Wrong Kind of Fireworks

It seems to me like the Tigers usually don’t fare well on the 4^th of July, but I’m not about to go look that up. I said Cliff Lee was beatable, but that he would have to be outpitched. Jeremy Bonderman didn’t do that. The first group of runs he gave up were on a hanging slider to Russell Branyan and that’s Bonderman’s fault, plain and simple. After that, things got a little more complicated. There were several pitches that looked to be right down the middle that were called balls. Granted, Bonderman let that get into his head a bit too much, but I’m not sure where he was expected to throw his pitches for strikes. Anyways, that unraveled quickly and both Bonderman and Laird got tossed (Leyland tried his hardest to join them, but did not succeed in that endeavor). Meanwhile, the Tigers had several situations where they got the first two men on, but then nothing else happened.

Unfortunately, the BYBers, who cheered the Tigers to a victory on Saturday (pics), couldn’t bring the same mojo to the Mud Hens (pics), who lost their tenth straight game. Rick Porcello had one bad inning where he gave up four runs and only two balls left the infield (one of which was an out), otherwise he looked pretty strong. Larry Parrish was ejected arguing a close play at home plate. And the game actually turned out to be a rematch of the Tigers’ home opener, because the starting pitcher for Columbus was David Huff, but the Hens could do nothing against him. Twice, they had situations where someone doubled with a runner on first, but the runner was held at third and the next guy made an out, stranding two. The highlight of the night was when Alli, Jason, and I met Robbie Weinhardt and Scot Drucker, which was cool.

By the way, congratulations to Miguel Cabrera and Jose Valverde, who were named to the All-Star team yesterday. Cabrera actually won the player vote over Justin Morneau. It sounds as if he’s going to participate in the Home Run Derby as long as he gets over the kidney infection in time (Jason Beck finally learned that those aren’t cured with a single dose of antibiotics, and Cabrera is exhibiting other symptoms besides flank pain). However, that’s still a week away, so he should be feeling better by then. Meanwhile, Valverde’s definitely had an All-Star-worthy season, but it feels like he was flying under the radar so I thought he might be overlooked, but he wasn’t. If there were any snubs with the Tigers, it was Boesch and Verlander. I didn’t really expect Boesch to be named to the team, but I thought he’d have a real strong chance at the Final Vote. I’m not sure why Delmon Young was picked for that instead. Verlander’s ERA was probably a bit too high, but there’s still a chance for him to make it since any starting pitcher who pitches on Sunday will be ineligible, and right now there are several who are in line to start that day. However, Joe Girardi has already said that CC Sabathia will be replaced by Andy Pettitte, and as far as other potential replacements are concerned, I would think that Felix Hernandez and Jered Weaver would get preference over Verlander.

Today is an unusual day game to start a series (since the 4^th of July was on a Sunday this year), and the last-place Baltimore Orioles are coming to town. For a while they looked like they had a shot at overtaking the 2003 Tigers for futility, but they have been playing slightly better recently. For instance, today’s starter, Kevin Millwood, started the season 0-8, but has now won three of his last four starts. His ERA isn’t pretty, but those more into sabremetrics than I am believe he’s pitching in a lot of bad luck and his peripheral stats would indicate that he’s actually doing better than what his ERA says. In the past, I have seen the Tigers light him up, and I have seen them get shut down by him. Cabrera and Maggs have hit him very well (.323 and .375, respectively, and Cabrera’s hit two home runs). Damon’s not as good from an average standpoint (.261), but he does have four doubles. Not of the other Tigers have really hit him well. Meanwhile, the Tigers have flip-flopped Andy Oliver and Armando Galarraga in the rotation, and so Oliver will start today. I like this move. First, it puts the hard-throwing lefty in between Bonderman and Galarraga (good idea, since I think those two feature similar stuff). Second, it sets the rotation so that Galarraga will not have to face the Twins this weekend, which does him a favor as well as the Tigers. Anyways, Andy Oliver is still looking for his first win. He was not as good against the Twins as he had been against the Braves, so hopefully he can bounce back against the Orioles, who don’t really have a good offense this year (and the Tigers have caught a big break because Luke Scott is on the DL right now).

I Run My Record to 5-1

Photo: ME!

The only reason I’m using this picture of Austin Jackson is that it was probably the best picture I got all night, otherwise I’d use one of Verlander (no offense to Jackson; and I got a TON of pictures of Verlander and Cabrera, but they weren’t as good). Justin Verlander was much better than the last game of his that I was in attendance for. The ten strikeouts will attest to that. Even in the one inning where the Mariners scored their lone run, it’s not like Verlander got knocked around. That inning featured a lot of infield singles and bloops (Plus one hard-hit double by Kotchmann). The rest of the game featured a lot of swinging and missing from Mariners hitters. This game was also the first time I saw Ryan Perry in person and the second time I saw Jose Valverde. Both of them had some issues throwing strikes (though in Valverde’s case, he hadn’t pitched since Monday), but they got the job done.

It was fun to see the Tigers get to a guy who had pitched very well this year in Jason Vargas. It was a big game for Brandon Inge, who had two hits and three RBIs (By the way, he seems to have gone back to his pre-2009 batting stance, at least in terms of how he holds the bat). This game is notable because it’s the first game I’ve been to (Tigers or Mud Hens) in which no home runs were hit. It’s usually home run derby when I go to Tigers games. However, my Ryan Raburn streak continued. He has been in every Tigers game I’ve been to (I believe the same can be said for Brandon Inge). By the way, I can’t help but want to clear something up that Jason Beck said in his blog yesterday. It turns out that Miguel Cabrera’s back pain was due to a kidney infection (or, as we in the business call it, pyelonephritis). Beck said that “a round of medication cleared it up.” That’s actually not how it works. A kidney infection is not going to go away after one round of medication. Miguel’s going to be on antibiotics for the next two weeks (likely Cipro or Levaquin; those are the drugs of choice for pyelonephritis). I’m surprised he didn’t exhibit any other symptoms (Fever and general malaise are pretty common), but I suppose he could have had those symptoms and not said anything. Indeed, last night he looked like he was moving around with some discomfort (one of the reasons I took a ton of pictures of him was that I was convinced he wasn’t going to be around for the whole game). However, as long as he’s not bedridden, you might as well play him. You can’t exactly aggravate a kidney infection like you would a muscle strain. And it didn’t really affect him at the plate. He hit a double and the out he made was a hard liner to center (He also walked twice).

The Tigers attempt to go for the sweep today on Independence Day. They’ve got a huge roadblock named Cliff Lee standing in their way. Lee has thrown four consecutive complete games and his ERA is very, very good, and I am really hoping he gets traded to a National League team and not the Twins. Now, he is beatable. The Tigers beat him three times last year, although they didn’t exactly knock him around in any of those games. He mostly just got outpitched. That said, there are a few Tigers with good numbers against him. Cabrera is .348 with a home run, Maggs is .375 with a  home run, and Inge is .385 with three home runs against Lee (Granted, he has also struck out 12 times). There are also Tigers with not-so-good numbers (Damon, Laird, and Raburn). In the meantime, the Tigers will start Jeremy Bonderman, who didn’t really have it in his last start but still managed to beat the Twins. He has made one good start and one bad start against the Mariners. Also, we will be learning who our Tigers All-Stars are shortly, and I’ll be at the Mud Hens game tonight, hoping to break their nine-game losing streak. Your Mood Music today: The 1812 Overture. Happy 4th!

Back at Home Again

Photo: Getty Images

While the Tigers may all look like painters with those white hats, they sure did deliver. Max Scherzer turned in a very strong performance, the longest one of his career, in fact. The slider’s become a good weapon for him recently (and it’s an odd kind of slider, because it seems to move straight downwards rather than laterally like Bonderman’s or Galarraga’s). Phil Coke pitched a scoreless, though somewhat adventurous, ninth inning, although the hits he gave up to Ichiro and Figgins were not hit hard. The hardest hit ball of the inning was actually the one that Brennan Boesch turned into the double play.

Doug Fister didn’t really have it second time around against the Tigers. He kept leaving the ball up, but I’m not sure I can blame him for that because the strikezone was really high last night. The first big hit of the night was Don Kelly’s two-run double. The good thing was that it gave the Tigers a lead they would not relinquish. The bad thing is that he was in there because Miguel Cabrera was a late scratch with back tightness. They have not given very much of an update, but I don’t think he was even in the dugout last night, because I did not see a single shot of him, not even in the background. All Jim Leyland said was that he was “okay” and that he didn’t know if he was going to put him back in the lineup tonight or not. I’m guessing that means he won’t, which sucks because I’ll be at tonight’s game and I want Cabrera in there. Other big hits came from Austin Jackson, Brennan Boesch, and Johnny Damon.

Tonight’s the night of the big Bless You Boys meetup, and I finally get to see Justin Verlander in person again. I haven’t been to one of his games since 2007. He won his last start even though he gave up four runs to the Braves. The latest issue with him is that he tends to not pitch as well on extra rest, which is the case tonight. He keeps tinkering with mechanics, which at some point becomes a bad thing. He hasn’t beaten the Mariners in quite a while. He’s had a tendency to give up late runs to them which have cost him the game. The last time he faced the Mariners at Comerica Park he took a 3-1 loss. Ichiro hit a two-run homer off him in that game. He shouldn’t expect much run support tonight because Jason Vargas has been very good this year (How often do you get a matchup where the two starting pitchers have the same initials?). He hasn’t given up more than three earned runs in a start since his very first start of the year. The Tigers faced him once this year and scored two runs off him (They must’ve scored two more runs off someone else because that was the game that started trouble for Ryan Perry and they ended up losing 5-4). As I’ve said, I’ll be at Comerica Park for this game, so I expect a good show, boys.

Then Again, It IS the West Coast

A busy day yesterday prevented me from blogging about Wednesday’s game until now, although I can’t really delve into details since I only saw pretty much the top of the first inning and that’s it. But on the west coast, a lot of times up is down, black is white, front is back, and Ryan Perry is a bad pitcher. For shame, too, because I’ve heard Jeremy Bonderman pitched quite a good game. I caught wind of a 4-1 score in the seventh and thought that this one was in the bag. Apparently it wasn’t. At any rate, I heard we also got a 2-run shot from Magglio, and the rookies had themselves a good time at the plate as well. Someone (I can’t remember who) pointed out that this was a series in which each team’s best hitter was essentially a non-factor at the plate. Miguel Cabrera wasn’t there, and Ichiro went 0-for-9.

And so now the Tigers are finally back home and finished with going to the west coast (and in the minds of most experts, their most difficult part of the season is over with). They aren’t done with the AL West though. First up on this homestand is a four-game series with the Athletics, who scored quite a few runs in their just-completed series with the Orioles. Up until that point, they had not been a particularly good road team. At any rate, the Tigers will have all their starters except Gio Gonzalez, and in turn, they’ll see everyone except Jeremy Bonderman. Tonight’s starting pitcher is Dontrelle Willis (and by unfortunate coincidence, this means you’re likely to hear a lot of bad-taste Gary Coleman jokes, so I’ll spare you). D-Train is coming off a somewhat mediocre start against the Dodgers in which he started out okay but then faltered and hit a batter with the bases loaded. Things snowballed from there. Anyways, he’s faced the A’s once as a Tiger (at least), and walked a bunch of them, if I remember correctly. Other than that, he doesn’t have a lot of history against A’s batters. Just as Dontrelle Willis was once the ace of the Florida Marlins, Ben Sheets was once the ace of the Milwaukee Brewers. He started off this year not pitching that well (as his high earned run average will attest to), but he has been better lately. Six Tigers have faced him before, but only two have more than ten at-bats against him, both guys that spent quite a bit of time in the National League. Adam Everett is 12-for-34 with a double and a home run off Sheets, which is probably why he’s in the lineup tonight. Miguel Cabrera, is, well, 3-for-18 with ten strikeouts. Yikes. Still, it’s nice to see Cabrera’s name in the lineup again. Carlos Guillen is also back off the DL, and so the entire Venezuelan contingent is whole for the first time this season.

Sometimes Baseball Makes No Sense

This game would be one of those instances, at least from the pitching perspective. I mean, it seemed like Justin Verlander had good stuff. The eight strikeouts would attest to that, and not many of the outs were hit hard. Most of the damage came from Franklin Gutierrez and Milton Bradley, both of whom have hit Justin well in his career. Still, you’d hardly expect him to give up five earned runs to a team that has struggled offensively, not with the way he was pitching. I have no explanation for you. And I don’t have any problem with Leyland electing to let Verlander stay out there in the eighth. Usually JV will get the job done. This time he didn’t. He did get the #1 web gem, though.

I’m not gonna pick on the offense too much. Between Cabrera’s absence and the fact that Seattle has a good pitching staff, I wasn’t expecting them to score a lot of runs. And in the two instances where they had a runner at third with less than two outs and didn’t get him in, whoever was at the plate put a good swing on the ball. One turned into a hard groundout with the infield in and the other turned into a line drive double play and a hit and run. It was a good game for Brandon Inge, who had a single and a homer (I find it amusing that Mario and Rod finally noticed last night that his mohawk is gone, when it’s been gone for almost a week). Don Kelly can’t replace Cabrera in terms of power, but he did chip in with a single and was robbed of another.

It’ll be up to Jeremy Bonderman tonight to prevent a sweep. Safeco Field is the sight of his worst start of the season (yes, even worse than his meltdown in Cleveland that got wiped off the books). He gave up 10 runs (8 earned) in less than five innings, plus a ton of stolen bases. His career ERA against the Mariners is over 5, so this is nothing new (though if I remember correctly, the last few years have featured either great pitching performances or meltdowns, with nothing in between). Since he’s generally slow to the plate, it would behoove him to keep Ichiro and Figgins off the bases. The Tigers will be facing lefty Jason Vargas, who is also having a good year for the Mariners. Most of the Tigers haven’t seen him before (Johnny Damon and Adam Everett are a combined 1-4, which doesn’t say a whole lot). With the lefty on the mound, Ryan Raburn will be filling in at first for Cabrera today, and he will be batting third with Maggs once again in the cleanup spot. Not that I will see much of this game at all, since it’s on the west coast and I have to work. Hopefully I can get wind of the score at some point, otherwise the suspense will kill me.

Miguel Cabrera: Defying Gravity

Photo: Otto Greule, Jr (Getty Images)

Wicked was awesome. This game was also awesome, except for the rash of uneven pantlegs that drive symmetry lovers crazy (On a related note from a different game yesterday, I learned definitively that alternate-color jerseys and white shoes offset quite a significant amount of boxiness. However, the underlying reason remains a mystery. But I digress). I finally got to see a little bit of Max Scherzer pitching as a Tiger. And he pitched decently, for the most part, as did the bullpen. Ryan Perry in particular got himself out of a big-time jam.

The offense had some issues with stranding runners, but every time that happens, I keep thinking of something Lou Pinella said when he was serving as a color analyst for the 2006 ALCS. And this is something I actually remember from watching the game in 2006. I did not get it from watching the archives later. He said that if you keep getting baserunners, eventually you will score them. I don’t know why, but that stuck with me ever since (of course, he was talking about the fact that Nate Robertson kept getting into a lot of jams against the Oakland A’s, but Pinella was wrong in that instance; Still, if that series had gone to Game 5, who knows? Besides, the Cardinals didn’t have any problem scoring runs in the World Series that year). At any rate, Miguel Cabrera hit a 3-run homer on his birthday. And it went a long way. Austin Jackson came up with a big RBI single late in the game to tack on an important insurance run. Of course, not all the stranding was really the fault of the Tigers. Both Guillen and Avila absolutely smoked balls right at Chone Figgins who, on both occasions, turned them into Web Gem-quality double plays. Speaking of Alex Avila, he finally looked like he had good swings for probably the first time all year. We’ll have to see if he keeps that up or not. On the flipside, Magglio went 0-for-5. It had to even out sometime.

Okay, this long and winding road trip has made its way to Anaheim for four games (yuck). Places don’t get much weirder than the Big A either. And the Angels are hot right now. They just swept the Blue Jays and they got some really good pitching in that series (Rodney is now the closer, by the way). They’ll lead things off with Joel Piñiero. He’s pitched well so far this year, and apparently he used to dominate the Tigers, but has lost his last four decisions to them. The only one I remember is the last one, when he was with the Cardinals last year (I don’t even remember him ever being in the American League). The Tigers scored four runs against him in the first inning but nothing after that (It was a game the Tigers won, though). No current Tiger has homered off him, but Maggs and Guillen both hit over .400 against him. We might see Alex Avila behind the plate again, only because Gerald Laird has not hit Piñiero well in the past (only 2-for-13), and I’m not sure what they’re gonna do about shortstop because neither Everett nor Santiago has a hit against him. Meanwhile, Dontrelle Willis will start for the Tigers, and I’m still not sure what’s gonna happen. He hasn’t really imploded yet, but he hasn’t exactly instilled confidence in the fanbase, either. Earlier today, Tom Gage pointed out on Twitter that Dontrelle is 0-3 in nine career road starts for the Tigers (He does not mention ERA, which I would imagine would be quite high). I’m not surprised by the fact that he’s winless. I’m more amazed that he’s somehow ended up with six no-decisions out of the nine starts. At any rate, he hasn’t faced the Angels since 2005, which was the year he almost won the Cy Young. Obviously, a lot’s changed since then. As a matter of fact, only three current Angels have ever faced Dontrelle: Bobby Abreu (who wasn’t even with the Angels in 2005), Juan Rivera, and Maicer Izturis. Get ready for a long night. Really. That’s not a knock on Dontrelle at all. The game starts at freakin’ 10:00 at night. I’m not getting to sleep before 1 AM likely. And I have to get up at 7:00. So yeah.

Deep But Not Enough

Short post, because I have to leave very quickly. Well, at least we finally had a starter go seven innings. I didn’t see as much of the beginning of this game as I wanted to because I was bouncing between it and another show. At any rate, Justin Verlander said that his fastball command was off but his offspeed stuff was working. Whatever it was, he recovered from a 28-pitch first inning to last seven. However, it still wasn’t enough. Justin only had one walk, but it was a leadoff walk to Milton Bradley that he couldn’t get away with. I’m not sure what all the hating on Gerald Laird was after this game. He gunned down Jack Wilson and made two more close (Seriously, Pudge couldn’t have done any better). I actually thought Milton Bradley was out (and the fact that it was close was impressive enough cuz Laird had to dig that ball out of the dirt), but Santiago was behind Bradley when he caught the ball and therefore the umpire was not gonna be able to see the tag. I was not surprised that the offense didn’t do much against Ryan Rowland-Smith, but I am wondering how Scott Sizemore did NOT beat out that double play ball. He’s not necessarily a burner, but he’s no Sean Casey either, and that play took a really long time to develop.

Today, the Tigers will look to avoid getting swept at the hands of the Mariners. Max Scherzer will be up against Ian Snell. Snell struck out 17 Mud Hens in a game once last year. Scherzer only has numbers against Casey Kotchman, Jack Wilson, and Chone Figgins, and Wilson’s the only one with a hit off him, but that’s way too small a sample size to determine anything. I’d love to give more information, but I’m leaving to go see Wicked right now (literally). As such, I will miss the beginning of this game.

Welcome to the West Coast

Well, everyone on the blogosphere seems to be taking to this game by writing maybe one paragraph while holding their collective noses, and meanwhile providing no further insight beyond “everyone sucked.” Therefore, it falls to me to try to make sense out of it, although one thing to consider is that the west coast rarely makes sense. Bonderman was cruising pretty well for the first part of the game. He did give up a walk and stolen base to Chone Figgins in the first (and no matter what anyone else tells you, Laird had no shot at throwing out either Figgins or Ichiro later on), but got around that just fine. Then in the third, he gave up a two-out single to Ichiro, and I think everyone in the ballpark knew that Ichiro would be off and running, but Bonderman made a bad pickoff throw. For some reason, that got him flustered and he never seemed to recover from it. The error from Laird on the bunt in the following inning didn’t help matters, but with the way Bondo kept giving up hits, it probably only served to speed up the inevitable. And so we have the fourth game in a row where the opposition got a whole lot of hits, and that’s still a mystery that’s unsolved. I listened to a little bit on Gameday Audio, and Jim Price was spinning some conspiracy theory about the last series with Kansas City wherein someone was stealing signs and giving them to the Royals, because they got hits that were out-of-character (his specific example was the pull-hitter Yuniesky Betancourt flipping an outside pitch into right field). That sounds a little far-fetched, but so does the concept of every single starter giving up a ton of hits through an entire turn of the rotation.

There obviously wasn’t a lot on offense, but it’s hard to extrapolate anything from that since Felix Hernandez is one of the best pitchers in baseball. Rod Allen kept saying that Felix had been wild previously since he’d had seven walks on the season, but he neglected to mention that six of those were in his first start. Still, the Tigers only had one good inning that featured a Cabrera 2-run double that put the Tigers within one before the pitching fell apart. Laird had a double later in the game, and I’d like to mention that his average is now higher than Alex Avila’s. Just sayin’. But as I said, you can’t take a whole lot away from the offense in this game.

So needless to say, that last turn through the rotation was rather blah, and it began with a shaky Justin Verlander start against Cleveland. It’ll be up to Verlander to turn that ship around and get the rotation back on track. He didn’t have a lot of luck with the Mariners last year (the last time he was at Safeco Field, he had a perfect game through four innings with a ton of strikeouts before the Mariners scored five runs against him in the fifth) but his career numbers are good. Ichiro hits him well, as does Milton Bradley, but Chone Figgins is 2-for-16 with eight strikeouts. JV has given up a home run apiece to Ichiro, Franklin Gutierrez, and Casey Kotchman (try as I might, I don’t remember that one). He’ll be up against the Aussie Ryan Rowland-Smith. His ERA against the Tigers is 5.61 but I’m guessing most of that came as a reliever. His two starts (that I remember) against the Tigers didn’t result in a lot of offense. Also, most of the Tigers do not have good numbers against him at all. Ryan Raburn’s had the most success. He’s 3-for-5 with two home runs, and Gerald Laird is 2-for-4, but that’s about it as far as Tigers who have hit him well (and I believe one of Laird’s hits may have been a bunt single when he was still with the Texas Rangers). Brandon Inge is 1-for-5 (that one hit being a home run) and Miguel Cabrera is 1-for-6. All of the other Tigers who have faced him don’t have any hits. Kind of a scary proposition, if you ask me.

Rain Delay Turn of Momentum

Photo: Duane Burleson (AP)

Once again, things looked dim, but somehow that home field mojo found a way. I don’t really know what to make of Jarrod Washburn’s outing. I mean, it wasn’t good, by any means, but six runs on five hits, one walk, and a hit batter is a really strange final line. Okay, Russell Branyan hit a BOMB, and Jose Lopez’s home run was a line drive, but the other two home runs, though hit well, were definitely wind-blown. And in between all those home runs, he got some really easy outs (and Brandon Inge made two sensational plays that only netted him #3 on the Web Gems list). This game also featured some really good, crucial, scoreless innings from Zach Miner and Bobby Seay.

Meanwhile, once the rain stopped, the Tigers’ swings got a whole lot better, and apparently Leyland pushed the right buttons at the right time, cuz all three pinch-hitters he used came through with some sort of contribution, from Huff’s RBI groundout to Avila’s 2-run single to Guillen’s walk leading off the ninth. After the eighth inning, it looked as though any win the Tigers would have was snatched from them by the Seattle defense. But then David Aardsma had some control problems in the ninth. Give credit to Brandon Inge, who hit a fly ball that was just deep enough to score Guillen (collision or no) and to Clete Thomas, who hit the game-winner.

Tonight, the Tigers begin their final west coast swing of the year (thank goodness). First stop: Oakland. Since they last saw them, the A’s have pretty much traded away or released every veteran on their roster, save for Mark Ellis and Nomar Garciaparra. They’ve gone from being what I would term an “underachieving” offense to an offense that you’re probably as much as can be expected from (for the record, I DO term the Tigers’ offense as “underachieving”). Still, the last time I checked in on them, they did score quite a bit of runs against the White Sox. And the Tigers generally don’t play well at the Coliseum, no matter what the name is. At any rate, they’ll face lefty Gio Gonzalez tonight. He struggled for most of the year (including a loss to the Tigers, although they only scored three runs off him), but had put together a really good stretch prior to his last start, when he was shelled by the White Sox. Meanwhile, Edwin Jackson could use a good, stress-free start. He won his last start and only gave up three runs, but it was a bit of a struggle. I know. I was there. However, as I've said numerous times, strange things happen on the west coast. It’d be nice if the Tigers could get a nice, quick win, as well, because I have to get up at 7 AM tomorrow morning.

And Sometimes, All it Takes is One Mistake

Just like last time, I can’t offer a whole lot of insight into this game, as it was the bottom of the eighth when I got home. I did get to listen to most of the top of the fifth on the radio, and that’s when all the damage was done. Justin struck out ten, but from what I hear, when they did make contact, it was hit hard somewhere. And I suppose the moral of this story is that you may as well let Ichiro get his pesky little infield singles, cuz it beats giving up bombs to him. Meanwhile, I did caution you that the Tigers only beat Ian Snell in Pittsburgh because of Rick Porcello’s bat, as odd as that sounds. And it’s not like Snell was stranding baserunners left and right. The Tigers never did put up much of a threat. They had six hits for the game, but Magglio had three of them.

I want to talk about Pudge just a bit more, and then I promise I’ll shut up about him (unless something meaningful happens further down the road). After the Tigers’ game ended, I loaded up MLB.tv and started watching what remained of the Twins-Rangers game. Pudge was 3-for-4 in his return. I only saw his final two at-bats, and he grounded out his final time up (against Joe Nathan), but he had a solid single to right in the sixth or seventh inning (can’t remember which). I’m not one to memorize batting stances or particular types of swings (unless they’re really distinct like Ichiro’s, and in that case you can’t help but memorize), but when Pudge gets base hits like that, he has a swing that looks like no one else’s. I realized that I missed seeing that swing. I watched him a couple of times with the Astros, but seeing him in a Rangers uniform, it felt (almost) right (Which doesn’t make a whole lot of sense, since I don’t really remember him from when he was a Ranger the first time. I know I saw him, but I have no memory of him prior to his days in Detroit). Maybe I’ll watch Rangers games a little bit more than I would have (as long as the Tigers are not playing, of course). Okay, I’ll shut up now.

Today is the rubber match of this series, and the last game before the Tigers have to head out to the west coast. Given the fact that the Tigers generally don’t play well on the west coast, it would behoove them to win today. Jarrod Washburn had a good start his last time out against the Royals, and now has the task of facing his old team. That ought to induce a few mind games. And since I don’t work today, I’ll FINALLY get to see him pitch. The Mariners will send out the Australian lefty, Ryan Rowland-Smith (and the fact that he has a hyphenated name just blows Rod Allen’s mind). The Tigers have faced him a few times as a reliever and once as a starter. You should remember that game, though you may not remember Ryan Rowland-Smith. It was that 15-inning game last year in Seattle. The Tigers finally won that game 2-1 because the Mariners ran out of pitchers and sent backup catcher Jamie Burke to the mound to pitch the fifteenth inning. It was also probably Nate Robertson’s best start of the 2008 season (nine innings, only one run). However, that also means that they only got one run off Ryan Rowland-Smith. It came on a solo home run from Ryan Raburn. With a lefty on the mound and Granderson in his typical August slump, he gets the day off (and he might get tomorrow off, too, with Oakland starting a lefty). Clete Thomas gets the nod in center field.

Finally Some Late Heroics

Photo: AP

REALLY short post today, as I have to go to work in about half an hour. It was the top of the eighth inning when I got home from work, so I arrived just in time to see two normally rock-solid relievers have meltdowns, one on each team. For some reason, Bobby Seay has not pitched well against the Twins and the Mariners this year (I still remember the two-run homer he gave up to Russell Branyan last month). However, he managed to vulture a win when the Tigers put up four against Mark Lowe. That home run that Alex Avila hit was a BOMB. Even Cabrera was impressed by it, judging by his postgame interview. The Tigers followed that up with some really good at-bats to retake the lead. And one game after making three errors, Ryan Raburn made up for it with some really good baserunning, first by tagging up on Aubrey Huff’s deep fly ball, then by turning Cabrera’s mistake into a steal of home.

There was some big news yesterday concerning a beloved former Tiger. Yes, Pudge Rodriguez has gone home, so to speak. The Rangers acquired him from the Astros to back up Taylor Teagarden. He must really want the chance to get back into the postseason for him to give up a starting job like that (Though maybe he also took a look at the fact that Teagarden is currently hitting .198). I like the Rangers better than the Astros anyways. And if he can’t be in Detroit, then the next best thing is for him to be with the team he came up with and where the fans absolutely love him (This news created quite the Pudge lovefest on Bless You Boys last night). So this is great news, for the most part.

Tonight, Justin Verlander takes the mound for the Tigers. He was sensational against the Red Sox. He hasn’t faced the Mariners since April, where he had a really bizarre loss. He was perfect and downright dominant through four innings, only to give up five runs in the fifth. He stayed in until the eighth and gave up six runs. Hopefully, this outing looks more like the first four innings of that start and less like the last three. He’ll be opposed by Ian Snell, whom the Tigers last saw with Pittsburgh. In fact, that was the only game that they won in that Pittsburgh series. They won that game 3-1, with two of those RBIs coming off the bat of Rick Porcello. I’ll be at work tonight, so you know what that means.

You're Getting a Lump of Coal

Can we finally be rid of the stupid Christmas in July promotion? At any rate, I think Luke French pitched decently, and probably would’ve had a better line had it not been for a couple errors/defensive mistakes (For some reason, the Tigers haven’t played good defense behind Luke French, although Polanco made a nice play on a line drive that he turned into a double play). Tigers’ pitching as a whole did not walk anybody. Meanwhile, as far as the offense is concerned, well, where’s Pudge when you need him? I mentioned that the Tigers had had their way with Jarrod Washburn in recent years, but I neglected to mention that Pudge (who owns Washburn) provided a lot of the damage. You can’t really point towards failure at scoring opportunities, because there really weren’t that many opportunities (I’m not sure Granderson’s triple counts, because with two outs, you only get one chance to score him). Ironically, through the last turn through the rotation, the only win came on the one night the pitching was kinda crappy.

Now we’re all knotted up at the top of the AL Central with the White Sox coming into town, so this weekend’s series could be very good or very bad. We’ve got a full slate of baseball today with the doubleheader. And the White Sox are coming off of Mark Buerhle’s perfect game (Anyone else not want that to happen?), which means that Hawk Harrelson’s head isn’t even gonna fit into the press box. What I’m kind of astounded by is that Buerhle’s perfect game came against the Rays, who have a good offense anyways and in particular possess speed, speed, and more speed. You’d think one of them would’ve managed a piddly little infield single at some point (especially since Buerhle gets lots of ground balls). At any rate, though, that means we will not have to see him in this series. For Game 1, the Tigers will face Jose Contreras. Contreras is normally a punching bag for the Tigers, but in his first start back from the minors back in June, he absolutely shut them down, which had all of us in fits. However, he proceeded to rattle off several good starts after that, almost halving his ERA in the process, so maybe it was not a fluke. He has not been quite as sharp recently. Justin Verlander was sharp in his last start, but not sharp enough, as the Tigers only scored one run. The White Sox are one of his two “problem” teams, though he got a complete game win against them at U.S. Cellular Field in June, outdueling Jon Danks. Carlos Guillen is back, too, after going 3-for-4 (all singles) in Toledo last night. He did not play the whole game, but the Mud Hens had a 10-run third inning and the Syracuse Chiefs had position players pitching for them for the bulk of the game. Guillen still can’t play the field or bat right-handed, so for now he’ll be a left-handed DH. Josh Anderson has been DFA’d, but I do hope he clears waivers and gets sent to Toledo. He would be a very useful call-up in September as a late-inning pinch-runner. I will try to do a recap of this game before the second game starts.

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).

Yeah, That Makes Perfect Sense

Photo: AP

You have a series between the two top pitching teams in the American League. So naturally the game turns into a slugfest, of course (The Mariners must've brought some of their west coast weirdness with them). I’m not sure what to make of Rick Porcello’s start. At the beginning of the game (like, the first three innings or so), he gave up a lot of hits, but only the Jose Lopez RBI single seemed to be hit hard (everything else seemed to consist of bloops and infield singles). Then came the home runs. Those were definitely hit hard. And they did not stop after Porcello left the game. It seemed no Tigers pitcher was immune except for Brandon Lyon. Yikes.

Meanwhile, the offense apparently just needed to come back to Comerica Park. Or see Garrett Olson, one of the two. The Tigers were almost as home run happy as the Mariners. The big blow came on Magglio’s grand slam (his first since ’02, which ironically came AGAINST the Tigers). I know it came on a hanging breaking ball and not a fastball, but you know, at this point I really don’t care. You still have to hit it (something that Marcus Thames demonstrated in not one, but two of his at-bats where he got hanging breaking balls and just missed ‘em). He needed that, and the team needed it even more, as it turns out.

Okay, the “easy” pitcher is over and done with, and the Tigers did what they needed to do against him. Now comes the hard part. They gotta try to do the same thing against one of the best pitchers in baseball in Felix Hernandez, who seems to be entering his prime this year (with that record and that earned run average, I’m surprised that he isn’t really mentioned as a dark horse Cy Young candidate). The Tigers have faced him once this year, and it came at Safeco Field (duh). They did manage to score three runs against him (of the “manufacture” variety, which include a successful squeeze play), but ultimately lost because Justin Verlander had one strange and bizarre inning in which he gave up five runs. The last time Hernandez was at Comerica Park (back in ’07), the Tigers got to him for six earned runs, but he still won that game because Jeremy Bonderman imploded (He was also in the midst of hiding an elbow injury). Once again, I really want good things for Armando Galarraga. He went from “better” against Oakland to “really good” against Kansas City to “a step backwards” against Cleveland. I want to see those good sinkers and sliders again, not those different-looking pitches that aren’t effective (and please do a better job of keeping Seattle in the ballpark than the guys last night did). He faced the Mariners once last year at Safeco Field. He had serious issues with throwing strikes in that game but somehow was able to hold the Mariners to only one run (This is a game that the Tigers eventually lost because Fernando Rodney gave up a two-run homer in the eighth). Suffice it to say, I don't think the Tigers have the luxury of giving up seven runs tonight, be it from Galarraga or the bullpen. Jim Leyland has every lefty he can get in the lineup, and Ryan Raburn starts at third base tonight in place of Brandon Inge. I suppose Brandon needs a blow. He never really had rest over the All-Star Break, he’s in a bit of a mini-slump, and perhaps the reason for that is the sore knee that’s been bothering him.

Safeco Field: Still Weird, But No More Hell

Photo: Otto Greule, Jr. (Getty Images)

Considering that getting swept in this series was a very real possibility, given how well Seattle had been playing, taking two of three is certainly something I’ll take without any complaint whatsoever. As far as Porcello’s outing, I sensed a little bit of teetering on the brink, but he never got there, so that’s the important part (I guess you could contrast that with Verlander, who didn’t have any teetering whatsoever and still lost). The bullpen had maybe a few too many baserunners and they did give up a run, but it didn’t really matter at that point (the run-scoring single was not hit very hard, and it had been set up by an infield single). I think Porcello got pulled at the right time, cuz the Mariners were starting to hit some loud outs in the seventh inning (nice play by Inge, after basically being out-highlight-reeled by Adrian Beltre all weekend). And given that I certainly know what happens to rookies after they get their first Major League win, I was waiting for the inevitable towel full of shaving cream in Rick Porcello’s face. And sure enough, during his postgame interview, I noticed Justin Verlander in the background, walking just a little too casually toward the camera. Apparently they also poured beer on Porcello in the clubhouse.

I guess kudos goes to the team for demonstrating that they can win a series without hitting a home run (By the way, has anyone else realized that only five guys on the team have homered this year?). Outside of a few doubles, they mostly got it done with singles, bunts, stolen bases, hit-and-run, and taking advantage of errors. Unlike a lot of TV broadcasters, I don’t find “small ball” to be that exciting, but it’s still important to be able to manufacture runs when you have to, and the boys demonstrated an ability to do just that (However, I strongly discourage anyone from trying to turn the Tigers into the Twins or the Angels). Miguel Cabrera made a bid for a home run that probably would’ve made it out in most parks, but apparently the ball just doesn’t carry in Seattle. Once again, with the exception of Matt Treanor, there was a lot of production out of the bottom of the order. As far as the middle of the order goes, Maggs has been hitting the ball a lot harder over the past couple days, plus he’s taken a lot of walks. Guillen, who’s been the one really struggling, has had some long at-bats over the past couple days, and he was rewarded with two hits yesterday (granted, they were both hit-and-run singles, but it’s a start).

Today is another off-day, but starting tomorrow night, the Tigers will be down the coast in Anaheim, and if you thought strange things happened at Safeco Field, that’s usually nothing compared to Angel Stadium. The Angels are kind of in a tailspin right now. They just got swept by the Twins, their top three starters are on the DL, another pitcher was tragically killed by a drunk driver, Vladimir Guerrero is on the DL, and their bullpen is having serious issues, especially with walks. If ever there was an opportunity, now would be the time. However, they are still a good team capable of stepping up at any time, and the Tigers have not played well in Anaheim over the past couple years. Plus, they are going to be facing the Angels’ two best (healthy) pitchers. First up is Armando Galarraga against Jered Weaver. Galarraga has made three starts against the Angels in his career, two good, one bad (that was the one start he made when he was still with Texas). Jered Weaver has had several good starts and one very bad start against the Tigers. So it’s more late-night action, only this time I won’t be staying around for the whole game. I love ‘em to death, but when you gotta get up at 6 AM the next day, it just ain’t gonna happen.

Flu? What Flu?

Photo: Otto Greule, Jr. (Getty Images)

So apparently Leyland’s plan to keep Adam Everett away from everyone else didn’t quite work, cuz the flu spread, first to Marcus Thames, then it was revealed after the game last night that Edwin Jackson was “sick as a dog” (in the words of Jim Leyland). He sure didn’t look like it on the mound. Unlike Verlander, Jackson’s good career numbers against Seattle came through for him. These types of close, low-scoring games are downright exhausting to watch, cuz one mistake can totally change the outlook of the game, and as a result, I was wiped when this one was over. Rodney finally allowed a baserunner and probably wasn’t as sharp as he had been, but he was able to get Beltre and Sweeney to hit the ball right to people. The pitching staff also got some great defense from Polanco and Granderson, who threw out Jose Lopez at home in a critical spot.

Miguel Cabrera had a rare off-day, but against Erik Bedard, that’s not too disconcerting. He did come through in the sixth with the single that started the rally. It took all the Tigers had to get one run across. The second run came courtesy of Ichiro and his throwing error. Again, since it was against a very good pitcher, this isn’t cause for concern right now, though I’d like to see them put up more of a fight against the Seattle bullpen.

Well, today I finally get MY first look at Rick Porcello. He’s pitching on nine days rest, which is good to conserve his arm, but I’ve heard that it’s not good for sinkerballers to get extra rest because then they feel TOO strong and therefore their sinker doesn’t sink. Carlos Silva starts for the Mariners, another sinkerballer. The Tigers pounded him on three separate occasions last year, but prior to that, he had been really tough on them, and I’ve heard that he’s pitching much better so far this year (he did pitch quite well in the World Baseball Classic up until the semifinals). Guillen will DH today with Anderson in left field, and Treanor gets a start behind the plate.

I Warned You About the West Coast

Man, first game on the west coast and ALREADY we’re in Twilight Zone Hell. What happened? Justin Verlander pitched the best game I’ve seen from him in a long time (better than the start against Texas), and he STILL gave up six runs. And for the most part, it was just that fifth inning (you can’t even call them fluke hits, because the balls were hit hard, moreso than any out he got). Peripherally, you got everything you would’ve wanted out of him: 7.1 innings, a low pitch count, lots of strikes, only one walk, eight strikeouts, and 99 miles per hour. Even Leyland can’t figure it out. There is only one parallel I can try to draw, and it actually isn’t one of Verlander’s games. It was in ’07 during Interleague play in a game against the Atlanta Braves. Kenny Rogers and John Smoltz were locked in a scoreless pitching duel. Both pitchers were totally on their game and pitching very, very well. Then all of a sudden in the sixth inning (with two outs), the Tigers strung a bunch of hits together and scored 5 runs against Smoltz. It’s somewhat reminiscent of last night’s game cuz that just came out of the blue as well. Of course, in Verlander’s case, he got victimized by his defense again. For some reason, the defense just hasn’t been there for him in his first three starts this season. All the other pitchers get spectacular plays, and he gets costly errors (mostly from Inge). The errors cost him an inning (and a win) against Texas, and last night it may have cost him the game. Had Inge been able to not make the error, Russell Branyan would’ve been a dead duck at the plate and there would’ve been two outs, meaning it would’ve been unlikely that Franklin Gutierrez would bunt. But it looks as though Seattle has evolved into the type of team that you can’t allow them opportunities to force the issue. Verlander said he’s going to have a séance to the baseball gods. He’s probably joking, but he’s certainly welcome to do so provided he doesn’t do anything stupid that’ll piss me off.

By the way, the Tigers DID outhit the Mariners, but all nine of their hits were singles. Granted, Miguel Cabrera probably could’ve had three doubles, but he hit the ball so hard each time that it got to the outfielder really quickly (apparently there are times when you can hit the ball TOO hard). And the only reason his first single was not a home run was that he didn’t get it up high enough. He’s really the only one who hit the ball hard in the second inning when the Tigers got their three runs. Guillen had an infield single that was really a double-play ball bobbled by Beltre (so both Gold Glove-caliber third basemen made miscues in this game, though Inge’s was more costly), and Inge hit a ground ball in the right spot. And I don’t know why Santiago was given a sacrifice while Gutierrez got credit for a bunt single.

By the way, I had a dream last night that Brandon Webb no-hit the Tigers. Does anyone else find this disturbing?

It doesn’t get any easier for the Tiger hitters tonight as they’re up against Erik Bedard, who seems to have regained his form. I was taking a look at the press pass online, and to my surprise, most of the Tigers have had very few at-bats against Bedard (a lot of 0-for-2s or 1-for-4s or the like). The only one with a significant number is Laird, who has had 14, but not much success. Miguel Cabrera is only 1-for-6 off Bedard, but that one hit was a home run. Edwin Jackson has good career numbers against the Mariners, but so did Verlander. Please, no more Twilight Zone Hell. By the way, I have a small request that Gerald Laird switch to wearing long pants, not because of any Fashion Police issue, but because I keep getting him mixed up with Brandon Inge when he’s at the plate. They have, like, the exact same legs. Your Mood Music for tonight: Well, as most of you know, Safeco Field is apparently right next door to a train yard, cuz you can hear the trains throughout the whole game. In honor of that, I thought it would be most fitting to present Ozzy Osbourne’s “Crazy Train.”