2009 Season, Game Post

Game 2009.130: Rays at Tigers

90 Comments

PREGAME: James Shields and Jarrod Washburn on wrap-around day.

Tampa Bay vs. Detroit – August 31, 2009 | MLB.com: Gameday

POSTGAME: This was a slightly different script than many Tigers losses. They got some offense this time, especially from Carlos Guillen who had 4 hits including 2 homers. It was the complete lack of pitching that cost them this time. Unfortunately it was another bad outing for Washburn who aside from the Royals start has found a way to struggle in every outing. He’ll usually find a way to record a bunch of outs in a row, but that is usually sandwiched in between homers.

This time Washburn pitched into some bad luck with 3 flukish doubles in the first inning. He made good pitches and didn’t have much to show for it. But that doesn’t excuse the walk or the homer that also took place that inning, or the runs in later innings either.

And Ryan Perry has looked dominant at times, and at other times like today he has looked anything but. The travails of rookie-dom.

90 thoughts on “Game 2009.130: Rays at Tigers”

  2. Washburn does not have very good control right now. He needs to settle down and try to limit this damage to one run, if possible…

  4. French, Robles, and Jacobson traded for two team killing scrubs. I am not happy with my general manager.

    Miner warmup, please.

  8. I wonder if Keith still thinks I’m nitpicking when I said the Washburn trade hasn’t worked out so far…

  9. I wonder if Leland has this song in his repertoire “I’m gonna Wash that man right outta my hair, and send him on his way”? If I was him, I’d be humming in the clubhouse. What a godawful start.

    1. The Free Press reports Washburn doesn’t plan on re-signing with the Tigers..We should be so lucky

      1. Cut Washbum now. We have plenty of medicre pitchers in the system to replace him with. And take Huff with him.

  11. DD should never be allowed to trade for left handed pitching. He has made enough mistakes for two lifetimes, and seriously tarnishes his otherwise brilliant track record.

  12. Jeff remember your “huh” reply to me yesterday?

    Spotting the other team 6 before recording an out isn’t fun.

    Washburn hasn’t done much the last month. It’s all about “what have you done for me lately” in the playoffs

    1. Yes, I wrote a post about which pitcher to use in which stadium and you replied with something irrelevant. I still don’t know what your point is and why it’s directed at me.

  13. OK, we are working our way back into this one
    Need a few more good innings and no more runs for the Rays

    1. Yeah but the fact that Washburn is probably headed back out to pitch again doesn’t give me much confidence.

  15. They haven’t worked out, but I was behind them from the get-go, I think most on this list were. Even Miggy strikes out every once in a while.

    1. I supported bringing them here as well. But I think it’s clear to say these two guys aren’t working out. This is not to second guess DD, but just to point out that maybe it’s time to divy up Washburn/Huff’s playing time to somebody else.

        1. It’s probably too small of a sample size, but I can’t help but wonder where we’d be had we let French take these past 6 starts.

          Washburn is 1-1 through 5 starts, and if I recall correctly, we are 2-3 in those 5 starts. Can anyone confirm this?

          I’m sure Coleman will run some analysis on it soon.

          1. He has made 5 starts and we are 4-1 in the 5 starts he has made.
            The Tigers won these two starts he made, though:
            6 ip, 10 h, 1 bb, 5 er, 2 hr, 3 ks
            6 ip, 5 h, 1 bb, 6 er, 4 hr, 4 ks

            Horrible starts that resulted in wins.

            French has made five starts, and the Mariners are also 4-1 in the five starts he has made, and his record is 3-1. In 28 ip, he has a 4.5 era with 19 ks/14 bb and has given up 5 hr.

  16. Has anyone heard anything to suggest that the Tigers are interested in Brad Penny? Fangraphs thought so last week and suggested that releasing Penny was an overreaction on the part of the Red Sox similar to the release of John Smoltz.

  17. Washburn has retired 9 in a row. I think he is going for a perfect game, post the first 6 batters that crossed the plate before recording an out.

  19. When Galarraga comes back, how possible is it that Washburn finds himself out of the rotation? Armando has been bad this year, but Washburn is really breaking new ground in the field. It would look bad to cut the guy a month after trading for him, but how many more chances can you give him in a pennant race?

  21. I bet Washburn gets at least 3 more shots at it. He’s not an ace, but he’s not this bad either. He’ll settle down.

  22. The best case scenario would be to put Washbum on waivers and have him picked up by the Twins or WSox for the final run.

    1. If the Twins picked him up he would end up being a reincarnated Cy Young for the rest of the year.

  24. From the FSN telecast:
    11 hr in 133 ip for the Mariners
    11 hr in 37 ip for the Tigers

    Can anyone guess the owner of these numbers?

  27. The Tigers 5 through 8 hitters today are all hitting lower than .215 for August. That seems nearly impossible in the modern era.

    2. Goodness, that’s incredible. I think that instead of being in a team-wide hitting slump, we can safely say that the first two months of the season were an anomaly.

  28. After the game today waive both Washbum and Duff, call up two more players from the minors to take their roster spots and put Thames at DH.

  29. The remarkable thing is not only would the Tigers not be in first in any other division, they would be completely out-of-it in any other division. Thank goodness for .500 and below division rivals.

  30. Wasbum 6 starts:
    37 IP
    28 ER
    Take away the one good outing against KC 8 IP 0 R and…. well, you do the math.

  31. Leyland groused yesterday about how he hates September call-ups and then he calls up six players! Either his logic is shaky or he’s not calling the shots.

    1. They called up ONLY six. I am guessing that most teams will expand their rosters by more than that.

      1. I don’t think so, most teams take only three or four. And I bet there will be another arm added at some point. Seven would be a giant number for a contender.

    1. Ah, but they also have a winning record (even with today’s game) in August for the first time since 2000 (I believe). Winning record again for September and we should see the playoffs in this lousy division.

    2. It wasn’t a sac bunt – the throw barely beat him there. If he hit it a little softer it would have been a base hit. I thought it was a good idea, Longoria was playing him real deep at third.

      1. OK, that makes more sense. I would have assumed that, but Leyland hasn’t given me a good basis to make such assumptions.

  38. I’m still not sure the move makes sense.

    Dude was 4 for 4 with two bombs on the day. And we were down by 5.

    Even if the bunt is successful, does it really help?

    1. A homerun by Guillen in that situation would have meant very little. Baserunners are the name of the game at that point. We were still several baserunners away from the point where you care what base they’re on and how they went about getting there. HR, 3B, 2B, 1B, BB, HBP, catcher’s interference, dropped third strike, obstruction… all would have been equally valuable in terms of winning the game.

    2. Of course it helps – since we were down 5 we need him to score in order to win. It doesn’t matter if he hits a home run or if he bunts his way on and and gets walked home. The only thing that matters is that he scores that run, and the bunt seemed like a good way to get on base with a 40 year old man on the mound and a third baseman playing well behind the bag.

      1. Well, it helps if it works. I think his thinking was he was lefty on lefty, a rarity for him this year, and he thought bunting was worth a shot.

        1. I’m saying it would have helped if he reached base. Obviously, the sacrifice didn’t help. I should have been more clear.

    1. i was always happy to see him pitching against us. however, with these deadline deals you just never know…half the baseball world was ready to gut their minor league systems for roy halliday…methinks some general managers are happy today that they held off. still a great pitcher but not having a good stretch now. with washburn i would say still a serviceable pitcher but not having a good stretch.

  40. can we call Seattle, tell them we made a mistake, and we want a “do over” on the French trade……”our bad”

  41. Just got home from watching this game.
    I don’t know if Washburn doesn’t care, but he certainly didn’t look like a pro in this effort – continuing a trend since putting on the “D.”
    That said, what the heck was Leyland waiting for? He has an expanded bullpen starting tomorrow…he should’ve gotten JW out of there early – or at LEAST had someone go talk to him – and given his team a chance to get back into it. Instead, kept him around until it was hopeless. No exactly “playing a full 9” in my opinion.

  42. So the Wrong Sox traded Thome and Contreas last night. Are they giving up on the year or just trying to part with some expensive veterans?

      1. I agree. The focus now is all about the Twins. We have, what, 7 more games against them or something? Lets take at least 4 or 5 of those and put the division away strong.

    2. It seems odd to me to be throwing in the towel at this point…on the other hand, the AccuScore odds of making the playoffs favor towel-throwing:

      Last week: DET 56.5% CHW 38.8% MIN 5.0%
      This week: DET 75.9% MIN 15.4% CHW 8.6%

      We had a good week, they had a bad, and I guess they are agreeing with the low % estimate. And best of all they traded Thome to a NL team!

      1. very nice, Coleman. Are you looking at the PECOTA version of that report? I like that one better since it factors in the expected performance of the players. The one I saw from BP shows:

        DET: 65.6%, MIN: 19.8% CHW: 14.4%

        which does not exactly put the White Sox back in the race, but it’s a substantial difference in probability.

        Here’s the link for that report:

        http://www.baseballprospectus.com/statistics/ps_oddspec.php

      2. Well, I think the White Sox, with their recent World Series title factored in, calculated the chance of actually doing something in the playoffs if we make it at 0.000001%

    3. Those moves probably won’t hurt them much this year though. They already had a surplus of OFs. They’ll likely move either Dye or Quentin to DH full time. The only downside is Podsednik or Wise will have to start every day in CF, but Podsednik was playing most days anyway. And Contreras was about to be kicked out of the rotation anyway with the way he’s been pitching.

      So the hit to their postseason hopes will take a miniscule hit, if any. And they were able to save $ and get some prospects for two players who weren’t helping them much.

  43. Patience people patience. We need Washburn!!!!

    He’ll settle in, much like Brandon Lyon did. He’s just as important to us as Kenny Rogers was in 2006.

  44. I’ll take something close to Rogers circa 2006 with the sticky palm and all. Of course, one can’t help but dream about what this rotation would like in the playoffs had we held onto Jurggens?

  45. I am not ready to give up on either Washburn or Huff. I still believe they were good deals and will pay off in the long run.

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