Detroit Tigers: 42-33, 1st Place (3.5 ahead of Cleveland).
Well, that did not go well (including those ground ball things we were looking at). What is it with the Angels anyway? Jason Beck looks at the disaster that was Game 75 in a bit appropriately titled “Breaking Down the Tigers’ Breakdown.” The most distressing thing about the game last night for me is that Porcello has joined the Troubled Starters brigade, following rough outings by Verlander and Fister, and the injured Sanchez. Max is holding it all together right now. Perhaps New Guy Jose Alvarez will right the ship tonight.
Perhaps we should change the subject. How are those Mud Hens doing? What? they lost 16-3 last night? Oh.
OK, how about this. The Tigers may have given up 16 hits last night, but in a game back in 1977, Boston pitcher Reggie Cleveland gave up 18 hits to Detroit. And won, 12-5. And pitched a complete game. Check out his line in the link above: 18 hits with no walks, and only 5 runs (also pitching for Detroit that day: Steve Grilli, father of Jason). This courtesy of John Lowe.
I’m guessing this might be the last 18-hit complete game victory in our lifetimes.
So, where were we…I think there was a game or something last night. At any rate, there is one tonight, and the Tigers are still in first.
Today’s Player of the Pre-game: Torii Hunter. He was 3-for-4 in that debacle last night, and should have had an assist at the plate. Something tells me he doesn’t particularly like how his former team has been dominating against Detroit.
Today’s Lineup:
- Jackson, CF
- Hunter, RF
- Cabrera, 3B
- Fielder, 1B
- Martinez, DH
- Peralta, SS
- Dirks, LF
- Infante, 2B
- Pena, C
Looks like we’ll be going to the pen early again tonight.
The inevitable Martinez GDP. Where is it written that to be a Tigers’ DH, you have to hit 5th and be able to regularly hit into double plays?
By the way, recently I read an article where the writer claimed that V-Mart was rounding into mid-season form. On May 23 he was at .224/.275/.306/.581. Before tonight’s game he was at .227/.284/.335/.618. I guess that .030 bump in SLG is what signifies.
A phrase I expect to never hear: “and Victor Martinez beats the throw to first.”
Smokey must have listened to us …… no Donkey or Santiago have been seen as starters together or separately …… for a while.
They’ll be back. What goes around, comes around. Genius is probably waiting for the perfect strategic situation, probably when Holaday is catching.
I like Alvarez. Right now he is OK as an occasional fill-in #6 starter, but with some fine tuning he should make a nice addition to the regular rotation in a year or so. It will be interesting to see who goes in the future to make room. Maybe two righties go if Smyly slides into the rotation as well. Nice to see some good young (and cheap) arms coming up when they go into rebuild/tweak mode.
Of course Leyland left him in too long, he should have been gone after the Iannetta single (-1).
Alvarez was at 109 pitches w/Iannetta’s hit…and last game JL pulled him at 85 pitches
The all-important Quality Start was on the line.
Just can’t beat the Angels this year, despite their struggles…
Frustrating game. Gotta win tomorrow.
if the Angels got to play against the Tigers more often they would be the best team in baseball. In fact we might be comparing them to the ’27 Yankees….just sayin!!
The ’27 Yankees were overrated… I remember in ’71 Lasorda used the example of their 9 game losing streak to motivate his slumping team (Spokane Indians) of future stars… asked later if it was a true story, he shrugged and said it worked so, true or not didn’t matter….
Good story. He wouldn’t be able to get away with that now, when players could look it up on their phones if so inclined. Their longest losing streak was only 4 games, but what really stands out to me was their road record: 53-25 (.679). The Tigers could use some of that.