PREGAME: Interesting match-up of young pitchers tonight with Justin Verlander taking on Adam Loewen.

Verlander is coming off a start in which he limited the Royals to one unearned run on 2 hits. It wasn’t a perfect outing though with 5 walks.

Loewen was the 4th overall pick in the 2002 draft. The left hander went 5 innings in his first start this year allowing 2 runs on 5 hits, 3 walks, and 2 K’s.

With the left-hander on the mound, the Tigers will bat Ivan Rodriguez lead-off. Luckily his foot is feeling good enough to keep him in the lineup. It will also be the debut of Marcus Thames at first base.

Game Time 7:05. This one is on FSN +. The channel number will vary by your provider, but a complete listing can be found at Fox’s website.

POSTGAME: From Fangraphs:

Kind of tired after that one. So I’ll let the graph tell most of the story.

• Great outing by Verlander who was money, save for a blip where he couldn’t get the ball down.
• Great outing by Fernando Rodney who seems to have gotten his groove back.
• Great outing by Wil Ledezma who has been awesome. I’d love for him to be able to slide into the rotation
• Brandon Inge looked great in his first two plate appearances and awful in his last 3
• Thank you Craig Monroe!
• Here’s hoping Mike Maroth can make it through 6 tomorrow. The pen consists of Mesa and Zumaya tomorrow night. (Seay can probably go again and Jonesy will if need be)

Tigers 4, Orioles 1

PREGAME: The Tigers hope to get their offense going and Neifi Perez gets his first start of the year…let that sink in for a minute.

Perez will be starting in place of the struggling Brandon Inge and batting ninth. The rest of the lineup is what we’ve come to expect.

The Tigers will throw Nate Robertson tonight. Miguel Tejada is 5 for 13 with 2 homers in his career against Nate.

The Tiger bats will try to beat up on Jaret Wright. Magglio Ordonez who hits well in Camden Yards, and who has doubled in each of his last 2 games, is 8 for 18 with a homer off of Wright.

In his only other start this year Wright was gone in the 3rd inning after surrendering 4 hits and 5 walks.

Game Time 7:05pm

POSTGAME: Absolutely outstanding pitching by Nate Robertson tonight. He was uber efficient needing only 86 pitches through 7 1/3. He gave up only 4 hits, while fanning 5 and walking one. I said it in the comments, but he should have been given a shot to finish that game. That said, very nice 1-2-3 by Jonesy in the 9th.

The Tigers also got some very good defense. Curtis Granderson picked up an outfield assist on ill-advised baserunning, and an accurate one hop throw to 2nd. Craig Monroe made a nice play digging a ball out of the corner and sending a strong accurate throw to 2nd just missing Kevin Millar. Neifi made a couple nice plays at third and Polanco’s play to end the game was sweet.

The offense is still struggling, save for Curtis Granderson and Placido Polanco. The Tigers first 2 runs were fortunate to say the least with both runs scoring without a ball leaving the infield.

Gary Sheffield continues to struggle with a couple more strikeouts including one with the bases loaded.

Jim Leyland frustrated me on several occasions tonight. I already mentioned pulling Robertson, but then the two “strike-em-out-throw-em-out double plays” were both questionable decision with guys who were struggling at the dish.

But enough doom and gloom. The Tigers picked up the win. I’ll choose to just relish in the fact that I’m disputing the quality of the win for a change. Even with all the good of 2006, those 12 years prior are still pretty fresh in my memory.

Tigers 3, Orioles 1

PREGAME: It’s Opening Day in Baltimore, a day of renewed hope and optimism for O’s fans. The last time the Tigers were in Baltimore (don’t worry, I’ll stop these “last time the Tigers” things soon), Orioles fans staged a walk out protesting Peter Angelos ownership. It was a game I happened to be at.

Today Chad Durbin makes his first start of the season, and 57th of his career. His overall numbers are nothing to get excited about, but he’s up here because of what he did in AAA last year. For Toledo he struck out 3.24 batters for every one he walked and posted a 3.11 ERA in 185 innings.

He’ll be opposed by Daniel Cabrera who has filthy stuff, but no control. He struck out more than a batter an inning last year, but walked more than 6 per nine innings. The Tigers will put out there regular lineup against right handers of Granderson/Polanco/Sheffield/Ordonez/Guillen/Rodriguez/Casey/Monroe/Inge.

Game time 3:05

POSTGAME: So much for yesterday’s late inning heroics jump-starting the offense. The Tigers once again struggled to generate any offense. Even when they managed to get into hitters counts, they still struggled to make solid contact.

After the first 2 innings things were looking pretty good. The Tigers made Cabrera throw 21 pitches to only 3 batters in the first inning. In the second they saw 17 pitches, had a couple of hard hit balls and plated their first run. After that he only threw 66 pitches over the next 4 innings. The Tigers made a lot of routine outs, and when they did reach base the innings were cut short with double plays.

Meanwhile Chad Durbin mowed through the first 2 innings on 21 pitches. Everything was great until the 3rd inning when the wheels came off. A couple solid hits, a couple weak hits, and the Tigers were down 4 runs. He looked to gather himself well in 4th inning before surrendering a couple runs in the 5th.

Durbin gave way to Wil Ledezma in the 5th, and while he’ll get another chance or two, he may run the risk of giving way to Ledezma in the rotation as well. Ledezma looked great again today with 2 2/3 innings allowing only a run producing bloop single.

While Durbin struggled, he wasn’t awful and there’s a good chance they lose that game the way Cabrera was pitching anyways. Removing Durbin from the rotation is probably premature at this point.

Fortunately (or unfortunately depending on your point of view), Jose Mesa managed a strong inning.

Tigers 2, Orioles 6

PREGAME: First of all, Happy Easter to everyone (or at least those that celebrate).

It’s the rubber match and it will be Jeremy Bonderman taking on Brandon Duckworth.

This will be the first start of the year for Duckworth, who has a tendency to allow a lot of baserunners. Over the last 3 years his WHIP is 1.83 across 101.3 innings pitched.

Bonderman is making his 2nd start and looking for his first win.

Game Time 2:10

POSTGAME: I love how I tease the game with a stat, like about Duckworth:

who has a tendency to allow a lot of baserunners

and then have the exact opposite happen. Duckworth only allowed 4 hits and a walk. This was despite the fact that the Tigers made him throw pitches and routinely found themselves in hitters counts. In fact, Duckworth threw 51 41 (math is tricky) balls and 49 strikes, yet Tiger batters couldn’t make solid contact. It’s kind of hard to explain.

Fortunately Jeremy Bonderman had a very strong outing with the slider working quite well. He fanned 8 and his only walk was the intentional variety to Mark Teahen who had driven in both runs (I wonder if Teahen will be Bonderman’s new Matt Stairs). He went 6 innings and kept it close enough – with the help of the bullpen to set-up some 06ish heroics.

Magglio Ordonez finally made solid contact and was 2 feet away from a homer to right-center. A full pitch walk to Carlos Guillen was followed by a no-doubter line drive to left on the first pitch to Ivan Rodriguez. And with one swing an afternoon of angst and frustration about the offense was almost forgotten.

Other thoughts:

• Carlos Guillen reached base 3 times and seems to be settling in after a slow start to the spring.
• Marcus Thames drew a couple walks. Not to discredit Thames eye, but until Brandon Inge starts making solid contact the number 8 hitter isn’t going to see a lot to hit.
• Fernando Rodney had pretty uneventful inning – which was great to see. He surrendered a double, but that was among 3 weakly hit balls.
• Todd Jones turned in his second routine save in a row.
• Gary Sheffield struck out twice to bring his total to 5. What is it about the Tigers and strikeouts?

Tigers 3, Royals 2

PREGAME: Mike Maroth returns to the scene of his last start last year, where he was hammered for 3 homers and 6 runs while only recording one out. Of course he was hurting and landed on the DL following it. (The Tigers actually came back and won 13-8).

Meanwhile the Tigers will take on Gil Meche, he of the very much laughed at contract this winter. Still, the Tigers struggled against him last year. Meche only allowed 5 runs in 20 innings spanning 3 starts. He posted a 17:7 K:BB ratio against

This is the one game that won’t be seen anywhere for the Tigers this season. The 2:10 start time falls during Fox’s exclusive window, and the Royals just weren’t enough of a draw to get a national game.

POSTGAME: This 6-5 Tigers win was more along the lines of what we saw last year. There were 3 homers, all solo, powering the offense. The starting pitching kept the team in the game and handed over a lead to the bullpen. The relievers limited the other team to 1 run over 4 innings. And everything was backed by solid defense.

Good times.

PREGAME: Ah, a return to Kansas City where the Tigers began their out-of-nowhere season last year with a 2 game sweep to start the season, and clinched a playoff spot with a 3 game sweep in September.

The Tigers will throw Justin Verlander against the Royals. Verlander kind of feasted on Royals last year, allowing only 2 extra base hits and 2 runs in 21 innings. Of course, the 2006 ROY didn’t have to deal with 2007 ROY preseason candidate Alex Gordon.

The Tigers will face their first southpaw in Jorge De La Rosa. De La Rosa only has 144IP in his career and he has nearly as many walks (106) as strikeouts (114). The newly patient Tigers could exploit this number, espeically on a bitter cold night where gripping the ball could be a challenge.

Game Time 8:10

POSTGAME Enough with the excuses about wind in the outfield. Craig Monroe had his second ball this season drop in front of him. Magglio Ordonez screwed up 2 plays in the outfield, one was on the ground so I don’t think the wind impacted it. Plus, the Tigers hit pretty much every ball in the air and the Royals didn’t have a problem with it.

Other comments:

• Jose Mesa wasn’t fooling anyone, and the ball was up. The results speak for themselves. Monroe’s gaffe allowing the second run wasn’t Mesa’s fault, but the damage had already been done. He was pretty bad in spring training allowing 23 baserunners in 13 1/3 innings. I wonder how many chances he’ll be given.
• Verlander looked great early on, but then the control completely disappeared. The five walks didn’t cost him, except for shortening his outing.
• Craig Monroe’s double was only the Tigers 4th extra base hit.
• Two very nice plays from Brandon Inge. He needed some help from Casey on his first throw, but it was a heck of a play to come up with it in the first place.
• Very nice first outing for Wil Ledezma coming in to bail out Mesa and only allowing a walk in 1 2/3.

Royals 3, Tigers 1