PREGAME: The Tigers will try to move to their record to 10-0 against the Royals this year. Tonight’s matchup features a couple of finesse left handed All Stars in Mark Redman and Kenny Rogers.
I don’t have a lot of notes tonight, except judging by the current weather conditions the pitcher that keeps the ball down tonight will win. It’s very breezy, very humid, and quite warm. If a thunderstorm doesn’t break out, I’d expect the ball to carry.
POSTGAME: And yet another interesting game against the Royals. I have to admit that I only saw bits and pieces of this game because I was at a party, and then driving home from a party. What I did see is that Kenny Rogers was getting hit hard, and often. The Tigers meanwhile hit a number of balls very well, and I mean more than their 10 runs courtesty of KC errors probably dictate. Guys were driving the ball to the right field and up the gaps. Many of those ended up in gloves, but I love the approach. Particularly of note is Brandon Inge who I lamented had been swining for the fences just last week. In his last 2 games he’s knocking line drives all over the place.
And of course there’s Carlos Guillen. If one CG doesn’t get it done, the other one surely will.
The win wasn’t pretty, but you have to give the Royals credit. They kept hitting all night, and it wasn’t just off of Rogers. Every Tiger pitcher struggled to get KC out. One of these nights, a 4 run lead will be too much to overcome.
Zumaya…sigh
rats
Way to go Guillen.
Hehehe…
Yankees beat White Sox and Detroit is now 3 1/2 up in the Division.
GUILLEN!! Unbelievable! …. now, what’s happened to the pitching? Bondo yesterday, Rogers tonight…….and Z walking 2 men. If we weren’t playing the Royals, it’d be 2 losses instead of 2 wins. I’d love to prove the fools on ESPN wrong; they keep insisting the Sox are “clearly the best team” and they’ll beat the Tiges out. We’re 3.5 ahead now……..we’ll see……. 🙂
My first reaction while listening to the game last night was to get worried and/or uptight about our pitching (both starting and relief last night). I mean, Zumaya was out there doing his best Fernando Rodney impersonation after the Tigers had gone ahead 9-6.
Then, I calmed down and thought about it. Yeah Rogers was getting tagged last night, but so were our relief pitchers. The Royals were hitting the ball well last night and Thursday night. I don’t think that it is cause for worry.
Now, with that being said, if we let the White Snots get hits like that and we lose a couple of games to them I will be concerned. That would lead me to believe that it wasn’t just a couple of flukey games and is getting to be more of a long-term problem.
We’ll see. Perhaps the All-Star game break and the beefy record at the halfway point got to the players’ heads. The Tigers received a lot of praise during the break (not counting ESPN’s comments) and with a young team like they have I could see it going to their heads.
The nice thing is that Leyland won’t let it keep going to their heads. He will let them know when they are not playing hard and for that I am grateful.
P.S. Go Yankees!
Usually anybody who says “Go Yankees” in my house sleeps in the garage 🙂 , but for this week-end I’ll make an exception. GO YANKEES!
Hope this’ll quiet the Todd Jones slaggers for a while. I’d love Zoom or Rodney to win the closer job, but they ain’t there yet. The fan base ought to know by now that Leyland will figure out when that happens before we do.
Well, beej, like I told my husband, “I’ll lay off Jonesy until the next time he blows a game.” It’s probably not fair, but the thought of the bottom of the ninth in a post-season game with Jones pitching doesn’t exactly inspire me with confidence.
And don’t forget to check out that Yankees-White Sox game. The Yanks are mercying’em.
Before everyone goes crazy, remember these Royals have been playing well and scoring alot of runs. Over their last three series, they took 2 of 3 against St. Louis and Minn. and split a 4-game series with Toronto before the break. Their pitching hasn’t been helping them any, but we should not be surprised by the competitiveness of these games.
That said, we better sweep these guys.
This game was the perfect example of the luck necessary to have a great season.
Thames misthrows a ball that should have been a run-scoring error, but didn’t affect the game.
Monroe makes the base running mistake and scores anyway.
Shelton hits that ball a few inches shallower and he’s out.
Guillen hits that ball a few more inches to the right and it’s not a homer, a few more inches to the right and he’s out.
This is just too much fun.
Funny story. I’m watching the game with my brother. Zumaya blows the save and he says, “What’s ‘blown save’ in spanish?” I say, “Todd Jones.”