Stupid Weather

Okay, so take everything I said about last night’s game and apply it to tonight, because it’s the same pitching matchup. I really didn’t want them to have to play a doubleheader because that messes up the pitching schedule, which means someone will have to make a spot start on Wednesday, which means someone else is going to lose his rotation spot. At any rate, the reason the doubleheader was scheduled for tomorrow and not today is because more storms are expected today, so we might have this conversation all over again tomorrow.

More Fun With Rainouts

Are doubleheaders against teams other than the White Sox even allowed? Ordinarily, what I do during doubleheaders is that I’ll do a post on the results of the first game right between the two. However, I work 4-9 today so that’s not gonna happen. Since the game 1 pitching matchups are the same as they were last night, I’ll preview game 2 in this post. It’ll be Jeremy Bonderman against Phil Hughes. Bonderman had a meltdown his last time that got wiped off the history books by the rain. The individual matchups versus the Yankees are actually quite favorable towards Bonderman. Of the current Yankees, the only one who has hit above .250 against him is A-Rod (.308 with 2 HRs), though Derek Jeter has hit three home runs off him. Phil Hughes seems to have finally put things together as a starter for the Yankees (My fantasy team thanks him, but I’ll be more than willing for him to take the loss tonight). As favorable as the individual lines are for Bonderman, they’re even more favorable towards Hughes. Miguel Cabrera is 3-for-6, and Magglio is 1-for-8. That’s it. None of the other Tigers have hits against him (Well, Carlos Guillen does, but that’s not a big help right now). The Tigers have called up Alfredo Figaro from Toledo and sent Ryan Raburn back down. With Brad Thomas and Eddie Bonine both likely still unavailable, they probably needed an extra reliever for the doubleheader (It’s unlikely that Figaro would start today, as he would be on short rest). They will need someone to start on Sunday to get everyone back on their normal rest (no off-day). That will likely be Figaro, but I was kind of hoping they’d give Armando Galarraga a shot (and he is already scheduled to start for Toledo on Sunday; then again, the Red Sox have not been the greatest matchup for him in the past).

Fun With Rainouts

Forget what you saw last night, cuz it never happened. Miguel Cabrera never homered. Jeremy Bonderman never had a meltdown. Ryan Raburn didn’t make another error. It was all your imagination (Actually, I never saw it in the first place; all I saw was the fourth inning). So with that, they’ll just play one game today, which is a day game (not happy about that, since I work 10-5). Justin Verlander will get the chance to build on the dominance he showed against the Angels last week. Meanwhile, Justin Masterson will start for the Indians. He’s struggled this year (especially against lefties, apparently), but he was the big piece in the Victor Martinez trade. The Tigers have not seen much of him.

Keep on Chewing Those Fingernails

So as it turns out, this agony of waiting will have to go on a bit longer. I did not want a doubleheader, I can tell you that much. Unfortunately, I will not have time to post a Game 1 recap tomorrow before I go to work, so I guess you’ll have to settle for two games in one post. Good night, folks.

Rainout Restart

It seems the steady rainfall we got all day yesterday in Toledo was also happening in Detroit (though I would’ve missed the beginning of the game anyways). I wouldn’t even bother posting about it, except the rainout has resulted in a shuffle of the rotations of both the Tigers and the White Sox and, as such, today’s game actually features both starting pitchers who were originally scheduled to pitch today. So instead of Rick Porcello and John Danks a day later, we’ve got Armando Galarraga against Jose Contreras. Technically, Galarraga HAS faced the White Sox before, but it was in that stupid makeup game they played after the season ended, when we were all so emotionally disconnected from the team that even though I listened to the thing on the radio, it seriously feels like it never happened (indeed, I may not be the only one who feels that way, because a lot of broadcasters, websites, and news stories frequently rattle off his pre-makeup game numbers). He faced one batter, walked him, threw two wild pitches (allowing the tying run to score), got lifted, and eventually took the loss when his runner came around to score after Gary Glover gave up a grand slam to somebody. So technically, he’s 0-1 with an ERA of infinity, but really, I don’t think one batter is a high enough sample size, so for all intents and purposes, the White Sox have never seen him. However, just like with Texas, he’s going to have to EARN this win. He’ll probably have to work very hard to do it. For one thing, Chicago’s offense is hot right now. Second, they seem to kill Tigers pitching no matter who it is. Third, even though Galarraga had that stellar batting average against, he DID give up a lot of home runs, especially to lefties, and that’s basically how the White Sox have dominated the past four years. It is supposed to be warmer today, so hopefully the weather won’t affect him like it did Zach Miner. Now, I assumed that John Danks would start for the White Sox, but apparently Ozzie Guillen has (wisely) decided that he’d be more useful against the Rays, who have more left-handed bats in their lineups, so we are getting Contreras after all. I actually like this, cuz I honestly think the Tigers have a better chance of beating Contreras than Danks. They’ve had success against him recently, and up until Floyd’s wild start on Monday, he had been their least effective starter (“least” being a relative term, as he still gave up only four runs). At the very least, the rainout guarantees that the Tigers will have a winning homestand. And it’d be nice if the guys worked quickly today, cuz I have to be at work at four, and it’s agonizing not knowing the score for five hours (wrong pharmacist is working tonight). By the way, today is the Jackie Robinson game, and it’ll be a little different this time around, as apparently EVERY player, coach, and manager will be wearing the #42. I guess they finally decided the disproportionate representation was starting to look a little awkward (Last year, you had teams like the Tigers who had several players wearing the 42, but you also had the Marlins, whose lone participant was their third base coach).