PREGAME: It’s a hot and muggy and breezy afternoon, the kind of weather where the balls tend to fly. That could be good boding for the Tigers because Milwaukee starter Dave Bush has had homer issues, with 17 allowed so far this season. He’s been taken deep in 12 of his 14 starts and multiple homers 4 times this year.
The Tigers will lean on the big league debut of 24 year old Alfredo Figaro. Figaro posted a 7.8 K/9, 2.2 BB/9 and 1.1 HR/9 in 68 innings for AA Erie.
Milwaukee vs. Detroit – June 20, 2009 | MLB.com: Gameday
POSTGAME: First things first, let’s talk about the kid making his debut. I was impressed with Figaro. The stuff definitely seemed to live up to the billing with more fastball velocity than I expected and a pretty nasty breaking ball when he could control it. That said, he did get knocked around quite a bit and the Brewers stranded 2 runners in each of the first 3 innings. But with 7 K’s Figaro was able to pitch around some jams. He finished with 96 pitches, many of them thrown in tough situations. All in all a promising debut.
And then there is the offense. Miguel Cabrera is swinging like he did in April where everything off the bat seems possible of injuring someone. Marcus Thames is locked in. Heck, everyone was locked in today except for Curtis Granderson and Brandon Inge. even then Grandy hit a couple balls well and Inge had a sacrifice fly.
- Miggy has been playing some superb defense at first base, not just making the plays fielding the ball but making heads up plays when he has it in his glove.
- Speaking of heads up, how about Alfredo Figaro being in the right spot backing up a throw to 3rd. Yes, he should be there but in a big league debut I can see it easy for him to be distracted.
- The Tigers didn’t take a walk today, and yet they scored 9 runs. The last time the Tigers scored that many runs without a walk was…Friday night when they plated 10. What’s odd is that since 1954 the Tigers have scored at least 9 runs with no walks only 7 times.
- Ryan Perry was not good with the walks.
- Brandon Lyon walked in one of Perry’s runs
- Nate Robertson added a walk after 2 quick outs
- Fernando Rodney had a 1-2-3 inning
Pinapple was dfa’d
A “Dream” match-up Today in LA. Jeff Weaver vs Jerod Weaver
Gamecast is categorizing Figaro’s breaking pitch as a curveball… yet looking at the PFX values it seems that this breaking pitch is a slider… anyone know?
I’m glad that Dickerson is back.
I agree Kevin, Price as an analyst is tough enough to handle, the play by play role…..If anyone has an iPhone you really need to get the MLB At-Bat app, all the games are on radio. The really great thing lately is being able to listening to the opponents broadcast instead of Price.
Yeah, the new video feeds for MLB At Bat are sick. Check out the US Open app – live video from the tourney.
Wow, I did not expect a triple out of that.
Nice boys. Let’s get this 4th one home. Don’t let up.
Ugh… Way to blow the squeeze.
Great read and jump by Don Kelly on the Anderson single.
This team suddenly knows how to hit now that there isn’t a gaping hole right in the middle of the order…
I like the squeeze there. That’s okay that it didn’t go our way. Everett usually gets those done.
Have the Tigers successfully executed the squeeze yet this year? I can’t believe Leyland keeps trying…
Uh, yes. At least two.
Pretty sure that was the first failed one.
There have been at least two other failed ones. One where the batter missed the ball when trying to bunt and the other was Sardinha, who missed the sign.
When Sardinha missed the sign, didn’t he get the run home anyway? I thought he got a single. That, to me, isn’t a “failed” one. It wasn’t one at all, and it didn’t fail.
Figaro is really having some problems keeping the ball down in the zone.
With a fastball like that, he can pitch at the top of the zone and be fine, like Verlander and Jackson. It’s a Jim Price fallacy that pitchers have to pitch at the bottom of the zone to be good. It works for a lot of guys. Look at Halladay or Webb. But for others, pitching up in the zone makes more sense.
All these Tiger “extra base hits” are freaking me out.
Shadows approaching home plate.
Figaro leaves too many balls up but he can definitely strike people out with that breaking ball.
Aw what the hell. Polanco with another home run. What got into this offense?
Sounds like Figaro is done. I would have liked to see him go one more vs. the bottom of the lineup, but well done Alfredo.
Goodness, hitting is fun. I’d like to put the credit squarely on Dan Dickerson. He just makes everything better.
Can we go back in time and spread all these XBHs over the last two weeks?
It’s all good and well to sit here enjoying this, but shouldn’t we be doing something more useful, like, say, campaigning to get the Brewers back into the American League?
gotta love it: 7-run lead and he walks 2 men in a row……what is he a “baby Rodney”??…… 🙁
after two games of this series has:
a) the Brewers left the book everyone else has been using to pitch the Tigers back in Milwaukee?
b) The benching of Maggs has gotten the rest of the Tigers attention.
c) the fat that the brass has made some moves this week is paying off
d) all of the above
e) none of the above
b
and also their pitchers leaving balls up and guys like laird and thames getting hot and inge using all fields
its simple, when you make people accountable (even if by example) it sends a strong message
i just got back, game was hot as heck, and great…. anderson didn’t look good defensively, but cabrera sure did and has – maybe he has adjusted
Nice work from F-rod.
Random question. Does anyone know what song Josh Anderson has for his on-deck music?
Anderson’s music it called Strong Tower by the band Kutless.
Figaro Figaro Fiiiiigaro. Nice game, kid. That’s not to say that I endorse nepotism or anything.
and just like that we have a 3 game win streak.
Laird is breaking out of his slump too. I thought he would start hitting again if we got a new back-up catcher and maybe I was right for once.
Kerry Wood blows another save for the Tribe and on back to back games. Hard to believe, but I’m glad we were stuck with Rodney. Wood has been a total disaster for Cleveland. Sometimes the best moves are the moves you don’t make.
Nice to see Figaro pitch well considering people were critical of him for being so old as the reason he was dominating low Class A hitters at West Michigan.
Figaro’s numbers were meh to me in his first game with the Tigers, but it was a decent start for him.
He came in just like Verlander did. From AA Erie.
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