2012 Season, Game Post

Game 2012.159: Tigers at Twins

44 Comments

Detroit Tigers, 85-73, 1st place, 2 up, magic number 3.

Fister, then Smyly, then Verlander: the Tiger starters are on a roll, and this afternoon Anibal Sanchez takes the mound, following up one of the best Tiger starts of the season, to face the 1-9 Australian Liam Hendricks , who is the only Liam in MLB history, so he’s got that going for him.

Not that there wasn’t any drama last night, thanks to Long-Ball Benoit and Ryan D—it (again!). Doumit now has all 8 of the Twins’ RBI for the series.

And once again, P.J. Walters baffled the Tiger hitters.  Luckily the Twins had to resort to our old friend Casey Fien out of the bullpen, Cabrera re-tied for the HR lead, which has Mitch Albom all excited.

Speaking of excited, in the 5th inning yesterday, Quintin Berry stole second, an event that slipped under the radar.  Berry now has 21 stolen bases for the season, and has yet to be caught.  If he can manage the last 4 games without being caught, Mr. Berry has an American League record.

Max Scherzer is stiff iffy, but let’s wait a day or two before we start fretting about that.

Stat of the Day: Al Alburquerque has picked up on his improbably good season last year, throwing 12.1 scoreless innings, with a WHIP of 0.892.  Al now has a 84 strikeouts for his career in only 55.2 innings (1.52 per inning).

Today’s Player of the Pre-game:  Miguel Cabrera. The Twins’ Hendricks has given up 1.95 HRs per 9 innings, the 4th worst in baseball. You see where I’m going with this.

Today’s It-Worked-Yesterday Lineup:

  1. Austin Jackson CF
  2. Quintin Berry LF
  3. Miguel Cabrera 3B
  4. Prince Fielder 1B
  5. Delmon Young DH
  6. Andy Dirks RF
  7. Jhonny Peralta  SS
  8. Alex Avila C
  9. Omar Infante 2B

44 thoughts on “Game 2012.159: Tigers at Twins”

  1. Going to KC for 3 final games should be a concern…KC seems to be a much better team at home – (i.e., Team BA home – .278 vs .253 away). A win tonight for DET is highly adviseable… as going into KC w/a 2 or 3 game lead is MUCH better than a 1-game lead.

    Congrats to Berry for his 21 for 21 SB’s – impressive, and at least one of those SB was on a pitchout (vs. LAA). QB adds a dynamic DET has not had in a long time, and i’m happy to see JL has given him some PT lately. Whether QB is in the lineup or not, he also seems to be one of the team’s biggest cheerleaders.

  2. Jason Beck reports: “Good throwing session today, according to Scherzer. More optimistic about Wednesday, confident he can be at full strength for playoffs. If AL Central is decided by Wednesday, Smyly starts.”

  5. Tigers need to take a strong lead to help out when Sanchez turns this game over to the bullpen.

  8. Sanchez pitched a helluva game… if/when DET makes the playoffs, Porcello will (should) be the odd man out – relagated to the BP

    DET offense making a pretty bad pitcher (Hendricks) look very good today

  14. Angels come back to beat the Rangers. Next the Rangers have their final 3 in Oakland. How cool will it be to relegate the Rangers to the Wildcard?

      1. As of last Thursday, our friends on MLB XM radio have been already talking about a Yankee v. Tiger ALDS.

        1. Call me mean spirited, but in my view sweetest outcome would be: Orioles take AL East, Yankees get to play WC decision against Oakland and lose. Then we would have both the most amazing AL clubs this season in the playoffs.

  15. don’t wake JL, its the 8th and they didn’t put in Benoit…you know, ‘the 8th inning guy’

  16. We need another run. Solo by someone? Does Avila have one in him?

    Probably gonna have to rely on a 2B by Dirks and a blooper by a BOOB instead.

  18. top of MIN order coming up…going to be tense.

    if Mauer gets a hit, he will lead Cabrera for the batting crown

  23. Congrats to Detroit Tigers on having 7th best record in American League and getting to open with Verlander at home in playoffs! Selig rules.

      1. Selig signed off on profoundly unfair decision to let this year go to a 2-3 divisional series because they wanted to shoehorn 2nd WC this year and cut travel. Next year they go to 2-2-1 again. Having first games at home in a short series is giant advantage. In 87, the Tigers got jobbed out of home field–they alternated back then–and Twins got first two games at home. Series was basically over after first two games. No time in MLB history has the lower seeded opened at home in playoffs. This year it happens.

  25. Ed Farmer: That’s strike three and the Ray’s came in here and…Uh I don’t know what Rodney is doing.[audible sigh] We’ll be back with keys to the game…

  26. I think Price may have sealed the Cy Young today. From a WAR perspective, JV gets it. But looking at the numbers, Price should win. Gonna be tight though, as I think Weaver, JV and Price will all get votes.

  27. The Playoffs aren’t supposed to count towards the Cy Young, ala King Felix winning, but this year the pitching in the playoffs might win it for one of those mentioned.

    1. Don’t the bbwa knuckleheads vote for cy and all other awards on the last day of the regular season?

      1. That’s what I thought as well. By the time the play-offs start, voting is already over. Plus votes could already have been cast. Last year, JVs narrative of pure dominance and MVP caliber season was spun in mid august to mid september, along with an early post-season clinch by the Tigers. This year, that was precisely the stretch when he had a bit of a weak phase, while Weaver was cruising. Thus, Weaver might have it already sealed 2012. We’ll see after the playoffs.

  28. The fact that Detroit finally won a 1-run game is a good sign going into the playoffs. The fact that the offense came up blank against a 1-8 pitcher (again), not so much.

  29. Had a thought last night; I see all the comments re JL, Gene, and Mac on this blog, and have some agreement with them, but if there is a CWS blog, should they be screaming for Ventura Highway’s head on a platter? I realize we are benefiting from their demise, and can’t wait to paraphrase the Hawk,”this SEASON is ovah!”, but for no particular reason the Pale Hose are really in a death spin….

    1. since 8/27, CWS has gone 12-21, and a lot of those losses have had to have been brutal for CWS fans to watch.

      Compared to the Red Sox and Braves collapses last year, CWS has been pretty mild. In my opinion the difference between Ventura’s team and JL’s team is the quality and depth of each team. Though there have been stretches where DET has looked pretty bad this year, i believe DET is clearly the superior team. With that said, i think Ventura and CWS have over-achieved this year (except for the past month), whereas i believe DET has underachieved. Yes DET appears to be playoff bound, and that’s great!… but had CWS not struggled over the past month, DET would be on the outside looking in. How much of that rests with JL and coaching staff is up for debate. If healthy, DET is as good as any team in the playoffs, how they perform from here on out, will dictate how JL is percieved collectively for the ’12 season.

  30. Every team’s fans love to hate their own manager…was just listening to some Reds fans going on about how awful Dusty Baker is, and they are in the running for best record in MLB. But I can produce video highlights of how awful Gene Lamont is at 3rd, and defy any other team’s fans to match him. If Leyland stays, couldn’t we promote him to bench coach or something?

    1. Leyland lives in Pittsburgh doesn’t he? Maybe the up and coming Pirates….. And McClendon used to play for the Pirates, so that could be a double coup for them. Lamont was highly regarded by some of the brass in BOS last winter, so if Valentine gets the axe, maybe there is a future in Beantown for Gene.

      1. The best possible scenario from my perspective would be if the whole gang stayed in the division and just moved over to CLE. Our sighs and groans would turn to laughs and cheers as we would get to play against them 19 times next year.

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