Month: July 2015

O’s 9 Tigers 3

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Nebraska sent me an article that that the fire sale has begun in Cincinnati.  I think it should begin in Detroit as well. Verlander was horrible. The offense wasn’t far behind.

It appears JV’s start in Minnesota was the anomaly. He gave up seven earned again today and wasn’t fooling anybody.  He couldn’t make it out of the third.

The offense could manage only three runs despited getting 14 hits.  There was pretty much nothing to like except Iggy’s four hit day.

This is going to get ugly but it doesn’t have to stay ugly for long.  I just don’t want to sit through another 2003.

O’s 3 Tigers 0

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This was actually a pretty well played game.  It lacked offense but I like a pitcher’s dual once in a while;  just as long as I don’t have to tip my cap to every ham & egger toes the slab against us. Both Price and Tillman were smokin balls.  The Tigers should have cashed a run in the bottom of the first when they had a runner on third with one out but Tillman looked like a top of the rotation guy last night.

David Price gutted out seven impressive innings allowing a single run on a solo shot by Manny Machado while striking out 12 and walking 1. Alex Wilson did what he does and pitched a clean 8th. Krol got a LONG out to lead off the 9th. Then Rondon essentially put the game out of reach by giving up two runs.  He needs to a bus ticket south about an hour.

Rondon did not pitch well and I can’t and won’t defend him.  But Anthony Gose could have bailed him out by making a catch he makes 9 out of 10 times.

It seems like things just are not working out for this team.  It doesn’t seem to be in the cards.  Unfortunately, I listened to 97.1 for a few minutes yesterday and some blow hard was talking about how if he were a season ticket holder he would be offended if the Tigers traded David Price.  I am a season ticket holder and here’s what offends me, charging $10.50 for three chicken fingers.

Tigers 7 Orioles 3

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During his first two at-bats I thought J.D. Martinez was going into another funk. He was swinging at bad first pitches and immediately finding himself in 0-2 holes.   He changed that in his third at-bat by hitting his 26th home run.

J.D. also flashed some leather robbing Chris Davis of a home run with a a nice catch at the wall in right.  This is slowly becoming the J.D. Martinez show.

They got enough pitching from Anibal and the pen, although, Soria scares me, to piece this one together. It’s nice to start the “second half” off with a win.

Twins 7 Tigers 1

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I’m late with this post.  I was under the weather most of last week and the weekend.  The Tigers play didn’t help any either.  They finished the theoretical first half .500 and were fortunate to do so.  The first few months of the season they couldn’t score consistently. Their pitching, including the bullpen, paced them to an impressive early season record.

The bats woke up the first week of June. The starting pitching imploded and the bullpen had a Fukushima like meltdown.  Since May 16th the Tigers have the worst record in the American league.  In June the Tigers bullpen ranked 29th in ERA. In July, so far, some how, they rank only 28th.

What has this taught me?  An old lesson that I guess I need to learn over and over no matter how much baseball I watch. If you can’t pitch you can’t win.  It is a lot more entertaining to watch a team that hits until you wake and realize you team sucks and isn’t going anywhere.

If your team can pitch it can win no matter how crappy the hitting is.  I guess we’ve seen this in practice over the last five to six years.  We had sit through an inconsistent offense that would score 10 runs one game then nothing for a week and they found a way to make it to the post season.  Granted, we are still waiting for a World Series but we are looking at a team right now that is scoring over six runs a game but can’t pitch a lick.  We are seeing a tale of two seasons in one this year.  The first two months of the season the Tigers could pitch and couldn’t hit but were winning.  The last month and a half they are hitting and can’t pitch and are one of the worst teams in baseball.

Here’s another conclusion i’ve come to.  I don’t want to trade Nick “The Quick” Castellanos.  I’ve been critical of him.  However, He’s young. He’s show’s flashes.  He’s homegrown.  They need somebody on this team that’s homegrown. Geez.  Look around this team  Avila and Nick.  That’s it.

Speaking of A Squared Money.  There’s no hope that Avila is going to hit if he stays behind the plate.  I don’t know why they didn’t leave him at first and leave McCann behind the plate.  They’re not getting anything from Kraus offensively.  His .135 is worse than Avila’s .192.  What exactly did they think Kraus was going to give them?  Put Avila back a first. McCann behind the plate.  Wait for Miggy to come back.  Get what you can for Price.  He’s not staying.  The Tigers aren’t going anywhere this year. Start planning for 2016.

FYI:  You need a whole bullpen.

Twins 8 Tigers 6

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Perhaps for only one game but Justin Verlander looked liked the Cy Young JV.  He was, in two words, SMOKIN BALLS.  Unfortunately, he turned over a five run lead to the bullpen in the ninth and they couldn’t hold it.

Despite the meltdown from Bruce Rondon and Joakim Soria there was a lot to like about this game. The offense scored six more runs, JV was on fire and Yoenis Cepedes made a nice catch in left to rob Joe Mauer of a double.

I’m trying not get upset at what the Tigers don’t have anymore.  They haven’t had a bullpen for as long as I can remember so anything they get from them I’m gong to consider house money.

Record Setting Indians Pitching Staff

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From ESPN:

Trevor Bauer struck out nine Astros batters on Wednesday to run his season strikeout total to 102, and joining Corey Kluber, Carlos Carrasco and Danny Salazar as Indians pitchers in triple digits. No other team in major-league history has had four players with 100 or more strikeouts as few as 84 games into a season. Prior to this year, the fewest games that any team needed to have four pitchers accumulate 100 strikeouts was 89, by the Dodgers in 1960 (Don Drysdale, Sandy Koufax, Johnny Podres and Stan Williams)

Right now the Indians are 40-44, three games behind the Tigers.  Hmmm, I wonder if the Tigers need to watch out below?

Tigers 5 Mariners 4

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The Tigers won the series finale and took two out of three from the Mariners with a big 5-4 win this afternoon.

Anibal Sanchez didn’t pitch great, but well enough to give the bullpen a bit of break.  He lasted 6.1 innings, allowing four runs, three earned on five hits.  I guess it qualifies as a quality starts but his walks were high, five, and he continues to give up home runs. However, given the starts they got from Ryan and Simon and the way the offense is to click, this looked like a gym.

What is the story with Jose Iglesias wearing his sunglasses on his hat instead of over his eyes.  He made one error and almost made another one.  With the struggles the pitching staff is having the last thing they need is to have to throw extra pitches and get extra outs.  If it’s sunny enough to get your sunglasses out why not put them over your eyes?

Off to Minnesota.