Random Thoughts

This will probably be the last post I write before I head to Lakeland on Saturday, unless there’s some big news that happens between now and then. For now, I just have some random thoughts to share:

• As far as Miguel Cabrera is concerned, the main priority should be his well-being as a person, and with that in mind, I sincerely hope that the treatment program he’s been recommended is truly the best for him and gives him the greatest chance of overcoming this problem. However, I won’t lie. It’s great seeing pictures of him back in game action.
• I wasn’t able to listen to yesterday’s game, but I’m told that the Astros radio broadcasters observed that there were fans booing Cabrera during his at-bats. Ignoring the fact that this is a tacky thing to do from a conscience standpoint, booing him doesn’t even make sense from a completely selfish standpoint. Even if all you were concerned about was the Tigers winning games, what is booing going to accomplish at this juncture? The season hasn’t even started yet. Nothing he’s done has hurt the team’s chances at anything. This is also puzzling because previous reports had stated that fans were treating him no better or worse than normal. I’ll be able to get this cleared up once I’m in Lakeland.
• Gee, the media sure doesn’t seem to be that interested in the news of Austin Kearns and Coco Crisp being arrested for DUI.
• Joel Zumaya will be out a couple of days after tearing scar tissue in his elbow. Not surprisingly, this news has caused a strange mix of panic and gallows humor-type jokes among the Tiger fans. I’ve seen enough stories about other players’ surgeries to know that scar tissue tearing is pretty much a normal part of the healing process. The only reason anyone’s making a big deal of it is because it’s Joel Zumaya. People panic if he so much as sneezes. 
• And last but certainly not least: While I’m in Lakeland, I will be blogging here (obviously), but I will also be writing for Allison Hagen’s blog, No Run Support. If you don’t read her site already, you should. 
  

Arbitration Matters and Latin Links

It took them a while, but the Tigers finally announced the corresponding move to make room for Victor Martinez on the roster by designating Zach Miner for assignment. Miner is recovering from Tommy John surgery, and the DFA automatically makes him a free agent, but the Tigers are interested in bringing him back on a minor league deal (though I think the assertion that he’d compete for a bullpen spot or perhaps try to crack the starting rotation is a bit optimistic, considering that it usually takes about a year to recover from Tommy John surgery and he just had his in late May). I don’t really dislike Miner (though Jim Leyland’s plans to use him out of the bullpen to get double plays never really seemed to work out the way they were supposed to), but right now I’ve gotten myself into “think of the alternative” mode, so at this point, the DFA doesn’t really bother me. Besides, he was a prime non-tender candidate anyways. Speaking of which, that deadline is Thursday, and by my count, there are three other Tigers who are arbitration-eligible. Since Ryan Raburn is essentially the left fielder right now, I expect that to be uneventful, and as I said before, they’d be foolish to not tender a contract to Armando Galarraga. That leaves Joel Zumaya as a possible non-tender candidate because of the injuries, but Jason Beck has said that the Tigers will probably offer him a contract, and they should, because when he’s healthy, Zumaya can be very effective, and he won’t be that expensive. There’s certainly room in the payroll for him.

And now I have some links for you concerning a few Latin American players:

• Thanks to some internet browsing, I have found a couple websites that stream live television broadcasts of Venezuelan baseball. I was watching one such game a couple days ago and it just so happened that Carlos Guillen was a guest in the broadcast booth and they held about a 10-minute interview with him. I was able to make an audio recording of part of the interview, so you can have at it. The sound quality’s not great (especially since this was happening during a game, so you hear cheering in the background as one team was in the middle of scoring a bunch of runs), and it’s entirely in Spanish. Unfortunately, I can’t translate much of it (He gets asked about Victor Martinez, the high number of Venezuelans on the Tigers, and the perfect game, among other things).
• The presentation of the Luis Aparicio Award took place last Thursday (The article is in Spanish, but at least I could understand most of it). The award went to Carlos Gonzalez of the Colorado Rockies, but Armando Galarraga received an honorable mention for the perfect game and his actions following it. He was unable to attend the award ceremony because he’s in Texas right now (or at least he was as of Thursday), but someone managed to get an interview with him (which I can provide a translation for, if you guys want me to).
• Galarraga was also a runner-up for Sports Illustrated’s Sportsman of the Year for 2010 (which was given to Drew Brees). Joe Posnanski wrote the nomination article about him and Pat Forde also tweeted his support.
• Via former Mud Hen Scot Drucker, we’ve learned that 2006 ALCS Game 2 hero Alexis Gomez was injured in a car accident in the Dominican Republic. We in the Tigers community all hope for the best. 
• And finally, happy 39^th birthday to former Tiger Pudge Rodriguez. And to no one’s surprise, he’s got no plans to retire any time soon (link in Spanish).

Doesn't Feel Like It

Photo: Reuters

The Tigers have a knack for doing what you want in ways that leave you feeling disappointed about it. If they go on a six-game road trip, you’d be thrilled if they finish .500 on the road trip, but not if they sweep the first team and get swept by the second (they’ve certainly done that before). Armando Galarraga threw a perfect game, but he’ll never be officially recognized for it, and God knows I didn’t feel very good about it after the last out was made and I’m pretty sure most of you felt the same way. But no one got hurt in that game. Now the Tigers have finally gotten back into first place, but at the price of losing Joel Zumaya. I initially thought he might have somehow broken his arm on the pitch to Delmon Young. I only know of one instance where a guy broke his arm mid-pitch, and other news reports on this story has reminded me that the guy’s name was Dave Dravecky. However, the reason behind Dravecky’s injury was that he had cancer that was weakening the bone structure and he eventually had to have his arm amputated (Dravecky now works as a motivational speaker and I know this because I originally learned of the story from a video our church pastor showed us in Sunday School many years ago). Thankfully, it does not appear that this is Zumaya’s problem. At this point, all we know is that he had an MRI this morning, Gerald Laird heard a pop all the way from behind the plate, the Tigers are describing it as an elbow injury, and Zumaya’s been placed on the DL (which should surprise no one). This makes speculation dangerous (especially since if I do so, we’ll hear something definitive about five minutes after I publish this post), but in general, news of an elbow injury is generally preferable to a shoulder injury because elbows seem easier to fix. The rehab is often lengthy, but guys usually make a full recovery. Tommy John surgery has been floated around a lot in this case, although most cases I know of don’t involve the ligament tearing that suddenly and that dramatically. At the same time, I wonder if maybe this injury wasn’t as sudden of an onset as it seems. I’ve pointed out at least twice that Zumaya had had some control problems recently and that in the past, that has been a warning sign of injury. Perhaps he was already pitching in discomfort or minor pain and that pitch to Delmon Young caused something that was already weakened to snap. But until the Tigers announce something more specific, we have to assume that Zumaya will at least be gone for the rest of the season, and that has some not very favorable implications on the bullpen. We saw in 2007 the type of negative effect that losing your setup men can have. For the time being, Casey Fien, fresh off from playing Ring Around the Waiver Wire in spring training, has been called up, but I’m not sure what they intend for his role to be. Ryan Perry is not that far off from coming off the DL, and if he can return to what he was doing in April and early May, that would be a huge boost. If he can’t, then I don’t know what the next move is.

 There are still other things to talk about with this game. That was the biggest offensive outburst against Francisco Liriano that I’ve ever seen the Tigers have. Granted, most of it was in the first inning when the first six batters reached base safely, and Liriano proceeded to pitch a lot deeper into the game than it looked like he was going to, but the Tigers did manage to tack on a couple of important insurance runs later in the game. And a lot of those were bunts and infield singles (turning the tables on the Twins, for once). All in all, Inge was the only one never to join in on the fun (someone always goes 0-for in these types of games). At the same time, I do wonder when people will get off Laird’s case. He’s been getting hits with a lot more regularity recently, same as Avila. I should note that Magglio was scratched late, partially because of the oblique issue and partially because he was sick. Keep him away from the other Tigers.

And so, high price or no, the Tigers have themselves their first win at Target Field. Thanks to a recent AT&T Trivia Question (I miss the AFLAC duck), I know that in the span of a week, the Tigers have narrowed down the list of ballparks that they’ve never won in from five to three. The three remaining ballparks are New Yankee Stadium, Nationals Ballpark, and Great American Ballpark (and those last two are understandable because the Tigers haven’t played there; yes, it’s really surprising that they’ve never been to Great American Ballpark because it’s been around for about 7 or 8 years now). Now it’s time to get win #2 at Target Field. They’ll be facing Nick Blackburn, who has struggled so much this month that his ERA has gone from 4.28 to 6.10. He did not pitch well on the Twins’ last road trip. However, he has pitched well this year at home, and his career against the Tigers kind of reflects this. For the most part, they’ve hit him real hard at Comerica Park, but in Minnesota, they’ve done next to nothing against him. They did face him this earlier this year at Target Field. Blackburn got a complete game win against them, but not in the way he imagined. He went into the ninth inning leading 3-2 when Brennan Boesch hit a mammoth solo home run against him which tied the score. Blackburn stayed in the game and got out of the inning (only because Alex Avila had rounded third base too far when Santiago hit an infield single), and got the win when Ryan Perry gave up a triple and a wild pitch in the bottom of the ninth (That was the night Ernie Harwell died). On the flipside, however, Armando Galarraga has his own issues with the Twins. Even in his good rookie season they got to him early and often (his best performance resulted in a 3-2 loss, and even in that game he walked five). He did beat them last August, but it wasn’t easy and the Tigers had to absolutely nurse him through five innings just so he’d qualify. At this point, I wonder how much of it is mental, because he knows how he’s struggled against them. Looking at the individual numbers, however, I’ve noticed that the bulk of the damage has come largely from only two batters: Denard Span and Joe Mauer (both of whom have punished many a pitcher). Span is 6-13 (.462) with a double, while Mauer is 8-17 (.471) with a double, two home runs, and a whopping ten RBIs. Other Twins (Morneau, Kubel, and Young) have homered off Galarraga, but they haven’t done as much damage in terms of average (Morneau’s home run was a grand slam, though). Somehow Galarraga’s gotta figure out how to stay confident and not overthink things when he’s on the mound. Making things more complicated is that since Valverde had to record a five-out save last night, Leyland has said that he will absolutely not be available tonight, so the Tigers are without their setup man AND their closer.

UPDATE: The diagnosis for Zumaya has been announced (and it was actually announced before I published this, but I didn’t feel like changing what I already typed). He has a non-displaced fracture of the olecranon (basically, the tip of the elbow). He is done for the season, but there hasn’t been word on what happens after that. Since it’s a non-displaced fracture, he might not need surgery this time. Unfortunately, they don’t teach a lot of orthopedics in pharmacy school, but from what I’ve read, the fracture itself takes about 12 weeks to heal, but most of the information about how long it takes to return to full strength (I’ve read everything from 4 months to over a year) seems to revolve around patients who have surgery, so that’s still unclear.

Did Atlanta Move to the West Coast When I Wasn't Looking?

More on crappy strike calls in a moment, but first I gotta talk about the pitching (surprisingly, the game was still going on when I got home, but they were in the ninth inning). From what I hear, Max Scherzer did pretty well, although he had some issues with walks near the end of his outing. Walks victimized Joel Zumaya even more (and again, I point out that wildness has been a warning sign of injury in Zumaya’s past), but all I heard from Jim Price the last two days is that Chipper Jones has no batspeed. If that’s true, how was he able to catch up to 100 MPH and launch it? Talk about lack of offense all you want, but once the setup men come in and you have a one-run lead, they’ve gotta protect it, whether the score is 1-0, 3-2, 5-4, 9-8, or 16-15. There’s no such thing as run support for relievers. If you’re eighth inning guy needs a 3-run cushion to pitch effectively, then he shouldn’t be pitching the eighth inning (and I don’t mean that as a knock on Zumaya at all). The Braves somehow got an insurance run in the eighth, which turned out to be big. The offense finally started to rally in the ninth, starting with a long home run by Cabrera. Then the walkathon followed. Everyone keeps complaining that those were gifts and that the Tigers should’ve hit more, but at least give Brandon Inge some credit. That was an epic at-bat, one of the best I’ve ever seen from him. He earned that walk. The walks to Worth and Laird were probably gifts, but the called third strike to Johnny Damon was a gift from the umpire to the Braves. I know it’s probably because I’m a Tigers fan and I watch all their games, but it seems like the Tigers get victimized by blatantly bad calls more than any other team (and I’m not talking about borderline strike/ball calls or bang-bang plays where it could’ve gone either way, but the replay shows that the guy was technically out/safe, and no, the Jim Joyce call is NOT included in that category). They say it all evens out, but I’ve yet to see a blatantly bad call go in the Tigers’ favor. Maybe that Denard Span call, but as I said at the time, Span had his back turned to the umpire, so I’m not sure there was a good way to see that he had caught it.

And so it is time to turn to Justin Verlander to avoid the sweep. He didn’t have it in his last start against the Mets. He’s faced the Braves once before and beat them, with their only run coming on a Chipper Jones solo shot. The Braves will counter with hard-thrower Tommy Hanson, who was lit up even worse than Verlander in his last start, giving up nine earned runs in 3 and two-thirds innings. However, Hanson, like Verlander, is a much better pitcher than that. The only Tiger he’s faced before is Max Scherzer, which isn’t a big help. Maggs is supposed to get the day off today as well, so things get a little tougher for the offense. And I’ll be at work, with no chance of seeing any of this game. Boo again.

The Dancing Knuckler

Somewhat short post today (again), because I didn’t see a lot of this game and I’ve got an exam and work coming up today. I suppose Jeremy Bonderman pitched all right, but he could not get Jose Reyes out. It was a rare night where I did have internet access at work, but Yahoo messed up and never indicated that Joel Zumaya was in the game (It also got stuck after the wild pitch, which it said was on the exact same play as the preceding single, and at that point the pharmacy closed so I just went home). When I got to the car, the first thing I heard was “3-2 pitch way out of the strike zone, and you’ve got to believe that’ll be the end of his night,” and I still believed Bonderman was in there. Zumaya had not had a real rough outing up to this point, so the only concern I have is that in years past, control problems have been an indication that he was hiding an injury. And I swear Dan Dickerson later said something about someone (Ike Davis, I think), getting a bunt single on an 0-2 pitch, but I have not been able to verify this. Meanwhile, as I said yesterday, if the knuckleball is working, the hitters are in for a rough night. And with what is now a 6-0 record and an ERA in the low twos, R.A. Dickey’s had it working for a while now. The Tigers are far from his only victim. And this random thought has occurred to me: It’s been a full two weeks since the batting order’s been “normal.” The last time the Tigers had their top four hitters in their typical spots was the final game in Kansas City. Magglio then missed the next six games, and after he came back, Austin Jackson was out. Now Austin Jackson is back, but they’re in National League ballparks and therefore someone gets squeezed out of the outfield every night. And Miguel Cabrera has not hit well in that span. Still, association does not imply causality, but I’m going to have to wait until the lineup is intact before I can figure out if that’s a coincidence or not.

And so the Tigers are in the position where they are trying to not get swept. And so far the only pitcher on their staff who has been capable of getting Mets hitters out without hemorrhaging runs is Enrique Gonzalez. This all adds up to quite a bit of pressure on Armando Galarraga. He had a rough outing in his last start, which was blamed on a combination of tentativeness and fatigue from the heat. Last I checked, it was supposed to be pretty warm in New York today. Galarraga has gotten a lot of attention from the New York media, which seems to have surprised him (It didn’t surprise me; he’s probably going to get extra attention just about every time the Tigers go somewhere they haven’t been this year, so he better get used to it). At any rate, he’s going to have to figure out how to shut down the Mets, because he is in need of a bounceback start and his next opponent will be much tougher. I’m not sure what he’s gonna do against Reyes, who is hitting just about everyone right now, but if he doesn’t have any better luck than his teammates, then it’ll be imperative for him to shut down the right-handed hitters in the lineup (namely, David Wright). Obviously, he’s never faced the Mets before, but he has a brief history with two of their hitters. Jason Bay is 0-2, and Rod Barajas is 1-2, with that one hit being a home run (that I don’t remember). The Tiger hitters (and Galarraga, for that matter), will face lefty Hisanori Takahashi (Wow, there are a lot of syllables in the starting pitcher matchup). He started the year in the bullpen, struggled, was moved to the rotation once John Maine was injured (I think), and has excelled ever since. Obviously, since this is his first year stateside, none of the Tigers have faced him before. And I’ll give you some Mood Music to rally around tonight (I stupidly thought this was a day game and switched shifts with someone, only to find out this was a night game).

Not a Good One to Miss?

Photo: AP

Short post, because I did not see this game at all. It looks like it was an intense pitching duel for a while there. Justin Verlander seemed to be on his game for most of the night. He didn’t strike out many, but from all accounts, the outs he got were pretty routine (with a nice play by Cabrera mixed in). Things got quite dicey there in the eighth, with Verlander giving up two hits to start the inning, Zumaya leaving with a torn callous (not serious; he’s even expected to be available today), and Phil Coke giving up an RBI single. Bringing your closer in during the eighth inning tends to lead to disaster, but they averted it this time, as Valverde pretty much slammed the door. Meanwhile, for most of the night the Tigers could do nothing with Luke Hochevar. Then Miguel Cabrera launched a massive solo shot, as he is wont to do. After that, Guillen and Inge teamed up to drive in some big insurance runs against the KC bullpen.

Today wraps up this three game series which I have seen very little of. Jeremy Bonderman will toe the slab for the Tigers. He took the loss in his last start against the Indians but pitched decently, giving up three runs in eight innings. He has not faced the Royals this year. He’ll be opposed by Brian Bannister, who has handcuffed the Tigers over the past few years and who has pitched really well in day games (one of those splits that probably does not mean a whole lot). Jim Leyland has promised more playing time to Alex Avila, which I think was the plan ever since before spring training started (similar to how they phased out Pudge a couple years ago), but at least I got the seal of approval on Avila’s defense before that plan was implemented. At any rate, this game will start sometime while I’m driving back home, so at some point I will be able to pick it up on radio.

Neftali Feliz? No Problem

Photo: AP

I wanted a split, and a split is what I got. It sure took a power display and a roller-coaster ride to get there. For a while there it looked like Jeremy Bonderman was finally going to be the one to pitch some good innings, maybe even get into the eighth. Then something happened with two outs in the sixth and I don’t know what. He left after 5.2 innings with only 74 pitches thrown, but not being able to get that last hitter. Joel Zumaya finally bent, although it was through hits, not walks, and the runs scored when Phil Coke was on the mound. Coke ended up vulturing the win after pitching a scoreless bottom of the eighth, and Valverde got the save rather easily (though perhaps it’s good they’re leaving when they are; Josh Hamilton is showing signs of coming around).

Offensively, this game started the way the previous game did: A lot of runs early and then nothing in the middle innings. Until Brandon Inge hit a massive 2-run homer, that is. His average had been steadily going down on this road trip, and I was beginning to wonder if he was pressing, since he hadn’t homered yet. Maybe he had been, because after that home run, he laced a double down to left that almost got out, and then homered again in his last at-bat. The big hero was Miguel Cabrera again, who homered off Neftali Feliz right before Inge did. For all the (probably deserved) hype about Feliz and how dominant he is, the Tigers don’t seem to have that big a problem with him (of course, Ramon Santiago gave all the Tigers a good long look at all the pitches Feliz throws).

And after a not-great-but-satisfactory road trip, it’s time to don the home whites for a little while. I saw so little of the last homestand that to me it’s almost like they’ve been on the road for this entire season. And while the Tigers got into Detroit sometime in the wee hours of this morning, the Twins arrived yesterday and are well-rested and ready to go. Right now they are on pace to win 110 games. That’s unsustainable, isn’t it? I was right that they wouldn’t miss Joe Nathan that much. They could’ve made Nick Punto the closer and he’d magically rack up 60 saves this year. I still can’t help but feel they are overachieving, particularly in terms of their starting pitching, but in the last few days they have been winning games the way I expected them to (outslugging their opponent as opposed to their pitchers spinning gems). With that in mind, however, their offense is plenty dangerous, and probably the best one the Tigers will have seen thus far (League-leading Kansas City be damned). Which is unfortunate, because Justin Verlander needs a good start to rest the bullpen (and while he’s had history on his side thus far and I believe in him all day every day, one more bad start might get more than a few people whispering). He did get sent home a day early, so he should be well-rested, but he said that he felt “out of whack” in his last side session, and the Twins have several hitters who have mashed against him (Mauer, Morneau, Kubel, and Span all hit him well over .300; Jim Thome’s only 10-for-41 but he’s hit seven homers off Verlander, so odds are he’ll be their DH tonight).  On the flipside, I don’t remember back when Francisco Liriano was an electrifying Rookie of the Year candidate. He’s apparently been pitching real well this year, but the Tigers have never done well against him, so it probably doesn’t matter if his ERA is 2 or 102. Maggs, Cabrera, and Raburn have hit him pretty well (each with at least one home run); the rest of the Tigers have not (Inge does have a homer off him, for what it’s worth). My special request is that the Tigers NOT lose 8-6. Your Mood Music for tonight: “Hanging by a Moment” by Lifehouse. Because I’m sitting in a restaurant right now and that’s what they just played on the radio.  

Seay It Isn't So!

While I maintain that both Justin Verlander and Edwin Jackson could have pitched better at Yankee Stadium, Armando Galarraga truly deserved better. For one thing, you can’t expect him to be overpowering and dominant the way Verlander and Jackson are capable of being, so with last night, you could not have asked for more than what he did. For another thing, he was downright masterful, and for all intents and purposes, he shut out the Mariners (I know he ended up being charged with one run through some quirky rule about runners who are erased on FCs, but he wasn’t in the game when that happened). For some reason, the bullpen hates Galarraga (They did the exact same thing to him in his start against the Mariners last year. Galarraga left the game with a 2-1 lead, only to watch Fernando Rodney give up a two-run homer to Jeff Clement in the bottom of the eighth). The offense is taking a lot of flak for only scoring one run, but it’s hard to draw any conclusions from that because Felix Hernandez is the sort of pitcher who would hold just about any team to one run (or fewer). What it boils down to is that it was a one-run game. It doesn’t matter if the score is 1-0, 2-1, 3-2, 5-4, 9-8, or 16-15, the relief corps has a job to do, and they didn’t do it. If the score had been 9-8, nobody would be complaining about the offense when Bobby Seay gave up the home run. They’d be complaining about Bobby Seay. I don’t hold it against him. He just picked an inconvenient time to throw a hanging slider to a guy who finds the seats with regularity.

A couple of injury updates for you: First, Joel Zumaya apparently first started feeling pain in his shoulder about four weeks ago, “but it wasn’t major and he could still throw 100 MPH.” Um, four weeks ago is about the time he started to majorly struggle. Coincidence? I think not. Don’t pitch hurt. Also, we got a little more detail about Brandon Inge’s knee problems (perhaps a little more detail than we wanted). Inge and Kevin Rand tell the story a bit differently, but the gist of it is that there are tears in both tendons (moreso in the left) and that a short stint on the DL probably wouldn’t be enough to relieve the pain, so Inge is determined to keep playing. I’m okay with this, as long as: A) He can’t do any further damage to the tendons, and B) Both his offense and defense remain reasonably high.

Today is the rubber match in this series. The Tigers will face another pitcher who is having a great year in Jarrod Washburn. The lefty has an earned run average that is under 3.00. However, the Tigers have won seven straight games against him. Some of those have been pitching-dominant, low-scoring affairs. More recent meetings have resulted in the Tigers scoring a bunch of runs against him. Something’s gonna give. He’s apparently a sinkerball pitcher, so double plays are a concern (especially since the “righty” lineup is slower than the “lefty” lineup). Luke French is coming off a decent start against the Yankees in which he only gave up two runs (one earned) over six innings (He could conceivably have shut them out if not for some defensive miscues). Brandon Inge is back in the lineup, and Jim Leyland finally remembered that he DOES have two catchers on the team, because Dusty Ryan gets a rare start (though I’m guessing he’ll start one of the games of the doubleheader tomorrow, likely the second game).

[Cutsey Pun Headline Deleted]

Considering that the Tigers are in New York, the home of Broadway, I had the perfect pun all set and ready to go, but considering the latest news on Zumaya, it would be inappropriate for me to use it. Zumaya said he felt something pop in his shoulder while pitching last night, and now he’s on his way back to Detroit for an MRI. Here we go again. Now, he says the pop happened when he threw ball four to Swisher, so it was late in the inning, long after he gave up the home run to Teixiera, but I can’t help but wonder if there were any warning signs at all (which brings me back to the old adage of not pitching hurt). The generalized feeling on the blogosphere is that considering all the complaining, criticism, and declaration that Zumaya could never be an effective pitcher again, no one seriously wanted this to happen. For what it’s worth, Zoom says the pain is in a different part of his shoulder from where the stress fracture was. At this point all we can do is hope this isn’t as bad as it sounds. As far as the rest of the game in a nutshell, well, Luke French kind of got in and out of trouble all night, but I suppose he pitched effectively enough. The Tigers had ten hits but only three runs, which isn’t very efficient. Phil Hughes just made them look bad, and I don’t like that. On a somewhat lighter note, I think I may have found the root cause of the problem:


Where Dick Cheney goes, bad things tend to follow.

I’m writing this post now instead of when I get back from work because it’s a freakin’ day game today and it’ll probably be two-thirds of the way over before I get home. And it’s a battle of aces. The last time Justin Verlander faced the Yankees, it started off that dominant stretch that he went through in May and early June. It would be so totally awesome if this start could set off another dominant stretch for him. He’s been a little more human as of late, but he is coming off a really good start against the Indians. CC Sabathia has already lost to the Tigers once this year but pitched well, and he tends to pitch really well in the second half. He’s coming off a somewhat rough start against the Angels. Hopefully we’ll get news on Zumaya sometime today (and hopefully it’s good news).

Run Support is a Beautiful Thing

Photo: AP

(Semi) quick post today, as I just got home from work and I don’t have a lot of time to elaborate on the finer points of last night. Suffice it to say, Edwin Jackson pitched superbly. He may have fallen behind hitters a little bit more than I’m comfortable with, but it doesn’t really show up in the boxscore, and he’ll be going into the All-Star Break on a high note. And while I can’t say the offense was rolling, they did get three runs for him early, which is more than they usually do. Ironically, the big hit was a two-run single off the bat of lefty Josh Anderson (who was thrown out trying to advance to second on the throw; while I appreciate his aggression on the bases, it has gotten him into trouble recently). By the way, is it just me, or is Brandon Inge maybe caught in a bit of a cold snap? He had an important base hit early last night, but didn’t really do much after that. And that’s pretty much how he’s been on the entire homestand. The Marcus Thames home run in the eighth inning was both a blessing and a curse, because it provided much-desired insurance, but also ensured that Fernando Rodney would not pitch well. Why couldn’t Brandon Lyon pitch the ninth and not Rodney? I don’t remember Leyland ever using Todd Jones in this many non-save situations before. Finally, a couple injury notes: Zumaya was taken out of the game in the eighth inning with a bloody thumb. There seems to be some confusion as to whether it’s a cut or a blister, but I know I saw him messing with his thumb while he was warming up in the bullpen, so it’s something he knew about when he took the mound. Also, some of us have observed that Cabrera has slowed down at the plate over the past week to ten days. Could he be banged up as well? There were a couple shots of him in the dugout last night talking to Leyland and Kevin Rand, and they seemed to be looking at his knee. If that’s the case, hopefully the time off during the All-Star Break will do him some good.

But Edwin Jackson’s fine performance was definitely not the highlight of baseball last night. Back when I did my season preview, I made the “gut feeling” prediction that there would be one no-hitter this year, and it would be in the National League. Whether I was right about there only being one remains to be seen (though if one of the Tigers’ pitchers wants to throw one, I’ll gladly be wrong), but I was correct about the league. Congratulations to Jonathan Sanchez of the San Francisco Giants. I watched the ninth inning, and it sure was exciting. His only baserunner reached on an error in the eighth (If I was Juan Uribe, I would make myself scarce for some time). The Tigers saw him last year in Interleague play, and fittingly enough, it took them until the fifth or sixth inning to get their first hit. I also remember Ryan Raburn hit a pinch-hit home run that either tied the game or put the Tigers ahead (It was a game that the Tigers eventually won). But it’s a great redemption-type story. Sanchez is a very talented lefty, but he was struggling this year to the point where he got sent down to the minors, and then called back up and put into the bullpen. He was only inserted back into the rotation because Randy Johnson is on the DL. I’d say he earned himself another start. And the great thing is that his dad had flown in from Puerto Rico to see his son, and it was the first time he ever saw him pitch in the majors in person. So good job, Jonathan Sanchez.

Tonight is the Negro Leagues Tribute Game in which the Detroit Stars host the Cleveland Buckeyes, and everyone wears those wacky, baggy throwback uniforms. The pitching matchup features Armando Galarraga against Carl Pavano. Those two faced off back in May, and it wasn’t pretty. For Galarraga, it touched off a long two months worth of struggles. He has shown signs of turning things around, first by gutting his way to a victory against the Cubs, then battling control problems to beat the A’s before a fantastic performance his last time out against the Royals, only to settle for a no-decision. This could be the telling start. Prior to his disastrous outing against them in May, Galarraga had pretty much dominated Cleveland, but the Indians are much more patient and have a much better offense than the Royals. I’m cautiously optimistic, but I am nervous nonetheless. Carl Pavano hasn’t been all that bad for the Tribe. He’s had some really good starts (including one against the Tigers in the aforementioned May game), and he’s been pretty good recently. I think the only reason his earned run average is so high is because when he does have a bad start, it’s a REALLY bad start. The Tigers have already lost one throwback uniform game. It’d sure be nice for them to win this one. By the way, this marks the first time since 2005 that Justin Verlander has NOT started the Negro Leagues game. I love Justin, but I was getting curious as to how silly the other starting pitchers look in those wacky Detroit Stars uniform.

Armando Deserves Better

I rather wanted this one to start with, and as the game went on, I wanted it more. But it was not to be. Armando Galarraga was pretty damn good. He walked the first batter of the game, but after DeJesus was caught stealing, he settled down and didn’t walk anyone else. His pitches looked very, very good. There were very few of those “bad” different-looking pitches. It was certainly a joy to watch. I’m not going to proclaim anything just yet, though. We’ll see how he does against Cleveland first, since the Indians are much more patient and have a better offense than the Royals (And with Porcello being skipped in the rotation, that means that Galarraga will have the “honor” of pitching wearing that baggy Detroit Stars uniform). And I know Leyland wanted to discuss the lack of offense rather than the ‘pen (dismissing it as “those things happen”), but what happened with Zumaya and Rodney was kind of irrelevant to the offense anyways, especially Zumaya. Even if the offense is going well, you’re still going to have a one-run lead at times, be it 1-0, 2-1, 5-4, 9-8, or 16-15. Zoom’s gotta find some way of protecting that lead (although when he does get burned, it’s usually either walks or bad pitch selection; this time it was a little of both). Rodney’s struggles in non-save situations are well-documented, so there’s no need to elaborate.

It’s tough to tell what to make of the offense. Placed within the context of what has been going on, it seems that the struggles continue. However, when you consider that it was a Gil Meche start, it’s par for the course, at least in my experience. It seems like anytime he pitches against the Tigers, Meche gives up a bunch of baserunners, but not a lot of runs. Whether that is the result of the Tigers being ineffective or Meche making a pitch when he absolutely has to, I don’t know. But this is definitely not the first time I’ve seen it happen. And the Tigers were definitely grinding out at-bats. Many of them saw seven or eight pitches, but they just didn’t come up with much. Leyland says the double play ball that Everett hit to close out the second was hit hard, but in the wrong place (obviously). In the sixth inning, Laird smoked a ball right to Mark Teahen to close out the inning and strand runners. However, a lot of those hard-hit outs came from the bottom of the order. The top really hasn’t done much in the past several days.

Tonight, it’s Justin Verlander against Bruce Chen. Justin is coming off a loss in Oakland in which he gave up two two-run homers. If he’s gonna rebound, Kansas City might be the team for him to do it against. Meanwhile, Chen has not won a game for the Royals yet, but his earned run average isn’t bad. There are some Tigers that have had some at-bats against him, but they haven’t come since, like, 2005, so they may as well be facing him for the first time. Which has presented some difficulties this year (For what it’s worth, however, the previously struggling Brett Anderson who stymied the Tigers in Oakland threw a complete game shutout against the Red Sox last night, so take from that what you will). With the lefty on the mound, Leyland’s loaded his lineup with righties (except Granderson). And while you’re watching the game, make sure you stay right near your computer and vote for Inge the entire time. He did take over the lead (briefly) last night, but Ian Kinsler passed him this morning, so Brandon needs your help. Your Mood Music for tonight: It’s Elvis night at Comerica Park, so I had to naturally come up with something of his. Given Verlander’s tendency to work quickly (hopefully, not too quickly), I settled on “A Little Less Conversation.” Besides, the Tigers’ offense could use “a little more bite and a little less bark, a little less fight and a little more spark,” so to speak. And if Verlander loses a close pitching duel (say, 1-0 or something like that), I’ve got a headline for tomorrow. Hopefully, I won’t have to use it.

Sleep Is Overrated

Photo: AP

When I got home from work, it was a little after 9:00 and it was the fifth inning (though I did know the score because I was able to follow the game at work), and though I’m not naïve enough to believe a 5-run lead is safe at the Metrodome, I didn’t really expect that I would be in store for four more hours and eleven more innings of baseball. And they were some of the most nerve-wracking innings I’ve ever sat through. I can’t give a lot of insight into Luke French’s performance, since I watched most of it on ESPN GameCast and only saw the tail end of his outing on TV. Leyland said he was rusty because he hadn’t pitched in 10 days, but I’m a little bit surprised he didn’t let French try to get the final out of the fifth to qualify for the win, even though there were a couple runners on. Meanwhile, can Zach Miner not pitch for the rest of this series? I don’t know why, but every time he’s taken the mound at the Metrodome this year, he has not pitched well at all. Also, why is it that the Tiger pitchers cannot throw strikes to Nick Punto? He has drawn a ridiculous amount of walks in the season series, and almost all the walks have led to Twins rallies. The guy’s hitting .210 and has almost no power. At any rate, the rest of the bullpen put up a valiant effort (especially Zumaya, who hopefully will suffer no ill effects), although Dolsi didn’t exactly wow me (nothing new there). It’s not like they had a choice, though. He was the last pitcher in the ‘pen, and they had Galarraga warming up. Now, on any given day, I prefer Galarraga to Dolsi immensely, but in this situation, I’m glad it didn’t come to that, because that would’ve totally screwed up the rotation (not to mention Galarraga’s struggles against the Twins). However, Freddy Dolsi’s gotta make a better effort to learn the signs. I could be wrong, but crossing up your catcher three or four times in three innings seems a tad bit excessive.

I missed the early offensive outburst (although the Laird home run happened just as I got in my car), so as they went through all those innings deadlocked and unable to do anything against the Twins’ bullpen, I couldn’t help but wonder if they might have chased Kevin (not Kyle) Slowey a bit too quickly. Still, seven runs should be enough to win. Every Tiger that appeared in the game (be it starting, pinch runner, or pinch hitter) got a hit at some point. Cabrera came closest to drawing the collar, as he only went 1-for-8 (that’ll tank your batting average). Miggy may not have had a sterling night at the plate, but it was Polanco who drew the most abuse. He struck out three times (exceptionally rare for him), and then fouled a ball off his manhood (I’m sure every male watching that just cringed). He had the last laugh though, as he delivered not one, but two RBI singles, one in the fourteenth and one in the sixteenth (R.A. Dickey gave up nine hits in three innings). It was a brief but rather ironic night for Magglio, who lined into a double play instead of grounding into one (He just can’t win, although part of that was the fault of Raburn and some bad baserunning), then later coming up with a groundball single for an RBI (at this point, I don’t care that it was a ground ball; Magglio needed that). By the way, here is another reason why I am unhappy that Maggs cut his hair: I’m having tremendous difficulty recognizing him if he’s not the main focus of the camera shot. In the past ten days, I have mistaken him for Raburn, Cabrera, and Chad Durbin.

Today, the boys are on big Fox for a late-afternoon game (not the “A” game, but I prefer Mark Grace to Tim McCarver anyways). They’re probably counting on Edwin Jackson to give them some innings today (lots of them, preferably). Edwin Jackson is probably looking for his mates to give him some run support. He hasn’t made many bad starts this year, but his only outing against the Twins was one of them, although he was pretty much cruising until the seventh inning, when things kind of imploded. His career numbers against the Twins are not good. Meanwhile, he’ll be facing off against the same pitcher as in that matchup: Francisco Liriano. Liriano was struggling for most of the season (though you couldn’t convince the Tigers of that; they can’t do anything against him), but his last two starts have been really good. Even though the ‘pen was emptied last night, it’s in better shape than you might think. We probably won’t see Zumaya or Dolsi for the rest of the weekend, but everyone else should be good to go. As you would expect, neither starting catcher from last night will be behind the plate today. Mauer is the Twins’ DH, while Laird gets the day off and Dusty Ryan will start. Your Mood Music for today: Well, it is the 4th of July. I was torn between two pieces of music, but I figured I’d extend them over the holiday weekend, since there is no way I’m going to be able to get my slideshow done before tomorrow (Look for it in September). At any rate, enjoy some Neil Diamond with your barbecue and baseball game today. Happy Fourth!

Maybe...Just Maybe

Photo: AP

I’m not sure what you want to call that one (ugly or strange), but it was a win. Armando Galarraga’s performance could be looked at in either a positive or negative light. He walked six, and that’s not good. Against a better-hitting club, he probably would’ve paid the price for it. However, I don’t know why, but it didn’t feel like he walked six. Maybe it was because he only gave up two hits and one run (and no home runs) in 6 1/3 innings. I do know that I didn’t see quite as many of those ineffective different-looking pitches that have plagued him (maybe some on the walks, but not with the hitters that he got out). By the way, what was up with him only wearing one sleeve in the first inning? Seay and Zumaya both turned in quality outings, although everyone’s holding their breath until we find out what the issue with Zumaya’s thumb was. And Rodney? Well, it was an adventure. Would you expect anything else?

After a couple of late nights, it’s now a late afternoon game today (at least for us in the Eastern time zone). While you can’t say that Justin Verlander was bad his last time out, the Astros made him throw a lot of pitches early and simply wore him out. Hopefully, he can bounce back against Oakland and their underachieving offense (I’m not going to say “bad” offense because with the guys that they have in their lineup, they should be better), and he has good numbers against the A’s in his career. Dallas Braden, yet another lefty, will start for the Athletics. His earned run average is really good, and yet he’s only 5-7. He must not get much run support. At any rate, he tends to alternate good and bad starts against the Tigers, and well, his last start against the Tigers was a bad one, so watch out. By the way, I am not going to do Mood Music today (I have to be at work at 4:00, so this game is gonna kill me with the suspense), and I know that yesterday’s link did not work. There’s something wrong with the upload, and I know the video plays fine, but I’ve tried uploading it to both YouTube and Xanga, but with no success. I’ll try to get it figured out and use it sometime in the future when the occasion presents itself.

Wild Zumaya + Hello, Old Friend

Photo: AP

I’ll tell you right up from that I was antsy and restless during this whole game. I thought I knew the reason for that (and that reason was behind the plate for half the game), but maybe I could sense the same thing that Leyland felt. Things started out really good, but then the offense kinda went quiet, at least when there were men on base. Now, is it that the old bugaboo about no clutch hitting back, or is it simply a matter of Wandy Rodriguez (who HAS pitched well this year) making a pitch when he needed to? I suppose we’ll find out soon enough. A lot of heat is gonna fall on Magglio for stranding seven runners, but it didn’t really seem to matter who was at the plate. Cabrera was the only guy in the lineup that did not strand anyone (He also hit a very long home run that I missed). Meanwhile, Justin Verlander had to work very, very hard for most of his outs, so much so that he gave up three runs and threw 118 pitches in only five and a third innings (Could it have been the climate? I know the roof was closed, but from all appearances, it was really humid inside the ballpark. They interviewed Pudge after the game and he was absolutely soaked in sweat, which was kind of nasty, actually). The bullpen was able to hold things down until Zumaya, who was clocked at 105 (my guess is that Houston has a hot gun), but couldn’t find the strike zone, leading to one of the strangest comments ever from Rod Allen: “This is where the Tigers miss Carlos Guillen.” I know he meant that a veteran like Guillen would try to calm Zumaya down, but Zoom’s still gotta throw strikes (and it’s also besides the point, since if Guillen were healthy, he’d be in left field and therefore unable to talk to Zumaya). However, this follows a stretch in which Zumaya hasn’t been that wild. He threw plenty of strikes on the homestand. The only issue he had was the two-run homer by Micah Hoffpauir, but that was due to an error in judgement, not because he was walking people. At any rate, after walking in the tying run, Zumaya had to be pulled and Freddy Dolsi was brought in. I was never particularly crazy about Freddy Dolsi last year, even when he started off the season pitching well, but it’s too early to tell if he’s made any adjustments yet, as he only faced two batters. Still, I know sometimes there’s not much you can do to prevent sacrifice flies, especially when you’re a flyball pitcher, but he could have at least gotten a lazy fly ball off the bat of Tejada, not a bullet that chased Don Kelly to the warning track, for crying out loud.

This game, regardless of the outcome, has been the source of some consternation for me for some time now because I didn’t know how I would react to seeing Pudge against his former team. As it turns out, I paid more attention to the game than I thought I would. And mostly it just felt nice seeing him again, even if he was wearing the “wrong” uniform. By the way, for all you Pudge fans still hanging around the Tigers blogosphere, Jason Beck has a nice blog post in which Pudge discusses Leyland, his future, and what he thinks of the Tigers now. I included one of the photos from it, even though I normally do not post photos following Tiger losses (Pudge is worth an exception). The only part of the game I could not bring myself to watch was any of his at-bats (I also couldn’t bring myself to watch any of Verlander’s at-bats, but that’s because he’s such a bad hitter that it’s downright painful, although I will give him kudos for laying down two sacrifice bunts). I’m sorry I keep being such a wuss about this. I did learn one thing, though: I can’t root against him. I just can’t. The Tigers and Astros could be tied in extra innings tonight and the Astros could have the bases loaded with Pudge at the plate and I STILL wouldn’t be able to root against him (The only similar situations I’ve found myself in were instances last year where Sean Casey and Craig Monroe batted against the Tigers. In those situations, I WAS able to root against them, but I felt bad about it. Pudge is different, though…and I imagine Verlander would fall into the same category as Pudge should it ever come to that someday, though I hope it never does). He struck out his first two times against Verlander, then doubled in his third trip. I guess this sums up my feelings about that: I’m happy that he got a double, but I’m not happy that he scored a run. I think that’s fair enough.

Tonight, it’s Game 2 of this series (and the Tigers have already been granted a bit of a reprieve, because the Cardinals beat the Twins earlier today), featuring Alfredo Figaro against Felipe Paulino. Figaro got the win in his Major League debut and only gave up two runs while striking out seven in five innings, but he had to pitch around a LOT of baserunners. Meanwhile, Paulino is coming off the DL, but he’s got a losing record and his ERA is pretty high. Honestly, I have no idea what to expect from this game, either from a pitching or offensive standpoint by the Tigers. I do know that tonight’s lineup is very similar to last night’s lineup, except that Ramon Santiago is at shortstop and Don Kelly is in right field (According to Jason Beck, Magglio is not starting tonight “because of the pitching matchup,” whatever that means). I know I promised that I would have my slideshow for the Mood Music tonight, but as it turns out, Pudge is not in the lineup for Houston, so I’m going to wait until tomorrow (I assume he WILL start tomorrow’s game).

Better Late Than Never

Photo: AP

I only saw the late innings of this game, but it certainly went from being a frustrating pitching duel to being a dramatic see-saw affair at the end. Edwin Jackson apparently had some control problems, but he battled his way through seven innings and only gave up two runs (both of which came on outs). I was at work during most of the game, including the go-ahead 2-run homer by Brandon Inge (though that happened right before we closed). I got to listen to most of the top of the eighth in the car on my way home. Derrek Lee’s single happened sometime while I was en route from my car to the house/TV, and the Hoffpauir home run occurred when I left the room for minute to change clothes. I do want to discuss that a little bit, though. If you believe the Comerica Park radar gun, Zumaya blew away Milton Bradley with a 104 MPH fastball (if that’s true, then that’ll break Zoom’s own record for the fastest pitch thrown). Hoffpauir really had no business sitting on a changeup, but at the same time, Zumaya really had no business throwing it. I usually don’t get into things like pitch selection, but it seems to me that it’s not a good idea for a reliever to take a chance on his third-best pitch in a one-run game with a runner already on base. With a three-run lead? Sure. But not when you have no wiggle room, especially when you throw harder than anyone on the planet and you have a somewhat decent curveball. At any rate, what I was referring to in the title is that the Tigers hadn’t had a walk-off win this year, and it’s kind of late in the season to not have one. Ryan Raburn took care of that, and made Jim Leyland look like a genius in the process. This game also featured the return of Magglio to the lineup. However, he was out of the game by the time I got home, so I can’t really comment on how he looked at the plate. He went 0-for-2 with a walk, though Leyland said after the game that he liked his swing better. More (bad) news on Magglio later.

Tonight is Game 2 in this series. Rick Porcello’s last start brought an end to a four-game losing streak, and the Tigers haven’t lost since. He maybe battled some control problems, though. At the same time, he’s tied for the team lead in wins with Justin Verlander. The Cubs will send Rich Harden to the mound. I haven’t seen him pitch this year, but I’m just going to ignore the 5.27 ERA, because I know he’s a much better pitcher than that. And now for the (bad) news (at least, it’s bad news for me and every female Tigers fan I know): We have advanced warning from both Jason Beck and MLive that Maggs is in the lineup…sans long hair. ¡Qué lástima! indeed (Of course, I would imagine the male fans are thrilled, as this topic had kind of stirred up a mini-battle of the sexes on a BYB game thread one night). Kurt has posted a link to a picture, and basically he looks like how he did in the old video I’ve seen of his pre-2006 days, which is, to say, not real distinguishing (And I’m praying that neither John Keating nor Mickey York have anything to do with the pre- or post-game show). Well, I had a feeling it’d come to this eventually. Damn superstitious bastards. Just for that, I’m going to punish you by having no Mood Music tonight.

EJ Can't Save You Either

One of these days I will get home from work and good things will be happening. Like, the Tigers scoring more than three runs. I’m sure Edwin Jackson did the best he could, but in the end, he apparently needed to be more dominant and the error he committed turned out to be huge. Joel Zumaya had some issues with the strike zone, and THAT turned out to be huge as well, because the run he walked in ended up being the difference.

Jim Leyland tried tinkering with the lineup some more, putting Granderson back into leadoff, Cabrera up one place to third, and Marcus Thames cleanup. And, well…it seemingly worked for Granderson. He had himself a fabulous night with three hits, two of which left the ballpark. Unfortunately, they all came with no one on base. Cabrera didn’t do too shabby either. I mean, he had two hits including a double, and had a good night defensively, so unless I see evidence to the contrary in the next couple days, this'll be the last post where I discuss the hamstring. It looks as though it's no longer an issue. Thames really didn’t contribute anything from the cleanup position, with the exception of a walk. I can’t say Maggs had good swings, but he DID get an RBI on a sac fly that would’ve been the tying run if not for Zumaya’s wildness, and it’s worth noting if for nothing else than the fact that it was a ball in the air, which we haven’t seen a lot of.

By the way, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the major milestone reached by a certain former Tiger. Last night, Pudge Rodriguez played his 2,227th game behind the plate, surpassing Carlton Fisk for the most all-time (ironically, Fisk was the opposing catcher when Pudge made his Major League debut back in 1991). It’s fitting that the Astros happen to be in Arlington right now, and from what I’ve heard, he was given a hearty ovation by all the Ranger fans. The Tigers Amateur Analysis sends out congratulations, and at least for me (as well as the great deal of people I see on TV still wearing Rodriguez jerseys), it was a pleasure (albeit a stressful pleasure at times) to have him wearing the Olde English D for four and a half years’ worth of those games. I just wish those days had had a better ending.

I’m generally more patient than a lot of those on the blogosphere (at least the commenters), but with this recent slide, the Tigers ARE drifting dangerously close to that .500 mark. Their lead in the Central is also dwindling, and they got bailed out last night, but Minnesota has already won today, so they won’t have that luxury tonight. As a result, this is an awful lot of pressure to be putting on Rick Porcello. He did pitch well and win in his last start against Pittsburgh, but remember, he drove in two of the three runs the Tigers scored. Now that they know he’s not a bad hitter, the Cardinals are sure to pitch him much tougher than the Pirates did. Jim Leyland has said that, provided Porcello pitches well and/or doesn’t have to be prematurely lifted for a pinch-hitter, he’d like to stretch him out to 95 pitches. It’s supposed to be really hot and humid in St. Louis tonight, and we’ve already seen what the humidity has done to Verlander. And could the Tigers PLEASE score more than three runs tonight? By the way, you’d think we’d see Fernando Rodney in the game tonight regardless of the score, right? He hasn’t pitched since last Friday. Your Mood Music for tonight: It’s another James Bond theme, this time “You Know My Name” by Chris Cornell. Basically, there’s been talk of trades or other acquisitions, but really, it’s time for the guys who are already here to pitch, catch, and hit the way that I know they can. Right now, they still control their own destiny, and as the song says, “no one else here will save you.” Of course, if you’d like to use this song to try to intimidate the Cardinals, go right ahead. It works both ways.

Three Out of Five? I'll Take That

This is gonna be a short post, because thanks to the ridiculously long rain delay yesterday, I was unable to see so much as one second of this game. Therefore, I mostly have to rely on the boxscore and other bloggers’ accounts. At any rate, it wasn’t exactly the performance from Edwin Jackson that everyone was hoping for, but if he can limit the opposition to two runs on days where he doesn’t quite have it, things’ll turn out okay. It looks as though Brandon Lyon followed him up with a couple of impressive innings (lowering his ERA to under five in the process). Nate Robertson, however, gave up a solo home run to A.J. Pierzynski that would turn out to loom large. There was a lot of griping that the Tigers only had the “B” lineup against Gavin Floyd, but Floyd has always pitched the Tigers hard no matter who’s in the lineup, and he’s been pitching well overall recently. The heroics came in the ninth inning, when Granderson was able to hang a blown save on Bobby Jenks, which is huge despite the outcome, because Granderson had previously been dominated by Jenks. Unfortunately, because of the Pierzynski home run, it only tied the game instead of pulling the Tigers ahead. Then in the bottom of the ninth, Joel Zumaya ended up being his own worst enemy. While the position players all seem to be doing much better defensively than they were last year, this seemingly has not carried over to the pitching staff. The pitchers have made some key errors in games this year.

Following this game, there was a flurry of roster moves. Clete Thomas has been sent down to Toledo to work on “shortening his swing.” He definitely needs work on that, but I kinda like Clete (even though he always looks like he’s either in awe of everything or scared out of his mind), so hopefully he’ll be back later in the season. The Tigers have purchased the contract of Don Kelly, who will start in left field tonight. Meanwhile, they have also placed Jeremy Bonderman back on the DL. You know, it looked to me like he just wasn’t ready to face big-league hitters yet, and apparently The Powers That Be were thinking the same thing. He wouldn’t be much help in the bullpen, and right now, starting Dontrelle Willis gives the Tigers a better chance at winning than starting Bonderman (in a lesser of two evils sort of way). Ryan Perry has been called back up to rejoin the ‘pen, and I think the blogosphere is generally happy to see him return. He’s got issues with walks, but he’s also got the velocity to (sometimes) get himself out of trouble.

Though yesterday’s game kinda slipped through their fingers a little bit, winning three of five in Chicago is certainly nothing to sneeze at. And with that, Interleague play starts up again. Hopefully, the Tigers can tap into that Interleague mojo they’ve had over the past few years. First up: The Pittsburgh Pirates, who have had no Interleague mojo (Plus, they just traded away their best position player in Nate McClouth). However, they do have a couple good, young pitchers, so this is by no means a cakewalk. The next six games for the Tigers feature the year’s first foray into National League parks, so it’s time for the pitchers to hit. Or not, so to speak. Now obviously Dontrelle Willis is by far the best hitting pitcher the Tigers have, although Edwin Jackson supposedly is okay. Justin Verlander is convinced that he can hit, but I have seen absolutely no evidence of that yet. In fact, Verlander looks so completely out of his element when he’s hitting that I really don’t like watching him try to hit. Armando Galarraga went 0-for-3 at the plate last year, but he did walk three times (in fact, his three walks accounted for the only offensive contribution from Tiger pitchers last year). Then there’s tonight’s starter, Rick Porcello, who was a shortstop in high school on days he didn’t pitch, and supposedly he hit 11 home runs his senior year. However, high school is a far cry from the big leagues, so I can’t imagine him being able to hit 95 MPH fastballs. But he gets paid to pitch, not hit. He’s been a little shaky this month after having a fabulous May. From what I’ve heard, the Pirates’ offense tends to score either a bunch of runs or none at all, for what it’s worth. Porcello will be opposed by Ian Snell, who is one of the Pirates’ better pitchers, although his numbers don’t indicate it right now. He pitched for Puerto Rico in the World Baseball Classic. The Tigers saw him (and beat him) in 2006, but obviously that was a long time ago. Probably the Tiger who has seen him the most recently is Cabrera, and yes, he does have good numbers against Snell. By the way, as all of you know, this is only one of two big Detroit-Pittsburgh matchups tonight, and I daresay this game’ll be playing second fiddle to the drama that’ll be going on at Joe Louis Arena. I probably won’t watch Game 7, but I’ll certainly be cheering for the Red Wings. Your Mood Music for tonight: Well, we’re playing the Pirates, aren’t we? It’s obvious, but it’s also from a damn good movie.

Round One Goes to Us

Photo: Jonathan Daniel (Getty Images)

Finally, a pleasant Game 1, for once, at least in terms of the outcome. It was rather stressful to watch, though. I thought Armando Galarraga pitched pretty well, save for a rocky first inning and a hanging slider he threw to Jermaine Dye. He certainly pitched well enough to win, and it’s a shame he didn’t. I love Zumaya, but this is the second game in a row that he’s kind of ironically gotten the win after giving up a run. Rodney looked like he might have some trouble getting through the ninth, but a timely double play got him out of trouble.

Meanwhile, while the offense could’ve been better, it was nice that every time the White Sox scored, the Tigers came right back and scored in the following half inning. Still, they left a bunch of men on base in the early goings, but once again, they were able to take advantage of some errors that the White Sox made. And hey, for all the complaining that goes on about Dane Sardinha’s lack of offense, he DID supply both a crucial sac fly (which came on a missed squeeze, oddly enough) and a sac bunt that set up a run. Either way, Jim Leyland certainly seemed happy in his post-game interview, but what was with all the smoke that was wafting into the frame? He must’ve had, like, ten cigarettes sitting in an ashtray just off camera.

Well, that was so much fun that we get to do it again. Tonight marks the return of Jeremy Bonderman. Ryan Perry was actually the one sent down to make room for him, but I get the feeling that may be temporary. Still no word on who he’s replacing in the rotation, and they might be waiting until after Dontrelle Willis pitches tomorrow night before they make that decision. Anyways, they say that Bonderman’s velocity hasn’t returned yet (And whether or not it WILL return seems to depend on whether you ask the trainers, who believe it will, or Bonderman, who speaks as though it won’t), and he says that will force him to throw more changeups. Well, we’ve heard that about the changeup before, and it never seems to stick. The White Sox are starting our old friend Jose Contreras, who obviously struggled in their rotation but had been pitching well in Triple A. To everyone’s surprise, Cabrera IS in the lineup for tonight, although he’s the DH. You also have Raburn playing first base (He has a couple home runs off Contreras in his career), Maggs on the bench (His career numbers against Contreras aren’t that good), and the speedy lefties in the outfield (because Contreras is easy to run on). By the way, this is the last “complete” game I’ll be able to watch for a while, as I work the whole rest of the week.

Clete Saves the Day

Photo: AP

You never like to see your pitchers walk a bunch of guys and struggle, but it’s nice to know that the team still has the ability to outslug on occasion. Rick Porcello had some trouble early, including giving up a leadoff home run to Chone Figgins (who joins guys like Ronny Cedeno and Alberto Callaspo as guys who don’t hit home runs who have homered off Porcello). He did settle down somewhat after that, but he threw too many pitches early and only lasted five innings. The ‘pen had kind of a rough time of it. Bobby Seay was the only one to get through his outing cleanly, without letting a runner score (his own or somebody else’s), but he only faced one batter. The right-handers all had problems of one sort or another. Zumaya in particular must’ve felt really good (He threw at least two pitches that were clocked at 103; ESPN’s commentators joked that he was throwing “a thousand miles an hour”), but he didn’t have the command that he’s been showing so far this year. And we’ve well documented the struggles that Rodney has in non-save situations (although I get the feeling that if Leyland had brought in, say, Brandon Lyon, the entire web community would’ve had a collective aneurysm).

Meanwhile, the Tigers finally got to see the struggling version of the Angels’ bullpen, and yet they very nearly let them off the hook. I’ve said on numerous occasions that for some reason, the Tigers haven’t been very good at taking advantage of walks, but if an opposing player makes an error, it’s like the floodgates open. And that’s what happened yesterday. The Tigers did not score in the eighth inning until the error by Matthews/Morales (they gave the error to Matthews, but it probably should’ve gone to Morales, cuz it wasn’t that bad a throw). Then there was another walk and then the grand slam by, of all people, Clete Thomas, who was only in there because Leyland lifted Cabrera for a pinch-runner earlier in the game. He sure did a good job filling in for Cabrera. By the way, it looks as though “Clete’s Cougars” have returned to the ballpark. I’m still not sure where that name came from, unless they are all fans from Sylvania (After all, Sylvania Southview High School IS the “Home of the Cougars”). By the way, the astounding thing was that the Tigers scored five runs in that inning and the only hit was the grand slam. At least they finally got one of their five-run eighth innings to count for something.

After ending what had been kind of a crappy homestand on a high note, it’s time to hit the road for a long, LONG time. First up is a freakin’ FIVE GAME SERIES in Chicago, beginning with a day-night doubleheader today. Has anyone else been looking at this week on the calendar and cringing (Actually, I know Ian over at Bless You Boys is “very fearful”). It’s not that I don’t have faith in the Tigers, but their tendency to play really crappy baseball against the White Sox is fast becoming the stuff of legend, so you can understand if I can’t help but envision all the bad things that could happen in this series. Yuck. At any rate, first they gotta tackle this doubleheader. Armando Galarraga gets the nod for the first game, and like I’ve said, I’m pretty sure he’ll end up being the one sent down (or otherwise taken off the roster) simply because they need the roster space for Bonderman, unless they decide to send down a position player. He’s not been dominant, but he’s pitched well enough to win in his last two starts (arguably his last three, as he wasn’t terrible against the Rockies), but has gotten no run support. I guarantee that if the Tigers’ offense had shown up in his last three starts, he would not be getting nearly the amount of flack from the blogosphere that he is right now. The White Sox offense is struggling right now, but that never seems to matter when Detroit shows up, and they’ve already proven that they can hurt Galarraga, especially in the homer-friendly confines of U.S. Cellular Field. He’s going to have to earn his way to a win. The White Sox counter with Clayton Richard, a lefty who has done a good job for them in most of his starts. The starting lineup for the Tigers is pretty much the same as it was yesterday, except Dane Sardinha is catching (and yes, that means that Cabrera is at first base, at least for the start of this thing). By the way, this’ll mark the first occasion that I’ve been able to watch both games of a doubleheader. In the past couple years, I’ve always missed the first game due to a dentist’s appointment, work, school, or the game wasn’t televised (though the Tigers have lost all those games, so it was never any big disappointment that I missed them). I would feel better about this if they weren’t playing the White Sox. Your Mood Music for today (or at least Game 1): Well, the Tigers are on the road again, and they’re in a place they don’t normally play well in, so here is Kenny Loggins with “Highway to the Danger Zone.” While the lyrics don’t all fit (though maybe they do, in an uplifting sort of way), the title certainly does.

The Kids Get It Done

Photo: AP

I’m not sure if this is the first time this has happened or not (if it’s not, it’s one of only a handful of times), but last night, the three pitchers the Tigers used were all younger than me. I’m 25 years old. I probably should not be feeling old yet. At any rate, I got off work during the bottom of the eighth inning, so I had to raid the archives of MLB.tv to catch up on this one. Rick Porcello did another nice job. It seems like every time he ran into trouble, his defense bailed him out, be it Josh Anderson, Brandon Inge, or Miguel Cabrera. Ryan Perry followed him up with two solid innings. Joel Zumaya was indeed Jim Leyland’s choice to try to nail down the save. It got hairy for him, but he got himself out of it when he had to. By the way, I have heard that traditionally, National League pitchers were known for throwing lots of fastballs, while AL pitchers preferred offspeed pitches. I can’t imagine that that’s really true anymore (given the frequent switching between leagues), but it seemed to me like the Rockies had Zumaya’s fastballs timed a lot better than any of the other teams he’s faced so far this year. Maybe I’m just making things up.

By all accounts, Ubaldo Jimenez was at the top of his game. The Tigers got just enough offense through a little bit of timely hitting and a lot of good baserunning, particularly from Laird, Polanco, and Larish. Laird had a good day at the plate, and he was able to go first to third on Santiago’s single, which set up the opportunity for him to score on the wild pitch that really didn’t get that far away from Chris Ianetta. Polanco and Larish both aggressively broke up potential double plays in the eighth inning, leading to the critical tack-on run that proved to be the difference.

I’ll spare you the obvious pun for tonight’s game and just say that it’s Armando Galarraga against Jason Marquis. The Tigers haven’t faced Marquis since 2002, and as a result, no one’s had a lot of at-bats against him except Cabrera (who hits him pretty well) and Polanco (who does not). Meanwhile, do I have to rehash that Armando Galarraga needs to pitch well tonight? I’m pulling for him all the way, but I’m sure there’s some added pressure because Jeremy Bonderman isn’t going to be on that rehab assignment forever. It sounds as though he’s got a pretty good idea of what he thinks the problem is and what he thinks the solution is. Now he’s just gotta execute. I was trying to think of some other good pitchers who have been struggling recently, and I came up with four off the top of my head: Scott Kazmir, Gavin Floyd, Andy Sonnanstine, and Ricky Nolasco. Kazmir was placed on the DL yesterday, but the other three all pitched last night. Floyd and Sonnanstine both turned in very good outings, while Nolasco gave up eight runs in two innings and has now been sent down to the minor leagues. As for Galarraga, I’ve come to the preliminary conclusion that unless he's hiding some sort of injury (a real possibility), the initial problem is mechanical, but I think he might be letting it get into his head too much, kind of like Justin Verlander earlier in the year. It’s like once something bad happens, he just lets it snowball out of control. That needs to stop. If someone hits a home run off him or he walks someone or something like that, he needs to just let it go and not let it affect him. Magglio is back in the lineup tonight as the DH, while Ryan Raburn mans left field. Everyone else is where they normally are. Your Mood Music for tonight: Well, my attempt at being tongue-in-cheek regarding Galarraga last time he pitched backfired badly and now looks really tacky, so this time, I’ll try to be inspirational. And to me, nothing’s more inspirational than hearing my favorite band of all time: Styx. Enjoy!