PREGAME: The Tigers need one more win to assure themselves of a winning road trip. Ideally they get that win tonight, and then a bonus one tomorrow.
Nate Robertson Zach Miner will be pitching for the Tigers. He faced Tampa at Comerica Park and allowed only 2 unearned runs over 7 innings.
He’ll be opposed by Tim Corcoran. Corcoran has a pretty good ERA at 3.57 due in part to his ability to limit the long ball. He’s surrendered one homer in 35 1/3 innings. But he also walks as many as he strikes out, and in July actually walked 15 against 8 strikeouts.
Dmitri Young will be playing DH and batting 3rd as Pudge gets another night off, I’m guessing due to his thumb.
Game Time 7:15pm
POSTGAME: I was all set to complain about pinch hitting for Curtis Granderson, and then the game turns into a blow out over the last 2 innings. While I still don’t agree with taking out Granderson, it does show the faith that Jim Leyland already has in Brent Clevlen as a capable defender.
Zach Miner kept the Tigers in the game until they could break through the dominance that is Tim Corcoran.
And my last comment actually reaches back to Carlos Guillen’s cycle. He has received some flack for going for the double because he was motivated by personal goals. Carlos Guillen is the most aggressive runner on the team. He ran hard out of the box and was rewarded for it. Last night, moments after being hit on the shin, he stole 2nd base when you could tell it was painful for him to slide. Yes he may not have gone for 2nd without the cycle as motivation, but dont’ knock him for hustle. I’d have a much bigger problem if he didn’t advance an extra base just so he could get a cycle.
Great slide by Inge.
Nice clutch hit. Too bad Miner won’t get the W.
Anyone wathing MLB.com tonight? The Ray’s color-announcer is a real wisecrack. He’s kinda funny though so it’s not totally obnoxious.
Nice 8th inning for the Tigs. This team just gets it done.
Nice to see Tigers snag the lead after eating dinner, hehe
Hang on Royals!
Yeah at first I thought the Rays announcer was stupid for saying Mags had a mullet, then later when a fan wearing a do-rag missed a fly ball (and possibly got in Lee’s way) he said ‘nice catch, it would help if you didn’t have the handkerchief all the way down over your eyes!’ which was pretty funny and made me appreciate him. I guess when you are the Rays announcer you need a sense of humor.
Ken Harrelson for the White Sox is the worst. (I just always need to add that.) Tho listening to him when the sox are getting thumped is ok!
As a longhair myself, I hate how the establishment has morphed the term ‘mullet’ into anyone with long hair. A mullett is business on top, long in back. Nothing more, nothing less.
Long hair is rock ‘n’ roll like Maggs, the man hitting for Rock City.
Joey the K, those are exactly the two comments that led to my post. Even the Maggs line–although totally unfair–made me laugh because the dude said it with such bitterness. He was clearly salty about the RBI double Maggs had just hit,
Nick you rule! Maggs is strictly rock n’ roll.
Sportscenter guy during the Tigers highlights this morning: “I have a feeling it’s gum time.”
The Sportscenter guys know about the Tigers??? Someone tell the guys at Baseball Tonight, who think somehow the Yankees manage to play their entire season without any other teams in the league.
yeah, I get really tired of “mainstream” TV….Yankees, Yankees, oh and Red Sox too….with minor lip service paid to the White Sox, only because they won last year. But that’s ok – we just go about our business and keep winning. Last night was a prime example: it really looked like we were gonna lose last night….then the 8th inning comes….a couple timely hits, and voila….we’re gonna win now. And we’ll seal the deal with 2 more in the 9th, just to show ya we really mean it. We probably won’t face the Yanks in the 1st round; we’ll face the wildcard team (either Twins or Sox)…but I’d like nothing better than to kick the Bombers’ butts and dominate ’em when we do. We still have 3 games in NY in mid-August to show ESPN how stupid they are….we gained a game last night; both Twinkies + Sox lost….gonna try to hit the stadium again tonight; see my Tiges live one last time this year
ESPN sucks
Rock on, boys…… 🙂
As a marketing guy – I understand the Yanks and Red/White Sox obsession (Big fan numbers = Big $$ for advertisers.) Not that I like it but that is the way of the world.
I just look at it this way. Detroit is running away with the American league (hardly newsworthy on an everyday basis) and the only competition is for second place. (newsworthy) Keep detroit out of the press and we are probably winning the 1st seed. So it is a good thing!
We’d face the winner of the West in all likelyhood if the wildcard came out of the Central. Two teams from the same division can’t meet in the first round.
I’m gonna disagree on ESPN though. I thnk they have paid a pretty good amount of attention to the Tigers this year. Quite often Detroit leads off the Baseball Tonight highlights. A couple of guys on BT said the Tigers were real all along. There was some criticism here and there, nothing more than you read on Tigers blogs, and they’ve already penciled the Tigers in as winning the Central.
I’m not really talking about the BT guys; they actually do talk about the Tigers; I agree there. The ESPN complaint comes from the games they air: always Yanks, Mets, Red Sox, Braves….and for the west coast, the Dodgers. Rarely do we see anybody else; last night was an anomaly: Cards v Phils…….and that was only because of Utley’s streak (which he extended).
Are you sure 2 teams from the same division can’t meet in the 1st round? I don’t remember that being the case. You might be right; the Tigers haven’t been in the playoff picture in so long, I haven’t paid attention to it……. 🙂
The games shown on ESPN (with some exceptions) are chosen before the start of the year. So, that’s why there aren’t a lot of Tigers games.
Yes, teams from the same division can’t meet in the 1st round. This is why the Yankees and Red Sox have not faced each other in the first round for the last five years. For this reason, I think we want the Twins or Sux to take the WC. The A’s and Angels are extremely beatable. Let the Red Sox/Yankees beat up on the Sux/Twins while the Tigers stomp the west.