Monthly Archives: June 2007

2007 Season, Game Post

Game 79: Twins at Tigers

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PREGAME: Today will be a battle of AL Central rookies with Kevin Slowey going up against Andrew Miller.

Miller won’t be fazed by national TV if his start last Sunday was any indication. He pitched 6 shutout innings allowing only 4 hits and 2 walks.

Kevin Slowey will be making his 6th start. He’s allowed 36 hits in 27 1/3 innings. He’s allowed 9 homers already. But he doesn’t walk people with only 6 allowed, and 4 of those came in one outing.

With Gary Sheffield serving his suspension, Sean Casey will bat 3rd and Marcus Thames will DH.

MIN @ DET, Saturday, June 30, 2007 Game Preview – Baseball-Reference.com

Game Time 3:55

2007 Season, Pitching, Players, Research

A different look at Andrew Miller

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On Sunday, June 24th Andrew Miller took center stage on ESPN Sunday Night Baseball and promptly pitched 6 shut out innings. Miller only allowed 4 hits and 2 walks and was never really threatened. Was this a dominant performance by a young stud pitcher, or just another day at the office for the slumping Braves? I don’t know if we can really say one way or the other, but with enhanced gameday data we can at least get some additional information.
Continue reading A different look at Andrew Miller →

2007 Season, Minors

Tigers Minor League Wrap 6/29/07

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Ottawa 2 Toledo 1
Chris Shelton doubled and walked and netted the only extra base hit. Virgil Vasquez pitched a 3 hitter over 8 innings, but one of them was a homer .

Erie 7 Bowie 2
Matt Joyce and Nick McIntyre homered. Jackson Melian had 3 hits and Clete Thomas had 2 hits and a walk. Matt Righter allowed 2 runs on 6 hits in 4 innings walking 1 and fanning 4. Roman Colon pitched 2 scoreless innings with 3 K’s on the same day he was indicted for punching Jason Karnuth in the face.

Lakeland 4 Jupiter 3
This was the first, and as it turned out only, game of a doubleheader. The 2nd game was rained out. But in this 7 inning tilt, Wilkin Ramirez was 3 for 3 with a walk. It appears that all the tools are finally starting to come together with his batting average up to 289. He has 10 homers and 23 stolen bases. He still K’s 4 times for every walk so he’s far from perfect, and hasn’t had sustained success yet, but the results for the 21 year old are encouraging. Angel Castro allowed 3 runs on 4 hits and 3 walks over 5 innings with 6 strikeouts.

West Michigan 1 South Bend 0
Scott Sizemore had 2 hits and Gorkys Hernandez singled and walked. Matt O’Brien pitched 7 shutout innings on 6 hits and 3 walks.

Tri-city 3 Oneonta 8
Kody Kaiser had 2 hits and 2 walks and has been a real tough out so far. Mike Sullivan and Devin Thomas had 3 hits each. Alfredo Figaro allowed 3 runs on 7 hits over 5 innings. Jose Fragoso pitched 3 innings of relief allowing only 1 walk and fanning 3.

GCL Blue Jays 3 GCL Tigers 2
Joseph Tucker had 2 hits. Londell Taylor has had a rough start and is 1 for 20. Brandon Johnson allowed 1 run on 4 hits, a walk, and 3 K’s over 4 innings.

Minors News

The Surge details some roster moves for the Whitecaps including DL time for Ramon Garcia and Jeff Gerbe and a broken ankle for Lou Ott suffered in the brawl.

2007 Season, Game Post

Game 78: Twins at Tigers

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PREGAME: It’s a gorgeous night in Detroit for what should be a phenomenal pitching match-up. It will be Justin Verlander taking on Johan Santana.

This is the 3rd time that the Tigers have faced Santana this season. They haven’t lit him up by any means, but they did push across a couple runs each time and more importantly ran his pitch count up to 100 after 6 innings both times. The Tigers will have Gary Sheffield tonight, the only game in the series where he’ll play because he’ll serve his shortened suspension on Saturday and Sunday.

Justin Verlander has been on quite the roll and will make one last statement in his case for pitcher of the month. So far in 4 starts in June he has a 1.24 ERA and a 35:10 strike out to walk ratio.

MIN @ DET, Friday, June 29, 2007 Game Preview – Baseball-Reference.com
Game Time 7:05

POSTGAME: Another home clunker for the Tigers. Justin Verlander was nearly unhittable. But he got himself into a ton of trouble with walks. It took him 31 pitches to get through the first inning, and part of that was the fault of Carlos Guillen who had a couple of miscues that could have shortened the inning. After mowing through the 2nd through 4th innings, Verlander did himself in by walking the bases loaded and surrendering a grand slam to Joe Mauer.

I don’t know if it was something about pitching from the stretch. Only one of the walks came when he was throwing from the wind-up, and that came on a full count. But with runners on base he couldn’t find the strike zone.

The Tigers threatened in the first against Johan Santana and made him throw 25 pitches. But an 8 pitch second inning put him back in control and the Tigers didn’t really muster any offense until Placido Polanco’s homer in the 6th.

Macay McBride did a nice job out of the pen. Eulogio De La Cruz came in and wasn’t great, but wasn’t helped when Neifi Perez made an error and 3 more unearned runs would come across.

And if you missed it, Perez started in place of Brandon Inge who was a late scratch with back spasms.
Twins 11 Tigers 1

2007 Season, Injuries

Zach Miner is back

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Zach Miner has rejoined the team for the DL. To make room the Tigers have put Tim Byrdak on the DL with tendonitis. And the revolvling door continues in the bullpen.

Byrdak has really struggled in his last 4 outings with batters posting a 409/435/909 line against him including 7 extra base hits. Whether it was hitters figuring him out or due to the arm pain, he just hasn’t been the same pitcher he was in his first 13 outings when opponents managed only a .567 OPS.

Zach Miner rejoins Tigers, Brydak to the DL – Detroit Tigers Insider – MLive.com

2007 Season, Minors

Tigers Minor League Wrap – 6/28/07

Ottawa 4 Toledo 3
Ryan Raburn had 3 K’s, but he also hit his 16th homer of the season. Chris Shelton went 1 for 4. Jon Connolly lasted 5 2/3 innings allowing 4 runs on 9 hits, 1 walk, and 1 strike out.

Erie 10 Bowie 2
That’s a lot of Erie offense for a game that was called after 6 innings – due to rain, not the mercy rule. Jeff Larish and Jackson Melian homered. Clete Thomas and Mike Hollimion each had 2 hits. Eddie Bonine pitched the complete shortened game allowing 2 unearned runs on just 1 hit and no walks.

Lakeland – Rained out

Lansing 2 West Michigan 4
Scott Sizemore tripled and homered to lead the attack. Jeramy Laster added 2 hits as well. Ramon Garcia only pitched 2 innings before giving way to Casey Fien who threw 5 innings of relief.

Oneonta 10 Tri-City 3
Casper Wells homered twice and doubled knocking in 5 runs. Chris Carlson and Kody Kaiser each had 3 hit days as well. Guillermo Moscoso allowed 4 runs on 9 hits over 5 innings with 1 walk and 3 Ks.

GCL Tigers 8 GCL Braves 1
Luis Arlet hit his 3rd homer and added a triple. Joaquin Guzman went 3 for 4. Luis Marte allowed 1 run on 6 hits over 7 innings with 1 walk and 6 K’s. Charles Furbush made his pro debut throwing 2 innings of relief allowing just a walk while fanning 3.

2007 Season, Game Post

Game 77: Rangers at Tigers Redux

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PREGAME: Nothing’s really changed, same starting pitchers (Kenny Rogers and Kevin Millwood) and all only it’s 20 degrees cooler, half the humidity, and all the clouds are pretty instead of ominous. Oh yeah, and I’ll be at there today.

For more info check out BR’s game preview

Game Time 1:05pm

POSTGAME: Beautiful day for a ball game today, so a 15 minute delay so the umpires could arrive was hardly an inconvenience. I guess that explains the black town car getting a police escort on the Madison ramp at about 12:30.

  • Kenny Rogers was amazing again. I saw the last run he gave up (the one in relief on the last day of the season), as well as the one today. But I also saw 2 of his playoff starts so I don’t think you can blame me for the scoreless inning streak ending.
  • But a couple other streaks continued, most notable was Carlos Guillen’s 11 game RBI streak. Guillen and Magglio Ordonez also both extended their hitting streaks to 14 games.
  • Remember how a couple days ago I questioned the issue of Ordonez turning on a ball? He certainly turned on one today hitting a long drive with home run distance that landed foul in leftfield.
  • Pudge Rodriguez was certainly stymied today. He racked up a ton of swing and misses, and from my vantage point it didn’t look like he was over swinging. He looked to be trying to shoot the ball to right, but contact seemed to be alluding him.
  • Gary Sheffield’s jumps on both the stolen base and wild pitch were incredible. Stealing third he was probably a third of the way before the ball was released, and he seemed to leave as soon as the ball hit the dirt from third base.
  • The Tigers drew 9 walks today, the second time this season they accomplished the feat.
  • And the bullpen was good too, even Todd Jones.

Tigers 5 Rangers 2

2007 Season, Minors

Tigers Minor League Wrap – 6/27/07

Ottawa 2 Toledo 5
Ramon Santiago had 3 more hits and is now hitting .271. Kevin Hooper and Timo Perez each had 2hits. Jack hannahan had a single and 2 walks. Ron Chiavacci went 7 innings allowing 2 runs on 7 hits, no walks, and 4 K’s. Zach Miner threw a perfect inning of relief and appears ready to come off the DL.

Erie 2 Bowie 1
Mike Hollimon had 2 hits. Clete Thomas singled and had 2 walks. Jair Jurrjens allowed a run in the first, but was otherwise untouchable for 7 1/3 innings with only 5 hits allowed, no walks, and 9 K’s.

Lakeland 2 Jupiter 9
Wilkin Ramirez was 2 for 3 with a walk and his 22nd stolen base. Cameron Maybin went 1 for 4. Chris Cody lasted 4 innings allowing 2 runs on 5 hits with 1 walk and 3 K’s.

Lansing 1 West Michigan 4
Audy Ciriaco hit his 4th homer. Scott Sizemore singled, doubled, and walked. Jeramy Laster was 2 for 3. Lauren Gagnier went 7 innings allowing 1 run on 5 hits, 1 walk, and 5 K’s.

Oneonta 6 Vermont 2
Mark Brackman started and went 4 2/3 innigns allowing no runs on 5 hits and 3 K’s. Justin Henry doubled, singled, and walked. Kody Kaiser was 1 for 2 with 3 walks. Cory MIddleton had 3 hits.

GCL Tigers 7 GCL Braves 3
Carlos Ramirez had 2 doubles and 4 RBI. Joaquin Guzman went 2 for 4, as did Brent Clevlen. Eleazar Aponte allowed 2 runs on 6 hits, 2 walks, and 5 K’s over 5 innings.

Minors News

Matt has done a great job rounding up all the minor league transactions.

2007 Season, Game Post

Game 77: Rangers at Tigers

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PREGAME: Time to get rid of that case of the uglies that the Tigers have picked up since returning home. Kenny Rogers will try to replicate his debut outing in Atlanta. Meanwhile the Tigers will try to replicate their last effort against Kevin MIllwood.

Marcus Thames is in for Craig Monroe today and Neifi Perez is playing for Placido Polanco.

For more see: TEX @ DET, Wednesday, June 27, 2007 Game Preview – Baseball-Reference.com

Game Time 1:05pm

POSTPONED – Sept 11th make up as a day-night doubleheader

2007 Season

Of Mountains and Molehills

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Where I overreact and overthink a couple of topics…

Maggs the spray hitter?

Not that I’m complaining about a guy who is leading the all the Majors in hitting, but do you think that Ordonez is focusing on going for the batting title? His last 8 hits have all been singles, and it seems the majority are to right field. He hasn’t hit a homer since June 2nd. In his last 13 games he only has 4 extra base hits. Let me emphasize again I’m not complaining, over those same 13 games he’s batting .438 and has an OBP of .518 which is quite awesome. I just wonder if he’s looking for singles, a la Placido Polanco, instead of looking to turn on the ball. Then again, it could just be he’s taking what the opposition is giving as well.

Andrew Miller’s Inning Limit

I heard back from the Tigers, and Andrew Miller doesn’t have an innings limit this year. Jim Leyland said it’s too early in the season to get into a discussion about an innings limit, but they’ll continue to monitor him as they do with all pitchers.

I know that there is mixed opinion about pitcher’s workload and corresponding injury risk so I won’t even take the discussion that way. I’ll just remind everyone about Justin Verlander fatiguing down the stretch last year. And Verlander had a full year of professional ball as a starter under his belt.

Interleague thumping

When I thought about how the Central might shake out this year, I didn’t really know which of the 4 teams would end up on top, but I was sure that the division wouldn’t have 3 90 game winners in it. I also thought that the division winner would be right around 90 wins. I thought this because a)there wouldn’t be as many wins against the Indians this year by divisional foes and b)it would be a tougher run through the NL.

Well, the White Sox look to be supplanting the Indians as the 2nd team to beat up on so point A may be a wash. However, the Tigers went out and beat up on the NL 14-4 which was just a shade under the 16-2 mark they posted last year. So maybe they can get back to 95 wins.

Strongest division

I really think all the talk about the AL Central being the toughest division is highly misplaced. The AL Central boasts only the 3rd and 4th best teams in the league. The White Sox are closer to last than 3rd and the Twins are flirting with .500.

I’m thinking if you look west, and to the NL, that’s where things are the most interesting. Sure, their division leading Diamondbacks have only outscored their opponents by 1 run so there is some luck involved. But the division has 4 teams that are .500 or better, and their 5th team has only been outscored by 16 runs on the season. If it’s not the strongest, it’s certainly the most complete.

All Star Voting

Tigers fans have certainly been stuffing the ballot boxes and it’s been great. Magglio Ordonez finally jumped into the top 3 (but the lead is slim so don’t think the work is done) and Gary Sheffield is at 5. Placido Polanco probably isn’t the most deserving second baseman, which is probably Brian Roberts, but he’s a respectable choice. But come on Tigers fans, Sean Casey 3rd? Craig Monroe 15th? I’m all about supporting the hometown guys, and giving the preference among some tough choices to your guy is fine. But I’m not a big fan of blatant blind voting.

2007 Season, Game Post

Game 76: Rangers at Tigers

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PREGAME: Hopefull it’s a bounce back night, both for the Tigers who played a clunker last night, and Nate Robertson who returns to the rotation after a stint on the DL and a really bad month of May. Nate’s last start was against the Rangers when he allowed 6 runs without retiring a batter. I bet he does better tonight.

The Tigers will face Willie Eyre who was moved from the bullpen to start in place of the injured Vincente Padilla.

For more stats see: TEX @ DET, Tuesday, June 26, 2007 Game Preview – Baseball-Reference.com

Game Time 7:05pm

POSTGAME: I thought I’d go to bed and wake up in a better mood. Didn’t happen. It’s amazing how 2 really poorly played games can wipe out the good will from an 8-1 road trip. The bullpen was awful again, and made worse by fielding gaffes.

Todd Jones and Mike Rabelo had a conference between every single pitch, and still couldn’t get the signs right which is the excuse for the 0-2 fastball to Sammy Sosa. Jones wasn’t supposed to throw the pitch in that spot, but he’d have to throw a pitch at some point. No word on what happened on the Marlon Byrd triple or the Ramon Vasquez single.