or Max Scherzer, really. I’m still not all that enthusiastic about re-signing him, but if Bonderman can pitch like that for the rest of the season, I’d certainly appreciate it.

The offense didn’t have Miguel Cabrera, but luckily, they didn’t need him. The only Tiger with more than one hit was Ryan Raburn, but the others made their hits count. Brandon Inge hit a two-run single with the bases loaded to give the Tigers the lead, and Alex Avila hit a two-run double in the same inning to break it open. Casper Wells added an insurance run with an infield single in the following inning. It’s definitely not a lineup I’d like to have out there long-term, but it came through for one night, at least.

The series concludes today with Rick Porcello on the mound for the Tigers. He got nickel-and-dimed a bit by the Royals in his last start (as the cliché goes), but did a decent job. The White Sox have been his own personal nemesis until the last time he faced them, when he pitched very, very well but came away with a no-decision (The Tigers did win that game, though). The White Sox are starting Gavin Floyd, who has also pitched very, very well this year and usually pitches extremely well against the Tigers. Despite that, there are three Tigers with really good numbers against him. Ryan Raburn is 10-for-25 (.400) with two doubles, Jhonny Peralta is 8-for-21 (.381) with two doubles and two home runs, and Johnny Damon is 6-for-11 (.545) with a double and a home run. With numbers like that, it’s amazing that Gavin Floyd has shut down the Tigers like he has (granted, the last time they faced him, it was back in June, Peralta wasn’t a Tiger yet, and Ryan Raburn hadn’t started hitting). Miguel Cabrera is still out of the lineup (no further update as of yet), but if it’s any consolation, his numbers against Floyd are downright dismal (6-for-29, only good enough for a .207 average, though three of those hits were doubles). Yeah, I know it’s not much of a consolation, but I thought I’d throw that out there anyways.

In Case You Forgot, Justin Verlander is Awesome

Photo: AP

I’m not going to be able to do this post justice because the game was in the bottom of the seventh by the time I got home and an early wakeup this morning meant that I did not have time to watch the archive. That means I missed Justin Verlander’s entire outing, but by the sounds of things, there was a lot to like about it. Verlander said he finally found his curveball for the first time all season (a bit surprising, considering that even though he hasn’t been quite as lights-out as he was last year, he’s still had a pretty good season). I’ve mentioned (not on here) that Verlander has kind of flown under the radar recently. Most of the media attention has been focused on the other four in the rotation (for various reasons), especially Scherzer and Porcello. If he pitches strong down the stretch, Verlander will become a main attraction again, as well he should be.

The offense, meanwhile, didn’t so much get to Freddy Garcia as they took advantage of some sort of injury. Johnny Damon hit a two-run homer off Garcia to give the Tigers an early lead, and then once Garcia was out, they feasted on some of the White Sox’s September call-ups (otherwise known as Charlotte Knights). I know Don Kelly is far from the ideal candidate to bat behind Miguel Cabrera, but he’s come through quite well so far. Granted, at this point they don’t have an “ideal candidate” (they don’t have Miguel Cabrera either right now, but I’ll talk about that later), so they might as well just stick the hottest hand behind him and see what happens. Jhonny Peralta had a big night, breaking the game open with a bases-clearing double. And Brandon Inge capped off the scoring with a long three-run homer in the bottom of the eighth.

Tonight marks game three in this series. Jeremy Bonderman started off very shaky in his last start, but then found a way to stay in for 7.1 innings, and actually left in a position to win before the bullpen gave up the tying run. He got lit up the last time he faced the White Sox, giving up two home runs and six runs overall. He’ll be opposed by John Danks, who is pitching on short rest and handcuffed the Red Sox in his last start. The Tigers will be without the services of Miguel Cabrera tonight and probably tomorrow. After that, it’s a crapshoot. The shoulder/biceps tendinitis is still bothering him. I wonder when they reach the point where they’ll do an MRI just for precautionary measures (after all, he is their highest-paid player). It drives me crazy when I can’t offer an informed opinion on health matters. Back when Cabrera had the kidney infection, I could tell you with about 95% certainty that he’d be on Cipro or Levaquin for two weeks. Unfortunately, they don’t teach a lot of orthopedics in pharmacy school, so I couldn’t even tell you if a cortisone shot would help (although a corticosteroid does help relieve inflammation, but I know there’s a whole bunch of MLB policies surrounding stuff like that). At this point, both Cabrera and Leyland seem more concerned with the shoulder impeding his ability to swing the bat the way he wants to than with the injury itself. I will tell you this, though: If he has to miss more than a couple games, you can kiss any remote chance of a miracle comeback goodbye. It goes without saying that Cabrera is the lifeblood of this offense (and that’s going to be true next year as well, no matter who they sign or trade for). Granted, he might not be missed that much tonight, as his career numbers against Danks are only so-so (.250 average). In fact, the only Tiger not on the DL who has good numbers against Danks is Gerald Laird (3-for-6 with a double). Unfortunately, it seems his back still is keeping him out, because Alex Avila is starting for the third straight day. I kind of wonder why Max St. Pierre isn’t getting the start against the lefty. As a matter of fact, there are four lefties in Leyland’s lineup tonight, some in place of available right-handed bats. However, a quick look at Danks’s splits may reveal why. Righties have only hit .206 against him, while lefties have hit .285 (now that I think about it, I seem to remember Danks featuring a really good changeup, which may explain the counterintuitive numbers).