PREGAME: Wouldn’t a doubleheader sweep make for a nice mood lifter heading into the weekend? Tonight’s game will be Eddie Bonine against Bartolo Colon.

Bonine had kind of a rough streak when he was with the team earlier in the year when he allowed homers in 3 straight appearances out of the bullpen. For Toledo he’s only fanning 4.3 per 9 innings, but he’s only walked 11 in 69 innings.

Colon is making his first start since June 7th.  Since then he disappeared for a little while, literally.

Chi White Sox vs. Detroit – July 24, 2009 | MLB.com: Gameday

POSTGAME: Wow, who knew doubleheaders could be so fun? Everything was awful yesterday, but the Tigers have bought themselves at least 2 more days in first place by taking the first 2 games of the series.

• How about Eddie Bonine? A quality start from the 6th starter is nothing to complain about. He did allow 2 homers, but he fanned 5 in 6 innings and really limited the damage.
• Bonine works VERY SLOW when he gets someone on base. Unfortunately he had someone on base every inning.
• Both centerfielders started off the game with nice catches. Granderson tracked down a Podsednik drive but he was one upped when DeWayne Wise made a spectacular catch on a Granderson drive. Watching Wise and the ball, I thought there was absolutely no way he gets close, let alone makes the play. Simply incredible.
• Carlos Guillen looks to be ready. He looks comfortable at the plate, and drove the ball well in both games. He also worked the count and saw quite a few pitches. Maybe he really can be the lefty bat.
• Magglio Ordonez turning on a fastball and pulling it down the line for a double set up the go ahead walk. Ordonez is taking to the platoon (thought tonight was against a righty).
• The White Sox put on a full shift against Marcus Thames. I’ve never seen one that extreme for a right handed batter, and Thames beat it by singling right where Alexei Ramirez should have been playing.
• Fernando Rodney and Brandon Lyon were both awesome. Let’s not forget night’s like tonight when we complain about the bullpen. Seay was shaky but man did he bounce back.
• Some interesting managerial moves from Leyland tonight. Everything worked in retrospect, but I thought taking Thames out after the 6th inning and the game tied was premature. Of course when the White Sox had a runner on 3rd and less than 2 outs, it could have been a big move if there would have been a flyball to left. Also, it meant that the Tigers would effectively have 2 lefties back to back making things easier for Guillen.
• That part proved to be true as Guillen turned to the lefty with the bases loaded. Here I was surprised to see Raburn pinch hitting for Guillen rather than pinch running for Ordonez (as he could then be a defensive replacement the next inning). I understand the platoon situation, but I wanted to see Guillen up. Raburn battled, but ultimately fanned.
• And that brings us to Clete, who had a heck of an at-bat (and a swing that looked pretty long early in the count) culminating in a take-the-lead walk.
• Disappointed in the crowd tonight. Some big moments in the top of the 7th and bottom of the 8th, and they were dead. Too quiet. I don’t know if people were too nervouse to cheer or what, but they didn’t seem as “into the game” as I would have expected.

PREGAME: It was about a month ago I downplayed the significance of a series in the Metrodome. I’m not going to downplay this one. A sweep by the White Sox would be pretty devastating. So let’s not get swept okay?

Justin Verlander is going for the Tigers which is usually a good thing. But the Tigers starter hasn’t been a factor lately, except in the sense that the performances get wasted.

Lately it has come down to a lack of offense, and today that offense gets a boost, but will it be enough to knock down Jose Contreras? Contreras has been up and down of late. One of the ups was an 8 inning 1 hitter against the Tigers. In his last 7 starts Contreras has a 2.62 ERA with 39 K’s and only 10 walks in 48 innings with only 4 homers allowed.

Your new Guillen-ized lineup:

1. Granderson, CF
2. Polanco, 2B
3. Thomas, RF
4. Cabrera, 1B
5. Guillen, DH
6. Raburn, LF
7. Inge, 3B
8. Laird, C
9. Everett, SS

Chi White Sox vs. Detroit – July 24, 2009 | MLB.com: Gameday

POSTGAME: This definitely qualifies as a big win. If the Tigers lose this afternoon they are relying on Eddie Bonine to try and muster a win. And it’s not that he isn’t capable, it’s that you’re putting a whole bunch on him and the rest of the series. Ideally the Tigers win the nightcap, but now the don’t have to.

And what makes it even bigger is that Justin Verlander went the distance, preserving the entire bullpen. Verlander was awesome. He battled control a little bit early on and his pitch count was in precarious shape after 4 innings when he was sitting at 73 pitches. But the White Sox got swing happy and started lofting lazy fly balls early in the count allowing Verlander to throw the final 5 innings on just 54 pitches. The last fastball coming on pitch 125 was clocked at 99.9mph.

The offense? Well they didn’t really kill the ball, and they struck out too much, but they scored. The hits were bloops and tweeners and things that fell just out of reach, but they fell. It’s like a week’s worth of cheap hits all fell in a span of 9 innings, but they fell. The Tigers were aggressive on the bases and kept putting themselves in scoring position which helped to pull the defense out of position and open up spots. Everybody take a breath and get ready for the night game.

PREGAME: Jarrod Washburn and Lucas French hook up in a soggy get-away-day game.

Seattle vs. Detroit – July 23, 2009 | MLB.com: Gameday

POSTGAME: Yeah. I’m at a loss.

PREGAME: As much as I’d love to talk about the Tigers carrying over their offense from last night, that probably isn’t a realistic expectation. Felix Hernandez has been absolutely sick.

The last time Hernandez didn’t last through at least 7 innings was May 30th, when he went 6.2. He’s fanning a batter an inning and almost 4 batters for every guy he walks. Opponents have only taken him deep 8 times all season. RISP opportunities are going to be hard to come by, so the Tigers need to be efficient when they have an opportunity.

Armando Galarraga makes his first post All Star break start. There were a couple somewhat promising starts for Galarraga leading to some hope he had turned things around. But he was hammered for 9 hits and 2 walks in 6 innings by the Indians in his last start.

Your Brandon Inge-less lineup:

1. Granderson, CF
2. Polanco, 2B
3. Cabrera, 1B
4. Thomas, RF
5. Thames, DH
6. Anderson, LF
7. Raburn, 3B
8. Laird, C
9. Santiago, SS

The decision to bat Thomas clean-up is a little strange, but I’m guessing the thinking is the lefty may provide a little more protection than Thames for Cabrera. The stranger move is batting Anderson anywhere higher than 8th. And did Dusty Ryan evaporate?

Seattle vs. Detroit – July 22, 2009 | MLB.com: Gameday

POSTGAME: The Tigers waste another masterful pitching performance and drop a 2-1 game for the 3rd time in 4 games. This time Galarraga allowed 1 freakin groundball single through 7+ innings, and still can’t get a win.

Bobby Seay threw a meatball to Russel Branyan who punished it. Seay had 22 straight appearances without a run allowed, and has given up homers in each of the last 2 games. But you can’t blame it all on Seay.

Josh Anderson has become Neifi Perez. I want to make it clear that I’m not hating on Josh Anderson here and blaming him for the Tigers offensive woes. When I call him Neifi it’s because he’s a player of limited ability that is being vastly misused by Leyland. Anderson is what he is and expecting more isn’t fair of him. Expecting the manager to realize that he is an inferior hitter who has no place in a starting lineup is another matter.

Anderson should not have been batting 6th. He came up in 2 RBI situations and ended the inning. This should not have come as a surprise. He should not have had a bat in his hands in the 9th inning. Horrible. If Anderson is a late inning defensive replacement or a pinch runner I have no problem with him being on the roster. But if you give Leyland a limited NL player, he’ll find a way to play him way too much. Leyland has done a good job in total this season, but his continued use of Anderson is baffling.

• Miguel Cabrera needs to start getting some of those hits with runners on base. Pat Caputo posted some startlingly abysmal stats about Cabrera and his tendendcy to not drive in runs. It bit them again tonight.
• The Tigers were very aggressive tonight. Of the first 50 pitches they saw, they swung at 30 of them and only took 4 called strikes.
• Galarraga was tiring. His command and delivery wasn’t as good as it was earlier in the game. That and there was some kind of forcefield around the plate when Ryan Langerhans and Jack Hannahan were up. It was very nice to see Galarraga’s slider being a swing and miss pitch again.
• Curtis Granderson has singled the other way 3 times in the last 2 games. Hopefully him using the whole field will get his batting average and extra base hits back up and this is the start of something positive.

PREGAME: The Tigers welcome the Seattle Mariners into town. The Mariners, like the Tigers are 6 games above .500 and rely heavily on their defense and pitching to overcome anemic offenses.

The Tigers will send out Rick Porcello for the first time since Michael Jackson died. Will he be rusty? Will he have extra giddy-up? Will he hold down the Mariners the way he did when he faced them on the left coast?

The Mariners send out Garrett Olson. Olson has a tendency to give up the long ball with 12 homers allowed in just 59 innings this year. He has a 4.53 ERA and strike out and walk rates that are unremarkable. The Tigers faced him twice last year and plated 5 runs in each game. So things should look good for an offense that is struggling, but I’m far from confident.

Tonight’s hopefully first place maintaining ineup:

1. Granderson, CF
2. Polanco, 2B
3. Cabrera, 1B
4. Thames, DH
5. Ordonez, RF
6. Raburn, LF
7. Inge, 3B
8. Laird, C
9. Everett, SS

Seattle vs. Detroit – July 21, 2009 | MLB.com: Gameday

POSTGAME: The Tigers got themselves some offense. When the first 5 batters score, things should be a laugher. But the Mariners kept coming back as they launched 4 homers and this game was way more stressful than it should have been.

Rick Porcello looked to have a ton of movement on his breaking balls. That was the good. The bad was that there were too many balls being put in the air. Porcello is normally an extreme ground ball pitcher, but 5 of the 11 outs in the field were in the air. And then there were the balls that flew out of the park.

But the offense, the offense, oh the offense. Magglio Ordonez seems to be taking to this platoonery as he cracked a grand slam picking up that long awaited “hit with RISP.” And the fact that were RISP was also refreshing. Placido Polanco and Miguel Cabrera later went deep making it an Arby’s night.

The pen wasn’t bad. Fu-Te Ni and Bobby Seay both gave up homers, but both had been  pitching well of late so I can’t hate on either of them. Brandon Lyon did his 2 out job, and Fernando Rodney made things interesting, but didn’t pitch badly. The 1-2 plunking of Branyan was clearly a mistake, but he was ahead of the count the whole inning, he didn’t nibble, and he followed the HBP with a couple grounders, a K, and a routine flyball.