Anibal Sanchez continues to make his case for this year’s AL Cy Young award. He improved his record to 14-7 and lowered his league leading ERA to 2.50. Anibal was masterful tonight in spite of an asinine strike zone from home plate umpire Larry Hanover.
Even with a strike zone that nobody could figure out, Sanchez managed to pitch 7 and 1/3 without allowing any runs. He gave up only 5 hits, walked 4 and struck out 10.
A few weeks ago I thought Max Scherzer had the Cy Young locked up but Anibal is right on his heels along with Yu Darvish of the Rangers and Chris Sale of the White Sox.
The offense was pathetic tonight which is pretty much what I expected. After scoring 9 runs last night. the Tigers managed only 1 run on 10 hits. They were 1 for 11 with men in scoring position.
I’m not sure what the issue is but Miguel Cabrera doesn’t not look good at all. I’m not sure if he just needs to get his timing back or if his injuries are plaguing him much more than we are lead to believe. However, if continues hitting the way he did on this road trip, the Tigers are in trouble.
Veras, Smyly and Benoit were aces coming out of the bull pen to preserve the 1-0 win for Sanchez.
Nick Castellanos was 1-4 tonight. I thought his most impressive at bat came in the first inning. After falling behind 1-2 he worked the count back to even. He then fouled off three pitches then took ball three to move the count to full. He ended up striking out but he did make Jose Quintana throw him 9 pitches.
The Tigers lead in the central is back up to 6.5 games courtesy of the Indians loss to the Royals earlier in the day.
This was a nice win. After losing the opening game, and third in a row, they managed to win the final two and take the series.
The Royals come to Comerica Park this weekend. Friday’s game features Justin Verlander against Bruce Chen. Let’s hope it goes better than the last time these two faced each other.
“God, I love baseball.” – Roy Hobbs | The Natural
Flashin' Leather 
I have to eat a little crow. I was not at all happy with the expensive signing of Sanchez, because he was a career .500 pitcher. He has quietly put his best year out there, and honestly if you had to pick the guy to win one playoff game, right now I would have to choose Sanchez over Scherzer by a slim margin. Having him under contract will afford them the luxury of parting with Max or Fister when they’re contracts are up.
Frankly I could care less anymore about the personal awards, such as CY and MVP. I’ll take the team success as the personal stuff hasn’t got us anything the past 2 yrs.
Offense was pathetic as expected… I’ll pass judgment on Cabrera on this home stand. He appears to be expanding the strike zone again, and his bat speed isn’t there. He’s not turning and driving into the ball with his legs. Most likely it’s a combination of injuries and expanding strike zone. Let’s see if the home crowd energizes him.
This was the most unpredictable strike zone I’ve seen all season. Whoever the ump was must have been high on something…
JV Friday… Who knows what we’re going to get.. The hitters should have a field day against Chen as its only been 5 days since they last saw him. A little patience will go a long way this time. This series will decide it. A Royals sweep and the race could get tight.
Sark, I have to agree with you on the Sanchez signing. I wasn’t that crazy about it either. But, I’m not good with player evaluations. I didn’t like the Cabrera trade when they made it either. So that tells you how much I know. The only player I was correct about was Red Pop. Even during his ridiculous April in 2006 I was telling Ross that he sucked. I didn’t know how he was doing it but I knew it wouldn’t last. He had the worst swing and approach I had ever seen. But he was the only one I was right about. I thought Alex Avila was going to be the next Pudge and we see how that has worked out. Although, I think if ever gets healthy we could see the guy we say in the 2011 regular season.
But right now, if I had the deciding CY Young vote, it would go to Sale over everyone else. In my opinion, he’s the best pitcher in the AL and has been for most of the last two years.
The good news about this game is the Tigers won a one run game. The bad news is that the Tigers won a one run game against the worst team in the division after going 1 for 11 RIPS. I will say it again KC has EVERYTHING to play for so this series should = a playoff level set. No one has clinched the Central yet. Let’s see how we respond.
Nebraska, this form of offense, if you can call it that, is unacceptable. I don’t care how good your pitching staff is, the Tigers can’t expect to hold other teams scoreless or to 1 run every game. Sadly, a lot of times, I get the feeling that if the staff gives up a run, the Tigers will lose. This is madness. What about the Tigers offense? I beginning to think, again, Lloyd McClendon has to go.