A quick series will get a quick wrap up. The Tigers didn’t dominate the Royals, only outscoring them 7-3, but it was enough for a tidy two game sweep. This series easily could have lent itself to being a let down. The Tigers had just spanked the Twins, and the Royals came to town looking for their first road win. Instead of a let down though, the pitchers kept on dominating the opposition while the offense did just enough.

Stuff of Note

• KC, despite hardly getting on base managed to swipe to bases.
• Neither team grounded into a double play
• The Tigers got the opportunity to shorten the game to 6 innings by handing it over to Zumaya/Rodney/Jones (or Z-Rod-Tod for the nickname proficient) for the first time and it worked as planned.

Series Studs

• Jeremy Bonderman pitched 8 shut out innings. He walked one, allowed 4 hits, and fanned 9. That’s pretty much as good as it gets.
• Mike Maroth followed that up allowing a single run in 6 innings. Since losing 20 games in 2003, Maroth is 29-28 for a team that is 161-190 over the same time span. (confession: I saw this on ESPN.com this morning, but the link is gone so I had to recreate it)
• Craig Monroe – he of the late inning insurance bombs. In this series Monroe only reached base twice, but both were homers late in the game. Since raising the socks at the beginning of the homestand, Monroe is hitting 450/450/900.
• Brandon Inge, who was really the only Tiger to struggle in the Twins series, got the first game off. He responded in the second game with two hits, including a tremendous homer that was the difference in game 2.

And those that struggled

• Todd Jones scuffled in the first game, making what should have been a shut out very interesting. Fortunately, he picked the right time to give up two runs – with the Tigers leading by 3.
• Curtis Granderson reached base one time, on a walk. He also struck out 4 times.
• Chris Shelton reached base one time, on a walk.