The Tigers pulled off the improbable and swept the Blue Jays on the road to start the season. After falling behind on a 3 run homer by Carlos Delgado, the Tigers came back with a 3-run shot of their own by Munson. Jeremy Bonderman settled down and pitched outstanding for the next 4 1/3 innings. Well, I think he pitched outstanding from what I could tell with K after K on gamecast. No local TV so I couldn’t see it myself. Bonderman struck out 8 in all before giving way to newcomer Steve Colyer.

Bonderman left early when he took a Vernon Wells line drive in the calf, but should be okay. I’m happy that Tram took him out. Even if he could pitch, you don’t want to see his mechanics get screwed up and risk an arm injury.

So the Tigers are coming home undefeated and people are actually excited about the team. While the Wings in the playoffs are still getting more sports talk attention, the Tigers aren’t a joke this year (at least so far). What’s more is the Tigers are catching their division rival Twins at a time they are beat up. Tori Hunter has a bad hamstring. Johan Santana has forearm spasms. Starting catcher Joe Mauer is on the shelf having his knee scoped, and back-up catcher Matt Lecroy left last night’s game with an oblique strain. Suddenly this looks like a winnable series for the Tigers. Last year the only winnable looking series were against the Devil Rays (and they didn’t even manage to do that).

Last week all I was hoping for from the home opener was that we could make it through the game without a “Let’s Go Red Wings” chant, that the game would be competitive, and there would be no sarcastic applause. What a difference 3 games makes. Now I’m expecting a win.

Other Notes:
-Andres Torres contract was purchased from Toledo to take Dmitri Young’s spot

In case you’re not doing it already, check out Brian’s running diary of what happened 20 years ago during the 84 Tigers march toward the world series. Each day he is chronicling what the expoits of the last great Tiger team. Twenty years ago today…Jack Morris’ no hitter.

Dmitri Young broke his fibula when his foot caught in the turf while avoiding a tag. The initial projection is that he’ll miss 6 weeks. This will probably mean more playing time for Norton, Shelton and Monroe. Trammell wanted to rest Rondell White tomorrow night on the turf. His resting may be DH’ing tomorrow night. Or Pudge could DH so that he wouldn’t have to catch the day after a night game.

Other thougts from tonight:
-Mike Maroth has to be thrilled to get the W tonight after the nightmare that was last year. Even more impressive than Maroth was Nate Robertson. Nate Robertson assumed the role of 4 inning closer and picked up the save. He had 7 K’s in 4 innings against 2 walks and one hit.
-The new guys continue to produce with Guillen hitting a homer and Pudge, White, and Vina all getting two hits
-Small ball wasn’t so effective for the Tigers. Norton missed a hit and run and Vina was cut down. Sanchez was caught stealing, albeit after beating out a bunt single.
-Munson continues to struggle at third making an error. He did recover and threw out Hinske trying to score.
-In 5 at-bats pinch hitting specialist Greg Norton has 4 strike outs. Is anyone else anxious to see Shelton?

If you had told me this morning that the Tigers and Jason Johnson were taking on Roy Halladay and the Blue Jays and the final would be 7-0, I can’t imagine the odds it would take for me to pick the Tigers to win. Roy Halladay owns the Tigers (and many other teams), and Toronto is returning the bulk of a lineup that ranked second in the league in runs scored. Yet Jason Johnson pitched effectively, including pitching out of a lead off triple and shut down the Jays potent offense. Carlos Pena plated the Tigers first run on a solo shot, then newcomers Pudge and Rondell white chipped in a dinger a piece as well.

Now the question is what to make of this win. It’s one game on a 162 game schedule. In that context it means very little. However, for the Tigers this is great building block for the season. Detroit dominated a game they weren’t supposed to even win. This happens sometimes in baseball, but it hasn’t happened to the Tigers for several years. What’s more is that the game illustrated the significance of Detroit’s roster moves. The key contributors were all newcomers-Johnson, Pudge, and White. In addition to bringing their physical tools, the new Tigers will hopefully instill a sense of winning into a clubhouse that hasn’t experienced it in a long time.

I recognize that it is only one win, and the Tigers could lose their next 5 or 6 games like they did in 98, 99, and 2000. Drew Sharp will probably use his column to point out such negative facts. However, Tiger fans know they should embrace each win, no matter how significant or insignificant it may seem at the time.

Other notes and observations:
-A pleasant surprise to see Hall of Famer and Special Assistant to the President Al Kaline in uniform on the bench
-Despite 5 strike outs, the Tigers really worked Halladay in the first two innings forcing 39 pitches. Halladay was quoted:

-Every position player played except for Shelton, despite the fact that he could have pinch hit for Pena in the 9th. Do you think the decision to keep Shelton on the roster may have been more Dombrowski’s than Trammell’s?
-The camera showed Maroth in the dugout during the 9th inning. He looked suprisingly on edge given the fact he wasn’t playing and his team was up by 7. I wonder if he’s thinking about tomorrow’s game.
-The Tigers didn’t score their 7th run of the season until their seventh game of the season last year.

The Tigers Opening Day lineup:
Alex Sanchez
Fernando Vina
Ivan Rodriguez
Dmitri Young
Rondell White
Carlos Pena
Carlos Guillen
Bobby Higginson
Eric Munson

Most surprising is Higgy and Munson batting in the bottom two spots. I guess Trammell did get nervous about batting the three lefties (Pena, Munson, Higginson) in a row. I’d still prefer to see Sanchez batting 9th and the top two spots being held by Guillen and Vina. That said, this lineup should be a lot more fun to watch then last years.

BA touches on a couple Tiger notes

From Boros’ comment it appears that Colyer is the centerpiece of the Ross trade. If the PTBNL is just a throw in, then I’m disappointed in this trade. The good news is Baugh has passed 90mph and Sleeth is projected to be in Erie relatively soon.

Chris Shelton and Omar Infante were awarded the final two spots on the 25 man roster. Mike DiFelice has the option of accepting an assignment to Toledo or becoming a free agent.

I’m quite happy that the Tigers kept Shelton-at least for now-over Mike DiFelice. I don’t know whether or not Shelton will ever amount to anything, but his potential is too much to give up on.

As for Infante making the team as a back-up, I’m not sure it’s the right move for him. While last year was a disaster for him, he’s still just 22. Playing everyday in Toledo might be best for him in the long run.

So now that the opening day roster is set, the next roster moves to speculate are who will be the two players removed when Fernando Rodney and Ugueth Urbina come back.

The Tigers traded Cody Ross for left handed reliever Steve Coyler. Baseball America had this to say about Coyler

While I like Ross, I don’t know that he is more than a 4th outfielder or borderline starter. He was going to be blocked in Detroit this year and will have a better shot with the Dodgers. Curtis Granderson and Brent Clevlen are on the way up in the Tiger organization as well and Ross appeared to be the odd man out.

As for Coyler, I’m not particularly thrilled with getting a left handed reliever. However, he’s only part of the deal. Therefore, I’m going to hold off on evaluating the trade until the player to be named later is identifed. I’m hoping that it is a LA draft pick from last year. If so, we won’t find out until June who that player is.

In other roster moves, Fernando Rodney and Lino Urdanta were placed on the 15 day DL. Also, after being granted an unconditional release Esteban Yan signed a contract to join the bullpen. And Mike Bumatay was returned to Colorado.

The Tigers also announced they have set their pitching staff and are breaking camp with 11 hurlers. The starters are Johnson, Maroth, Bonderman, and Cornejo. The 5th starter spot will come down to Knotts and Robertson. The rest of the bullpen will be Walker, Yan, Patterson, and Coyler.

It appears that Greg Norton has lockedup a bench spot with the Tigers. Norton’s resume was bolstered by the fact that he has lit up Detroit in the past. Unfortunately, there aren’t enough roster spots for the Tigers to sign all the players who have lit them up recently.

Unfortunately, this doesn’t bode well for Chris Shelton’s chance of making the team. While Norton is a known quantity, Shelton has much more upside. Hopefully the Tigers can work out a trade to either keep him and send him to the minors, or to send him someplace else and get something for him. There’s no word on who was being moved off the 40 man to make room for Norton, which is another strike against Shelton because Norton could take his spot.

What’s a little bit unsettling is this quote from Trammell

With all of the Tigers roster moves this year, they were done to help them in the short term without jeopardizing the long term (well, except maybe Pudge). If it becomes a Norton for Shelton trade off then they are trading the future for maybe 1 or 2 wins tops in a season where 1 or 2 wins won’t make a difference.

In other roster news the Tigers cut Eric Eckenstahler, Andres Torres, and Jason Smith today. That leaves 31 players and 6 more cuts. However, Chris Spurling will be placed on the 60 day DL and Urbina will likely start the season in Toledo so there will only be 4 more cuts.

Now that Jeremy Bonderman has a year under his belt most Tiger fans are curious as to what this year will bring. While Bonderman did give up runs last year, his defense didn’t help him at all. Also, his strike out rate of 6 per 9 innings was impressive, and not just because he was only 20. But now that he’s pitched a full season, how much should he pitch this year? Keep in mind, this is the first season that he’ll be able to drink (legally) and he’s still very young.

The common sense answer is that it depends on how well he pitches. The better he’s pitching, the longer he should stay in games. No suprises there. But in defining pitching better, it is also important to talk about pitching more efficiently. Bonderman averaged 15.90 pitches per inning pitched, which ranked 51st in the American League. Not terrible, but not that good either. He had a respectable walk rate, but he gave up 10.9 hits per 9 innings pitched which ranked 102 among AL starting pitchers.

If you want to keep Bonderman’s pitch count totals per outing in the 100-110 range, that means that he can give you between 6 and 7 innings. However if he can shave his pitches per inning down to 14.5, then he could get into the eighth inning with the same pitch count. Over the course of 30 starts it wouldn’t be unreasonable for Bonderman to pitch 210 innings if he can pitch efficiently. Now this would assume that he is averaging 7 innings per start, and we all know he’ll have some bad outings so he probably won’t quite get 210 innings.

While they still need to be cautious with Bonderman, and closely watch his pitch counts in each game, he shouldn’t necessarily be shut down after a certain number of innings. Bonderman’s efficiency should dictate how many innings he should pitch, and not some pre-determined number.

As an interesting side note, when pulling the numbers I noticed that Jason Johnson ranked last among qualified pitchers in pitches per inning pitched with 17.1. One of the things called into question by many about Johnson is his durability. Specifically, in 32 starts last year he only had 7 games where he made it out of the 7th inning and he’s never had a 200 inning season. By having to use so many pitches to get 3 outs, he is probably wearing down relatively early. Just something else to keep an eye on this year.

The Tigers have signed Ugueth Urbina and outrighted Matt Anderson to Toledo. Details of the contract are being withheld until a physical is completed. During the offseason I was against this signing. However, between Anderson’s failure, and Fernando Rodney’s injury the Tigers didn’t have a solid option to close games. I wouldn’t be surprised if this is only a one or two year deal and if Urbina is traded later this summer (hopefully once Rodney heals and shows us something).

UPDATE: This article says it is a one year deal worth $3.5 million. It also indicates that Pudge was instrumental in Urbina coming here. It looks like it didn’t take long for the Pudge Halo Effect to kick in.

The Toronto Star takes a look at Dave Dombrowski.