Monthly Archives: August 2007

2007 Season, Injuries

Andrew Miller to the DL

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Andrew Miller’s hamstring injury has landed him on the 15 day DL. Fernando Rodney was recalled from his rehab assignment and will take Miller’s spot in the rotation. Presumably Chad Durbin or Zach Miner would take Miller’s place in the rotation.

Andrew Miller has amassed 131 innings between the minors and the majors this year. I didn’t expect him to be pitching much beyond this point in his first full year of professional ball, so I don’t think this loss will be as great as it first seems. True, they have to replace his production in the rotation, but that was something I thought they would need to be doing later this month anyways. Who knows, maybe this will actually give his arm a little time and extend his season.

As for Miller’s outing last night, the 4th inning seemed to take a toll on him as he amassed 36 pitches, and only 8 of those topped 91mph.

As for Rodney, I thought it was curious that the Tigers were adamant that he perform well in Toledo before bringing him back. He hadn’t done well enough prior to Miller’s injury and yet now he’s ready? I know that sometimes you have to improvise, but the team was content being a reliever short last night with Chad Durbin not available. If they thought he wasn’t ready 24 hours ago, and he didn’t pitch last night, what makes him more ready tonight?

2007 Season, Roster Management

Neifi era ends, and Miner is back

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Two roster-ish type notes. First, Neifi Perez was suspended 80 games for another positive test of a banned stimulant. You think this is what Leyland meant when he said that Perez “brought a lot of energy” to the team. Let’s hope he kept it to himself.

Also, Zach Miner has returned from his bereavement leave and Jose Capellan was optioned out to make room for him. Capellan has had a tender elbow, so he didn’t really contribute much in the last week.

Timely that Zach is back because the Tigers will be without Chad Durbin who is with his wife and new baby.

2007 Season, Game Post

Game 108: White Sox at Tigers

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PREGAME: The boys are back in town, and this time it’s an actual homestand instead of just another stop on the Tigers July North American tour.

They welcome in the White Sox and Mark Buehrle. The Tigers beat up Buehrle to the tune of 14 hits in 6 1/3 innings, but he bounced back and threw 8 shut out innings against the Blue Jays.

The Tigers send out Andrew Miller who will be looking for that illusive 6th inning out. If he records one it will be his first since July 6th.

Game Time 7:05

2007 Season, Minors

Tigers Minor Leauge Wrap 8/2/07

Toledo 5 Charlotte 4
Dane Sardhina went 2 for 4. Henry Mateo doubled and homered. Yorman Bazardo allowed 1 run on 1 walk, 5 hits, and 3 strikeouts in 6 2/3 innings.

Erie 13 New Britain 3
Clete Thomas had 4 hits. Wilkin Ramirez was 3 for 5 with a home run. Kody Kirkland also went deep. Eddie Bonin allowed 3 runs on 6 hits in 6 innings.

Lakeland 5 Fort Myers 9
Deik Scram tripled and added 2 singles. Justin Justice also had 2 hits. Cameron Maybin was 0 for 4.
Peoria 1 West Michigan 7
James Skelton had 3 hits and Gorkys Hernandez went 2 for 4. Ryan Strieby hit his 14th homer. Jonah Nickerson pitched 7 shut out innings and allowed only 3 hits and 1 walk while fanning 4.

Brooklyn 5 Oneonta 2
Ronnie Bourquin, Chris Carlson, and Kody Kaiser all had 2 hits. Sean Finefrock allowed 4 runs on 6 hits, 1 walk, and 5 K’s in 5 innings.

GCL Tiugers Rained out

Minors News

Baseball America released its Best Tools list for AAA. Mike Hessman rates as the best defensive third baseman and Ryan Raburn has the best offensive arm in the International League.

Links

links for 2007-08-02

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2007 Season, Research

Mike Rabelo – the anti-save

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I don’t know if you’ve noticed or not, but Todd Jones and Mike Rabelo don’t really go together. If Jones is peanut butter, Rabelo is asparagus and if you look back at the game logs you see that Mike Rabelo has caught half of games where Jones has allowed runs. Luckily it seems that Jim Leyland has picked up on this, and has Ivan Rodriguez catch Jones in his last 13 appearances. A period where Jones has allowed a meager .490 OPS against.

On June 26th the Tigers were hosting the Rangers at the beginning of a lengthy homestand. Todd Jones entered the game in the 9th inning with the score tied at 6 after the Tigers scored 3 in the bottom of the 8th. After 2 quick outs Jones allowed a few baserunners and there seemed to be a conference between every single pitch with catcher Mike Rabelo. A triple and a single later the Tigers were down 3. After the game Jones admitted to missing a sign from Rabelo. He was supposed to step off the rubber, and instead gave up a hit. That was the last game that Rabelo has caught Jones.

And I’m pretty sure this isn’t a matter of coincidence. Twice Rabelo was the starting catcher, only to be replaced by Pudge at the end of the game for defensive purposes.

Looking back, Jones has allowed runs in 10 of his apperances and in 5 of those Mike Rabelo was the catcher. Jones has 5 blown saves, and Rabelo was manning the plate for 3 of them. Remember April 18th against the Royals? The Tigers take a 3-1 lead into the 9th inning. Jones walked 2 and allowed a double and a single tying the game.

Or what about May 28th against the Devil Rays? The Tigers have a 5-4 lead when Jones loads the bases on 2 hits and an intentional walk only to see Elijah Dukes single in the winning run on a chopper. Rabelo.

And who could forget the low point of the season (at least the low point before this week). The debacle on June 1st in Cleveland. Jones allowed 5 runs in the bottom of the 9th for a crushing 12-11 defeat. Rabelo.

In all, 12 of the 23 runs Jones has allowed have come with Rabelo behind the dish, which is disproportionately high for the backup catcher.

I don’t mean this as an indictment of Rabelo’s ability. His overall catchers ERA is 4.66 which is only slightly higher than Pudge’s 4.47. Given Rabelo’s limited playing time I’m not sure that is even a real difference. But for some reason, he and Jones just never seemed on the same page. They seemed to confer on a regular basis, and the Rangers game was just a manifestation of that. So if the game is close, and Rabelo is playing, you’ll probably continue to see Pudge get that 9th inning call.

2007 Season, Minors

Tigers Minor League Wrap 8/1/07

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Toledo 2 Charlotte 1
Brent Clevlen went 3 for 3 with a walk. Anastacio Martinez allowed just 1 unearned run on 2 hits over 6 innings while fanning 9. Fernando Rodney had trouble with the strike zone and only recorded one out in his 15 pitches while allowing a hit and a walk and only throwing 7 strikes

Erie 5 New Britain 0
Steve Torrealba singled and homered. Mike Hollimon also homered. Jeff Larish was 1 for 3 with a walk. Jair Jurrjens fanned 10 and walked none in a 3 hit complete game shutout.

Lakeland – double header rained out

Peoria 1 West Michigan 3
Scott Sizemore and James Skelton were 2 for 4. Jeff Gerbe was activated and pitched 3 no hit innings fanning 2. Charlie Furbush went 5 innings and allowed an unearned run on 2 hits in 5 innings. Brett Jensen finished it off by fanning 2 in the 9th.

Oneonta 3 Staten Island 2 11 innings
Ronnie Bourquin was 3 for 5. Casper Wells and Kody Kaiser each homered. Alfredo Figaro pitched 5 shut out innings fanning 7 and walking 4.

GCL Braves 1 GCL Tigers 1 (game suspend due to rain)
Hayden Parrot went 1 for 3. Brandon Hamilton walked 2 and fanned 2 to go along with 1 run and 1 hit in 3 innings. Richard Zumaya followed with 3 scoreless innings of 1 hit ball.

Links

links for 2007-08-01

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2007 Season, Game Post

Game 107: Tigers at A’s

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PREGAME: The ridiculously long, and very disappointing, road trip finally comes to an end. The Tigers will also get their first day off tomorrow since July 16th. Unfortunately it won’t be their last trip to the West Coast because they have 3 more against Oakland at the end of August.

Today it will be Nate Robertson, who gutted out 6 innings his last time out, but submarined the Tigers chances of victory with 8 runs allowed in just 2 innings.

He’ll take on Dallas Braden who was shelled in his last start to the tune of 7 runs (3 were unearned) in 4 innings.

Game Time 3:35

POSTGAME: Another day another loss. This time Nate Robertson did his job and turned in a quality start. He lasted through 6 innings because the A’s got jumpy with 14 batters swinging at the first pitch. But save for a rough 3rd inning and a huge Mark Ellis blast he had an easy go of it.

Of course he left things in a precarious state for Chad Durbin. Durbin did a fine job coming in with a 2nd and 3rd nobody out situation and keeping the ball in the infield as no one crossed the plate. Of course Bobby Seay nearly undid his good work by walking 2 and plunking a batter before Jason Grilli picked up the last out.

The offense had their chances with 12 baserunners but only managed to plate 2 runs. Some of it was poor execution and some was just unfortunate. Kind of like the whole roadtrip in a nutshell.