Verlander & Schlereth of the Series (Rangers)

Just as quickly as the Tigers fans were encouraged that Detroit was turning things around by winning 4 straight series they come back to mediocrity by losing two in a row. Sorry for the lack of review about the Pirates series, I was camping on the west side for the weekend and got a much needed break from the disappointing Old English D.  But from what I can tell I didn’t miss too much and the series awards would be pretty easy to pass out. 

Moving on to the Rangers series, the pitching matchups looked to favor Detroit in the final game (Fister vs Oswalt).  The Rangers got lucky and missed JV, so most fans already gave this series to Texas.  Well again it is a good thing the games are actually played on the field because Rick came out and had one of his best outings of the season, and the offense actually scored early to take some pressure off the 23 year old.  Drey Smyly continues to show he is an average MLB pitcher (at-best), and Fister just looks terrible on the mound right now.  Let’s move onto the awards, ahll we.

Verlander of the Series: well the offense scored as many runs in the first inning of game 1 as they did all of the Pittsburgh series, but they still frustrated me in this series.  Oswalt is not the same pitcher he was 5 years ago, and the Tigers hitters let him off easy for much of the game.  Folks, we should have scored 9 runs just off of Roy last night.  For most of the game we outhit the Rangers, except they did it with home runs and we did it with singles.  Do you realize that the Seattle Mariners have more homeruns that our lineup.  The Yankees almost double.  This team is built on smashing the ball around the park, there is no speed to hit an run or go first to third. We need to hit extra base knocks to score runs, it is that simple.  But right now we have almost 20 less home runs as we did at this point last season.  People, we didn’t have Prince Fielder last season.  What is wrong with this lineup right now?  Ok, sorry for the rant, but I had to get that out.  I am still frustrated with the offense from making marginal major league pitchers look like Verlander, so they will need to have a 30 run series for me to give them this award.  I will give the Verlander of the Series to Rick Porcello.  He overcame his demons of old and got out of the first inning against the Rangers.  It probably helped that the offense gave him 5 early runs to calm him down, but Rick really had the sinker ball moving around the strike zone and he located well all night. He finished with 7 strike outs in just 6 innings for his first K/IP over 1 for the season.  I doubt Rick will do this every start, but he now has 3 good starts in a row and has seemed to settle into the warm weather.  We will need him to step up more if Fister is going to continue to do his thing on the mound.  This takes me to the next award…

Schlereth of the Series: Doug effing Fister.  Do you remember last year when we picked him up from the lowly Mariners?  He outpitched Verlander during the 2^nd half of the season, the same guy that won the Cy Young and MVP.  Us Tigers fans expected this to be one of the best 1-2 punches in all of baseball this year.  No he was not going to continue his 1.75 ERA or his 8K’s to 1 BB ratio, but I think we all expected him to have an ERA in the low 3’s and to push to win 15 games.  Then injury struck and Fister missed the first month of the season, he came back average and got hurt again.  Now he came back from his 2^nd DL stint and looks extremely average.  I actually hope his side is still bothering him, it would at least give him an excuse of why he has been so bad lately. Dougie Fresh was up there throwing batting practice last night in a home run friendly park to the best offense in the league, that is not a good combination for Detroit.  Fister served up 5 hits in a 0-2 or 1-2 count (3 of those were home runs).  He did not locate his sinker ball well at all and looked very predictable on the mound.  On a night where all he had to be was average and the Tigers would have won the game and the series, he allowed Oswalt to have a CC Sabathia win.  If the Tigers have any chance of making the playoffs, they need 3 of their starters to be consistent.  We all know what JV will give us on a nightly basis, but then the remaining 4 guys are a mystery right now.  We knew Rick and Max would be inconsistent, and nobody knew what to expect from Smyly, but so far Fister has been extremely disappointing. 

Verlander & Schlereth of the Series (Cardinals)

Detroit continued to roll through interleague play with their 4th straight series win.  Don't look now, but they are only 2.5 games back of first place in the Comedy Central again.  On a side note, I should stop mocking the AL Central so much because the NL Central has 2 of the worst teams in all of baseball. 

Verlander of the Series has to go to the starting pitching in general.  Verlander, Porcello, and Turner all pitched well enough to get a win.  St. Louis had the 2nd best offense in all of the NL coming into the series and Tiger pitching shut them down for 3 games.  The Cards managed a total of 7 runs, and only 4 of them were earned.  I don't think this pitching staff could do much better in a 3 game series.  In a close 2nd would have to be the bullpen.  In their last 32 games they have been the best bullpen in all of baseball.  To keep the game tied yesterday the bullpen went out and pitched 5 shut out innings where they struck out 7, walked one and gave up 2 hits.  I am impressed.

Schlereth of the Series will go to Miguel Cabrera for the 2nd time this season.  The first time he heard me and became the Verlander the next series, I hope he can do that again.  Miguel struggled against the Cards with back to back 0-4 games.  People, you do not see this often, but it shows you how hard it is to hit a baseball at the major league level.  Two average pitchers (Westbrook and Loshe) had Miggy confused at the plate.  I guess you have to give credit to them as well because Miguel might be fooled in one at bat per game, but 8 in a row?  There is no doubt that he will start hitting again and raise the average closer to .320, but this was a rough series for the big fella.

Verlander & Schlereth of the Series (Rockies)

The Tigers continued their dominance over the NL last weekend with their 3rd straight series win and 4th overall against the inferior senior circuit.  This version of awards is pretty easy to decide. 

Verlander of the Series has to go to Max Scherzer.  While he did have a 15K outing earlier this season, but Sunday's pitching performance was masterful.  It might have been Max's best start of his career.  In the 4th inning the game was delayed for 45 minutes, and Max came back out of the dugout to finish the inning and go 4 more!  He struck out 12 Rockies and didnt allow a run.  Personally, I think the most important stat was Scherzer didn't walk anyone.  I do not expect Max to come out and pitch like this every night, but maybe this is a turning point of his season.  I think he is talented enough to be a 2nd starter on some teams, but the problem is he pitches like an ace once in every 5-6 starts, then like a marginal AAA pitcher once in that span and the remaining 3-4 starts are average at best.  If Scherzer can lower his ERA to around 4.00 and have his WHIP down in the 1.2 range, the Tigers will be tough to keep out of the division lead for long.

Schlereth of the Series will go to Jose Valverde.  He has a tendency of racking up quite a few of these awards.  The spud sputtered out on Friday night blowing a game tied at 4.  By the time he left the mound the Tigers were down 8-4 with 2 more men on base that he was responsible for.  I believed Jose was turning the corner a bit in his outings.  He was using the splitter with more regularity, his velocity was creeping back up into the mid 90's, and his control seemed to be improving.  Well, Papa took a big step back with this loss. Maybe this season is just one of those 1 step forwards and 2 steps back for the baked potato.

Tigers Week 9 Recap (30-33)

Detroit got 2 more series wins over the week as Tiger's fans flooded into the Great American Ballpark and Wrigley Field respectively.  The fans got to see some pretty decent baseball from the Boys of Summer, and it has caused the local media to believe Detroit has turned a corner of their season and will begin to assume their throne of the class of the AL Central.

Detroit played 3 one run games against the Reds.  They lost the first from a suicide squeeze play. In reality, the Reds outplayed the Tigers on the night and probably shouldn't have needed the gimmick play to win the game.  Verlander did his best to get a win on Saturday, but Delmon Young and the offense didn't want to give him any support again.  Luckily we managed to scrape a run across late in the game to win the 2nd game.  Finally, on the ESPN game of the week Sunday night, Drew Smyly did his best to make every viewer vomit a little in their mouth when a giant blood blister broke on his throwing hand. The rookie had to leave the game early, and Detroit again had to rely on the bullpen.  When all hope seemed lost, and the Tigers were laying an egg on national tv, the bats woke up against the bullpen again.  This time scoring 5 runs off of relievers, Aroldis Chapman being one of them.  Detroit got their first series win since the 3 game sweep of the little league Twins in May.

Heading into the series with the Cubs, most fans thought the Tigers needed a sweep to really make us believe they are a different team.  Well, those dreams were squashed in the first game of the series when Peralta make a mockery of the shortstop position.  He somehow had back to back routine ground balls turn into 2 errors turn into 1 game winning run for Chicago.  Boo.  Then the Tigers realized, hey the Cubs might be worse than the Twins and there are more Tiger fans here than lame Cubs fans... maybe we should play baseball.  The bats woke up for an 8-4 win in the 2nd game of the series.  Scherzer started and pitched his normal game, but luckily for him the offense bailed him out.  Boesch went off in the game, collecting 4 hits, including a home run.  The rubber match also happened to fall on Justin Verlander Day, and he did not disappoint.  The offense was slow to give him much help, but in the end JV got his 6th win of the season and Austin led the offense to a second straight series victory.

Looking forward, the Tigers welcome the Rockies and the Cardinals to Comerica Park as interleague play continues.  Folks, these teams are average at best.  The Rockies are 0-9 in games against the AL this season.  Their pitching might be worse than the Mudhens, and their hitting is close to useless outside of Coors Field.  Of course this combination will likely mean a 10 run outburst for the Rockies.  Detroit should win the next two series to continue to move closer to .500 and catching the White Sox for first place in the division.  One thing that interleague shows is how miserable the NL is compared to the AL.  The Tigers are an average baseball team, let me be honest.  Yet, they are head and shoulders better than the majority of NL teams.  It is kind of a joke.  I finally get to go back to Comerica this Sunday as well for a Father's Day celebration with my dad and grandpa.  It should be a blast.

Verlander & Schlereth of the Series (Cubs)

Well the Tigers should have swept the lowly Tigers, but they escaped with another series win which is important. Detroit just simply abused the Cubs bullpen (or whatever they call it), and Wrigley Field became Comerica Park West.  If you are a Cubs fan, I am sorry, but that was an embarrassment.

Verlander of the Series: This is a tough one between the fans and JV.  I will give JV the nod because at times he looked absolutely dominant again, and he got his first win since May 18th (his no-hit attempt). Folks, JV should never go a month in between wins, he is too good.  At some point this season will the offense bail him out or at least score 4 runs while he is on the mound?  Verlander struggled in the 2nd inning by giving up 2 runs, but then was lights out the rest of the way.  He finished with 8 strikeouts and 0 walks on the day. He also became the 2nd pitcher (after Strasburg the Great) to get to 100 K's on the season.  I am hoping JV doesn't get the extra day of rest for his next start which will allow him to pitch against St. Louis and Pittsburgh (when I visit PNC Park).

Schlereth of the Series: I have to give this to Jhonny Peralta.  Not only did he get an error on a routine ground ball to short, he followed it up on the next batter with a throwing error to first.  It was the only reason the Cubs scored a run off of Phil Coke on Tuesday night.  I don't know if the Tigers would have been able to score again to pull out the victory, but they should not have lost like that.  I knew the defense would be bad, but I thought they would at least be average in ground balls hit directly at them.

Looking ahead, the Tigers get the terrible Rockies coming to town.  These are the same Rockies who are 0-9 in inter-league play, so this probably means they will come in to Detroit and sweep the Tigers.  It would be nice to get another series win and pull closer to the White Sox (they play at the Dodgers).  The Rockies have some of the worst starting pitching that I can remember seeing.  They have a potent offense in their home stadium, but they lose their punch on the road.  Honestly, the Tigers should have no problem scoring 20+ runs in this series.  I guess at this point, let's just hope for another series win.

Verlander & Schlereth of the Series (Reds)

The Tigers headed to Cincinnati to take on the Reds at Great American Ballpark.  I was planning on heading down there for the weekend, but Chelsea and I were still traveled out from Boston (and the Sunday night game was switched to the ESPN game of the week at 8pm).  Detroit played a very good series on the road, and they continued there stretch of winning twice as much as losing inter-league games.  Let's get to the awards!

Verlander of the Series: I have to go with Austin Jackson with this series.  The man came back for the last two games of the series and the Tigers, of course, went 2-0.  He was hitless in the first game back, but then was the ultimate catalyst in the series finale on the big stage.  He hit a 2 run double against the best reliever in baseball to give the Tigers the game and series victory.  And as always, he plays a 2nd to none centerfield.  Man, how we missed our young star.  If AJ keeps this up there is no way that Ron Washington can keep him off of the All-Star roster.

The Schlereth of the Series: will belong to Rick Porcello.  This is a tough one because the bullpen technically got the loss for the Friday night game, but Rick could have pitched better.  This guy has a lot of talent in that right arm, but he just cannot stay consistent.  I know getting 14 wins a year from your 4th starter is pretty good, but when we drafted Rick we had number 2 expectations.  Yes, he is still young, but right now he is struggling.  He cannot keep the ball down with his sinker which is resulting in a lot of hard hit balls.  I hope he can turn things around, at least for the end of June and July since these have been his best two months of his career. In a close second place it has to be Delmon Young.  Part of it is that I just really dislike the inept left fielder, and trading him for a bag of seeds actually sounds like a good investment at this point.  The other part is he continually gives me reasons to be titled my Tiger... to yell at. He made one of the worst plays in left field on Saturday, of course during JV's start, that ended up making JV get a 4 out inning which led to a 2 run 2 out single (the only two runs the Reds scored). The dude is a half tool player... he cannot field a position, throw, steal bases, or hit for average.  The half tool comes from him being able to hit for power.. sometimes.

Looking forward, the Tigers have a real shot of sweeping the Cubs.  The way this season is going, they likely will not, but the Cubs are miserable.  Detroit has the pitching advantage in 2 of the games (with Matt Garza being the exception), and they have a better lineup.  Hopefully the friendly confines of Wrigley are friendly to the road team.

Verlander & Schlereth of the Series (Indians)

 Well the Tigers tried their hardest to continue their losing streak against the Tribe this week, but eventually they were able to scratch out one win in the series.  Cleveland improved their record at Comerica to 5-24 in their last 29 tries, they almost doubled their wins in one series.  Anyways, since the Tigers ended on somewhat of a decent note (good enough that the majority of the media is back on the band wagon and expect yesterday to be the turnaround game), my awards will have a more positive outlook than usual.

The Verlander of the Series is a tough one again.  There are a few guys that could be considered here, and heck, the offense even scored 13 runs in the last 2 games.  Miguel continued his hot streak, and seriously looks like he could be a .400 hitter over the course of a season if he didn’t take at bats off.  But, I am going to go with James “Marlbro Man” Leyland for his first positive review of the season.  Over the past few weeks, most Tiger’s fans have called for Jim’s head because firing a manager mid-season will instantly make the bottom 5 hitters be able to hit a 95 mph fastball.  Well, I thought I would give credit when Jim’s moves pay off.  Yesterday, starting in the bottom of the 1^st inning it was Leyland’s day in the decision-making department.  After Berry got on base, he immediately put the hit and run on with Boesch.  It caused Boesch to focus more to make contact, he shortened his swing a bit, and actually got a hit in the process which started the 4 run rally.  Then to start the next big inning, Jim had Holaday lay down a sacrifice bunt to move Danny Worth to 2^nd.  Finally, with Brennan up again and the count 3-0, Jim gave him the green light to the slumping hitter.  It was a very risky move, considering the 2 nights before Brennan “deep ball” consisted of pop ups to third base.  Brennan came through again with a ground rule double to straight away center.  Now, Jim cannot manage the same way every game because the risk outweighed the reward on most of those calls, but for some reason yesterday they paid off.  Jim set himself up to take the blame if the Tigers lost the game, and put Brennan in the spotlight (even if just for an afternoon).  Nice work skip.

The Schlereth of the Series will have to go to both Max Scherzer and the overall defense.  Max was looking to string together another quality start and try to add some consistency to the rotation.  Instead, he got abused on the mound.  He got hit hard most of the night, and he struggled to strike anyone out for one of the first times this season.  The defense could have helped him out in big ways in the game, but it was not meant to be.  Folks, this defense was expected to be bad, but it is a train wreck right now.  Prince is looking to cruise to victory in the most errors for a 1^st baseman (he already has 7), and countless other balls that would have completed a double play, stopped an error from a teammate, or if he was just average at the position he would have stopped multiple hits that got into right field.  People kept saying Miguel was just an average first baseman, but there is no comparison between the two.  Then Brennan dropped a routine pop-up in game two that extended the first inning where Scherzer gave up a 3 run home run (all 3 unearned runs), and coincidentally the Tigers lost by 3.  I know they are not good, but it would be nice to see a little bit of improvement in the field somehow.  Maybe when AJ and Dirks come back the outfield will look like Dirks in left, AJ in center, and Berry in right.  Also, Worth has been playing a very good 2^nd base lately (but nobody cares because he is hitting .200).

Looking forward, the Tigers look to extend their amazing 72-39 interleague record under Jim Leyland, and they certainly have some teams to do it against.  The Reds are first place in their division, but after that they get the Cubs, Rockies, Cardinals, and Pirates.  If the team was playing well, there is no reason they wouldn’t be able to win all of these series… but the way its going they could get swept by the Cubs.

The worst baseball game ever played...?

The Tigers came into last night’s contest with Cleveland 6 games behind the White Sox for 1^st place in the division.  They welcomed the Indians to Comerica Park for the first time this year after being swept by them earlier this season.  Over the past 2 seasons, Detroit had only lost to Cleveland a hand full of times at home.  Looking at the matchup last night it seemed like the Tigers had a big advantage on the mound with Drew Smyly.  Cleveland is the worst team in the AL against left-handed pitchers, and they countered with what is left of Ubaldo Jimenez.  Some people might have remembered what he did in the first half of 2010, but since then this pitcher has been borderline awful.  He entered sporting a 6.5 BB/ 9 IP, dead last among AL starters.  To make matters worse, it was 7.6 BB/ 9 IP on road starts this season.  He was 0-4 with a 9.00+ ERA in his career at Comerica, and had a 6.35 ERA in road starts this season.  Do I need to continue?  Ok, one more for good measure, Jimenez just came off a 7 ER outing.  If Phil Hughes is the definition of average, Ubalado is nowhere close. The game was over before it started, right?  The Tigers were going to come out and score 9 off Jimenez and force Manny Acta to use his bullpen early in the game.

But as it should be expected now with this offense, Detroit went out and scored 1 time off of the dominant Jimenez.  What is worse is they drew one walk in Ubaldo’s 6+ innings, which happened to come on his last batter, Ramon Santiago.  Last night I was not in a good mood, but I have had time to step back and cool down a bit from the extreme frustration that the Tigers are causing me.  Even now looking back on the game last night, it was the worst approach I have EVER seen a baseball team have.  If you know me, you know that I like to exaggerate some stats once in a while, but this time I actually mean worst I have EVER seen.

Detroit hitters were gifted with 9 2-0 counts while Ubaldo was in the game.  This is the best count for hitters to face, it is a dead fast ball count.  The Tigers were 0-8 with 1 walk in these at-bats.  Did you catch that?  They didn’t get a hit in any of these counts. Brennan Boesch was graced with 3 of these at bats.  In two cases he swung at the 3^rd pitch fastball which were out of the strike zone, once missing and once popping out to the infield.  Even though 2-0 is a great hitters count, I don’t understand why watching the 3^rd pitch against Jimenez is such a bad idea.  The guy could not consistently throw 2 strikes in a row.  He finished with 102 pitches, and was close to a 1 to 1 ratio of balls to strikes.  Then moving on to Delmon Young, his at bats might have been even worse.  In his 3 at bats against Ubaldo he saw a total of 5 pitches.  He had 2 one pitch outs.  I know he has never seen a first pitch he didn’t like, but at some point you have to adjust to the pitcher you are facing.  Ubaldo was under 50% on first pitch strikes, even with Delmon swinging on 2 of them. 

I understand that Leyland does not have much to work with right now to make this offense click, but there has to be someone who can add more to the lineup as Boesch and Delmon Young have so far this season.  Watching this team right now is nearly impossible.  I hope it turns around quickly, but I just don’t see it happening.

After a third of the season recap

The Tigers have played 54 games already this season which means they are exactly a third of the way through the 2012 campaign.  Detroit is sporting the impressive 25-29 record, which is good for third place in the AL Central.  Let’s be honest, this is a lot different than what was expected coming into the season.  While the Tigers do have time to turn this disappointment around and make the playoffs, they need to start playing better sooner rather than later.  Just think, if Detroit is to have the same record as they did last year they will have to go 70-38 from here out which would be a better winning percentage than the best record in baseball currently.  So why not take a look at what has happened so far this season to make it such a disappointment. 

Offense

The Tigers have been the definition of inconsistent with the bats this season.  Everyone expected Delmon, Boesch, Avila, Peralta, and Raburn to continue their success from the 2011 season, and guess what they simply have not.  Delmon Young is sporting a .711 OPS, Boesch .622, and Peralta a .691.  That is brutal.  In case that does not make sense, let me throw another stat from the Tigers normal 5,6,7 hitters out there.  They have combined to strikeout 109 times, and have walked a whopping 34 times.  Raburn was batting .150 and then decided to watch 3 different strike 3’s in Boston and was demoted to AAA again.  This is the same guy that led the entire team in batting average post All-Star game in 2011.  Yes, his average was higher than the batting champ (Cabrera) and VMart.  Avila has been able to draw some walks so far this year, but is not hitting the ball with any sort of consistency right now.  It probably also doesn’t help that he is a bit banged up right now. 

I am not going to blame this season’s deficiencies on injuries since every team has them and Detroit should have a good enough farm system and 25 man roster to cover up (over the short term) injuries to anyone besides Cabrera, Fielder, and JV.  Just when it seemed the offense was coming around, Austin got injured and has been out for 18 games now.  He is currently hitting .344 from the lead off spot.  Dirks was batting over .400 in the 2 hole during his limited at bats, and now he has been placed on the 15 day DL.  They have been replaced by Berry who has provided a major spark in his time with the big club, but will never be close to a .300 hitter let alone .344,  The 2 hole has been a joke since Dirks has gone done.  So now, with the bottom 5 in the lineup not contributing still, the 2 hole is an automatic out as well. 

The Tigers are 15-3 on the season when they score 5 runs or more, and they have scored 134 runs in these 18 games.  In the outings they have scored 4 or less runs, they are 10-26 and have scored a total of 99 runs in those 36 games.  The Tigers have scored a majority of their runs in a third of the games so far this season.  This begs the question, will the offense ever turn it around this season?  Also, if they do, will it be too late?

I am really hoping Austin and Dirks come back fully healthy soon and can be re-inserted to the top of the lineup.  However, I also think that Berry has proved his worth to this Tiger’s team and should stay in the majors for the rest of the season.  Berry should be moved over to right field, and Boesch should be placed on the bench.  Then the question is what to do with the DH position right now.  Delmon and Boesch have been the same hitter so far this season, just one from the right side and the other a lefty.  Both swing at anything from chin to dirt, have a high strike out rate with an incredibly low walk rate, and can add a touch of power if they make contact.  The Tigers would then have the option to try and trade Delmon
(or release him) and make Boesch the full time DH, or platoon these guys in that role.  I also think that Peralta should be given a chance in the 5 hole for a bit because even if he is having a disappointing year so far, he draws a ton more walks than Delmon.  Putting Jhonny there would keep the off-setting hitters (right, left, right, etc). Also, by leaving Berry in the lineup it gives the bottom of the order a little boost of energy.  No matter what Leyland decides to do with the lineup, the bottom line is that the offense has to get better and begin to lessen the pressure on the starting pitchers and bullpen. 

Starting Pitching

The starters really haven’t been the main issue so far this season.  Verlander is getting some of the least amount of run support from his offense and is somehow still 5-4 after 2 bad outings. I would imagine JV is getting a little frustrated, but wouldn’t it be nice if he had a few CC Sabathia starts where the offense bails him out and JV can put it in cruise control?  As bad as he pitched on Sunday against the Yankees, he only gave up 5 runs, and against the useless pitcher that is Phil Hughes, the offense should have been able to give JV the no-decision. Scherzer and Porcello have been average to good more than they have been bad, which is seeming like all we can expect from them in their careers. Smyly has been a nice surprise, but has strung together 4 bad starts in a row and needs a good outing tonight to begin straightening things out.  Then there is Fister, who most people expected him to continue his second half of 2011.  People, he was the best pitcher in baseball last year after being traded to the Tigers.  He outpitched Verlander during that time.  This was not going to be able to continue.  Then in his first start he injured his side and it has been nagging him all season so far.  I have no doubts that he will come back and be our number 2 starter hands down if he can get healthy.  I am not sure what more we can get from the starters right now, especially without Fister.

Bullpen pitchers

Overall this group has been very disappointing.  Eight relievers have earned 10 losses.  Did you get that? Almost a third of the losses have come from the bullpen.  On top of that, Valverde now is sporting a 3-1 record as a closer.  Benoit and Valverde both had career seasons last year, and should not have been expected to continue their complete dominance.  Benoit has been turning things around, until he got some arm soreness in his last outing.  Valverde is just looking awful so far this year.  He cannot command his fastball, and has all but removed his split finger pitch from his arsenal. When Benoit is healthy again, will Leyland make the switch to him to be the closer?  Below has been a nice surprise so far.  Villareal looked terrible in his first stint with the team, but has come back and looked dominant at times.  If he can locate his fastball for strikes, this kid could be the best pitcher in the pen for the Tigers.  Marte has added depth to the pen since coming back from the DL, and most people don’t remember but he won a job out of spring training and then got injured just before opening day.  Then there is Dotel, who started as the best pitcher in the bullpen, and recently has been struggling to locate pitches and has a tendency to give up the big fly.  Also, the Tigers are still expecting Al Albequerque to come back from injury after the All-Star game.  This group of guys will need to begin to pitch more consistently if this team is going to start closing the gap with the White Sox.

Defense

Last and certainly least.  The big question with adding Prince Fielder was going to be the defense and with Miguel moving back to third base.  Well, the defense has been worse than expected in my book.  The Tigers have a .670 defensive efficiency good for dead last in the AL.  The Tigers have a roster full of DH’s.  Somehow Miguel has been the least of the concerns in the field right now.  Prince is having his worst fielding year of his career, and I personally think he is the worst defensive first baggers in the entire league.  2^nd base has been a joke for most the season so far.  Peralta seems to have taken a huge step in the wrong direction in the field.  How many times has a ground ball been hit to the middle of the field and a double play has not been turned.  Whether it is Peralta bobbling the ball, taking too much time tossing to 2^nd base, covering 2^nd too late, or even taking too long to make the exchange from glove to right hand to throw to first base. Then moving out to the outfield, Delmon wouldn’t be able to cover enough ground to play left field on a little league outfield.  Analysts love anointing players as 5 tool players.  This means they can hit for average, hit for power, run, field, and throw.  Delmon Young is a successful half tool player (he can hit for power when he doesn’t strike out). I also used to think Brennan was a plus defender, but have quickly realized he is a butcher out in right field.  The scary part of this area of the game is that I don’t think they can improve over what they have been doing so far this season.  I don’t think they are slumping in the field, I just think they are simply that bad. The saving grace for this though is if the offense can score 5+ runs per game, these defensive lapses can be overlooked since the wins will start to pile up.

Heading into the middle third of the season, the Tigers will need to get the bottom of the lineup rolling with the bats.  They cannot wait much longer to start playing good baseball.  It will help a lot if Austin, Dirks, and Avila can come back from injuries soon.  I personally think that Brennan having success is a big part of this team’s success, and he just doesn’t look comfortable in the batter’s box right now.  I think sending him down to AAA or sitting him for a few games could really benefit the youngster.  Detroit has a pretty weak next 18 games where they should be able to  get in a bit of a winning streak (but the entire month of May was against lesser competition and they finished under .500).  I think it will be safe to count Detroit out if their division deficit grows to double digits by the end of this month, but if they can stay behind Chicago by 4-5 games then anything can happen.

Is Tiger back?

I know most sports fans do not consider golf a real sport, and even more cannot sit and watch a golf tournament on tv.  I, however, am not one of these people.  I will admit, I am not the biggest golf fan and do find some rounds pretty boring when I don’t know the names on the leader board, but I do follow every tournament that Tiger enters until he is no longer in contention. 

Well, in case you missed it, Tiger Woods won his 5^th Memorial Championship yesterday, and a glimpses of dominant Tiger peaked through during the final round.  He started the day 4 behind the leader and came out aggressive but under control.  The turning point of the round though happened on the 16^th hole.  Tiger’s first shot went just past the hole and onto the down slope of the rough.  It was not a favorable lie.  As the camera showed the view from Tiger’s second shot, all that ran through my mind is that water is very close.  He did not have much green to work with in front of the hole, and even less past it.  If I had 10 chances to throw the ball into the hole, I probably wouldn’t come close even once.  Tiger’s competitive nature came through and he expected to make this shot. Needless to say, he did.  He made the perfect shot and let the ball trickle into the hole as his caddy walked onto the green with the putter in hand.

Then came the classic fist pump made famous in Augusta. For the next hour Tiger of old was back.  You could tell from the look in his eyes.  He calmly played the 17^th hole safely and put his first two shots exactly where he wanted and tapped in for par, then stepped up to the 18^th tee box, the same hole he was +3 in the first 3 rounds.  Again he placed his first two shots where he wanted them and knocked down the birdie putt to all but seal the victory (his second of 2012).  It has been a while since I have seen final round Tiger look like that, and I loved it.  Golf becomes must watch tv when Tiger is playing like that.  I just hope he can do it for 3 of the 4 rounds in the US Open, and if he does, look out, he will run away from the crowd for his 15^th major championship. 

Another thing that I found interesting was watching the fist pump took me back to watching the first one on the green at the Masters.  I loved the energy that Tiger brought to the course.  This energy is what made Tiger a star.  Yes, he once was the most dominant golfer of all time, but not only did he win he was different than the cookie cutter, robot, golfer.  He was the normal dude on the course getting pumped when he made an amazing shot.  People loved the emotion.  Then he got injured and the winning slowed down, and Tiger continued to show emotion.  Except it wasn’t the positive energy, it was the frustration and disappointment of making poor decisions and shots.  Again, he was the standard guy on a golf course. The problem is nobody liked the emotion any longer, and Tiger was constantly ridiculed and even fined for not being a perfect gentleman.  I say you cannot have one without the other.  If you are drawn to Tiger because of the passion and emotion that he wears on his sleeve during the good times, you have to accept the negative emotion during a bad round. 

Verlander & Schlereth of the Series (Yankees)

After losing another series against a team with a winning record, the Tigers continue to dig themselves into a deeper hole in the division race.  They are currently finished with a third of the season, and are 6 games back of the surging White Sox. I still do not think it is time to hit the panic button yet, but the team needs to start turning things around quickly.

The Verlander of the Series will go to Miguel Cabrera by default.  The Tigers continue to only score runs by solo homeruns, and if it weren’t for Miggy knocking the cover off the baseball in game 2 we would be looking at another home sweep.  While Nelson Cruz just hit the longest homerun of the season last night (484 feet), Miguel might have the longest average of homeruns (2 or more in a game).  The big fella took Yankees pitching deep to straight away center field on Saturday night, and he did it twice.  The total home run distance was 910 feet. The Tigers were playing in Comerica Park.  In case you are not aware, straight away center field is one of the deepest parts of any park in MLB. Miguel hit one in batting practice range for his first bomb, it hit the ivy in front of the centerfield walkway.  The second moon shot landed in the camera booth.  Just in case that wasn’t enough, Miggy hit his patented laser double to left center.  Saturday night made Miguel look like one of the best hitters in the game today.

The Schlereth of the Series has a couple different candidates this time around.  Crosby showed why he is absolutely not ready for the majors by walking 4 people in one inning and then giving up a grand slam, but it is hard to come down on a kid making his MLB debut against the Yanks.  The Tigers might have been better off using a boulder behind the plate on Saturday night in place of Omir Santos, I am not sure if he was nervous or if he really is just that bad of a defensive catcher, but yikes.  But he hit the walk off sacrifice fly to win the lone game of the series, so I will continue my search.  Then we go to Justin Verlander, who for the first time is actually a decent candidate for this award.  He came out and didn’t have his normal dominant start, which you could see from the very first pitch.  Then he wasn’t in good position to back up Miggy on a throw to third which resulted in the 5^th run to score when the ball went into the dugout. But the worst part is after the game JV actually mentioned the 5 minute delay because of the Magglio ceremony might have thrown him out of his rhythm.  Really?  I know you have a routine, but you are the best pitcher in baseball and you just didn’t have your stuff today.  I cannot believe JV is 5-4 at this point of the season.  But he is still JV and even one of his worst games of the season still should have been enough for the Tigers to get the win with Phil “I have a WHIP of a slow pitch softball pitcher” Hughes but JV is on the mound so they managed to scrape across 1 run.  Watch out now, we are heating up!  But the real Schlereth of the weekend has to go to the bleach blonde spud. Yes, that is right, Jose Valverde (Papa Grande) has bleached his hair and his weird looking goatee. Gross. But on top of looking like a complete moron, he had one of the worst save opportunities I have ever seen.  With a one run lead in the top of the 9^th inning, Valverde came in and hit the leadoff batter with one pitch (9^th batter on top of it).  Then he walked Derek Jeter.  After getting Granderson to pop out, he gave up a double steal.  Then he really focused on ARod by throwing the ball at his heavily protected elbow.  The bases were now loaded for Cano, who for some reason swung at the 1-0 pitch and popped out to short.  The twice baked spud might actually get out of this fiasco. Nope, he then walked Texiera on a full count pitch that wasn’t even close.  There goes the lead and another save. He didn’t even give up 1 hit in the inning, yet gave up the lead and left the bases loaded. But we ended up winning the game, and Valverde improved his record to 3-1.  Maybe he is going for the most wins ever by a closer.    

Tigers Week 8 Recap (24-27)

I sound like a broken record with this team.  Another week of mediocre at best baseball and they are still below .500 and are fighting with the Royals for 4^th place in the division.  It is hard to believe this is how the season has gone so far.

This week was a roller coaster 7 games.  The Tigers finally broke the streak of not winning back to back games by sweeping the twins (I do not capitalize the t because some just don’t deserve it).  Then, when some fans thought it was alright to look again, they dropped a stink bomb in Fenway.  Fister got rocked and headed straight to the DL again, Verlander got rocked for the first time in 2 years for his 2^nd straight loss, and Ortiz looked like an MVP candidate against our pitching. 

The Tigers are closing in on completing a third of the season, and they just don’t look like a very good baseball team right now.  The scariest part about that is the division doesn’t look nearly as bad as last season.  Detroit has been hit hard with the injury bug, I guess it is making up for last season when nobody seemed to be injured. Looking back on last season, it is becoming more clear that it was a dream season.  The lack of injuries, Valverde’s perfect season, the bullpen in general not blowing a single lead after the 7^th inning (in 77 chances), Peralta’s career season, and Avila being the starting AL catcher.  The Tigers got all of the breaks last season, and they were a very fun team to root for.  This season, I would have to say a very small amount of breaks have come Detroit’s way, and when they do they seem to be the bad ones.  This baseball team is flawed, that is easy to see.  But they are better than a sub .500 team.

Looking ahead, the Tigers welcome in the Yankees and the Indians to Comerica before interleague play.  This is another important week of trying to get on a bit of a hot streak.  The way this season is going though, I really doubt that it happens. I guess at this point the only thing we can hope for is for AJ to come back fully healthy this week, then Andy and Doug to continue to heal and be 100% when their 15 days are up, and Alex to get back behind the plate soon because I don’t trust Santos.  

My trip to Fenway, and another live Tigers loss

For my 1 year wedding anniversary, my wife and I headed out east to spend the long Memorial Day weekend in Boston.  In order to move onto sports as soon as possible, I will just say that Boston is an amazing city and I hope that Chelsea and I can go back there again.  While there we of course had to visit Fenway Park (and lucky us the Tigers were in town for Memorial Day). 

Fenway reminded me a lot of Wrigley Field in the seating design and feel of the stadium.  Its old people.  It turned 100 this year, and is still the pride and joy of all Bostonians. It is a beautiful park.  Our seats were down the right field line pretty close to Pesky Pole.  The seats were facing the Green Monster (not home plate), and since the seating incline is so shallow it was pretty difficult for Chelsea to see much of the infield action.  After the top of the 2^nd inning she turned to me and said, I am glad we get to go to Comerica to watch the Tigers. Also, since it is an old park, the seats are pretty cramped.  I am not that tall, and I didn’t even have much leg room.  But this park is not about the comfort or the viewing angles, it is about tradition and being absolutely unique.  There is not another park like it anywhere in the world. 

Another thing that made the visit so great was we were surrounded by Tigers fans and very friendly Sox fans. It might have helped that the game wasn’t close for much of it.  Us Detroit fans had a few things to cheer about though, the Delmon bomb, the Leyland ejection, and Luis Marte pitching lights out for his first outing of the season.  On top of all of this, the weather was beautiful. 

Memorial Day at Fenway was a special event.  It began with the flag covering the entire Green Monster and the Coast Guard Quartet performing the Star Spangled Banner. After every inning different veterans were recognized and given standing ovations.  It was a special day in Boston. Then possibly the best part of the day was singing Sweet Caroline with 36,000 other people. 

Like Chelsea, I am glad that our home park is as comfortable and beautiful as Comerica Park, but Fenway was a great experience with such a unique environment.  I am very thankful my wife likes baseball enough to go to a city where the Tigers are playing for our anniversary trip.  I snagged a keeper, folks.

Verlander and Schlereth of the Series (Twins and Red Sox)

Hello again folks, sorry it has been so long since I have posted.  After getting back from Boston, I had a lot of business to catch up on.  Today seems a little slower so I will try to crank out a large number of posts (including my trip to Fenway).

Let me back track a little bit and had out the awards from last week’s 2 series against the Twins and Red Sox.  The Tigers finished 4-3 in the seven games, but it included a 3 game winning streak followed by a 3 game losing streak.  The Verlander of both series would have to be Quinten Berry.  After the Yankees series, this kid is tied for the team lead in steals.  He is making a strong push to be a regular player even when Austin and Andy come back from the DL.  Just think people, an outfield of Dirks, Jackson, and Berry patrolling the vast outfield of Comerica.  That looks a lot better than Delmon the Dreadful, Action Jackson, and Boesch the Butcher that we were looking at when the season began.  I think the speed and defensive quality of this potential new lineup could overcome the enormous shortcomings of our infield’s defense.  Then on offense, Berry could give Leyland all sorts of versatility in the lineup.  Q could continue to lead off, which would push AJ back to the 2 hole or even the 5^th hitter (where we hope he continues to swing well).  Austin could lead off, with Dirks in the 2 still, and the Q could anchor the bottom of the lineup.  Imagine Berry on base with Austin at bat.  The amount of pressure Berry puts on the pitcher when he is on base is incredible, and should result in AJ seeing some good fastballs. Yes, I am likely too high on this 27 year old journey-man.  He is most likely not the answer for the Tigers, but he could be the energy we need at this point in the season to turn things around.  Also, just think of Berry coming off the bench in the late innings to be a pinch runner.  We would actually have a base stealing threat.  Who would have imagined the Tigers running the bases, amazing.

The Schlereth of the (two) Series will go to the umpires.  I didn’t see most of the Twins set, but did get to see the Fenway debacle.  Of course the game I get to see in person, the play of the game comes from the umpires.  They made one of the worst calls I have ever seen live, and then on top of that missed a call at second base that should have resulted in a leadoff double for Worth.  On a foul tip strike 3, Aviles tipped the ball into Laird’s mitt.  All 9 guys on the field for the Tigers began making the trip into the dugout.  Aviles had his head down and was headed into the Sox dugout.  He was not arguing the call.  Then what seemed like minutes afterward, the first base ump (Bill Welke) decides the ball hit the ground and the inning continues. Then like clockwork, the Sox go ahead and score 3 runs with 2 outs and win the game 7-4.  The horrible call got Jim fired up and then ejected after he put on quite a show at first base.  I thought he was going to punch the ump.  I don’t know what it is about this season, but every morning when I turn on sportscenter, it seems like one of the topics is a missed call by an umpire.  Could it be that the games are televised more and more with more camera angles catching all of the problems?  It is a possibility, but when is it going to be enough (even for the baseball purists) and instant replay to be installed?  Hopefully soon, because I cannot stomach much more of this garbage.