2013 Season, Game Post

Game 2013.118: Tigers at White Sox

45 Comments

69-48, 1st place, 7 games up.

Baseball is a long season. There are many, many ups and downs. Rare is the season like the one the Tigers had in 2011 when they didn’t lose more the 2 games in a row all season (am I remembering right? something like that).

Anyway, we’re gonna lose a few more series from here on out, we’re gonna struggle with RISP in isolated instances, and we’re gonna have a few more losses against some bad teams like we did last night. Chris Sale was good last night, he beat us. Time to move on.

In case you missed Iglesias’ highlight reel play last night: http://www.freep.com/article/20130812/SPORTS02/308120159/detroit-tigers-jose-iglesias-video. Yes, he’s all ours. Until 2019, at least. Though he did sign with Scott Boras last week, so expect the extension talks to start soon.

Last time the Tigers saw Hector Santiago (all the way back to last week), he struck out Miguel Cabrera the first three times Miggy faced him. Santiago looked sharp through 7 and then came out for the 8th. We all thought that Santiago would be on a short leash, but after two outs, Santiago had earned the right to stay in the game even after a Torii Hunter blooper. Miguel Cabrera punished the next, and last, pitch of the evening for Santiago, and Cabrera has hit a home run in every game since that one. I’m excited to see watch this matchup tonight.

A few notes:

– MLB.tv game of the night tonight – free for you non-subscribers.

– Is it time to call up Castellanos? The LF platoon has become the latest whipping boy. Personally, I’d leave Castellanos in Toledo for the rest of the year.

Today’s Gotta Win to Take the Series Lineup:

1. Jackson, CF
2. Hunter, RF
3. Cabrera, 3B
4. Fielder, 1B
5. Martinez, DH
6. Tuiasosopo, LF
7. Infante, 2B
8. Pena, C
9. Iglesias, SS

 

45 thoughts on “Game 2013.118: Tigers at White Sox”

  1. I agree with you on Castellanos. At first I had thought you had tricked me into reading a Henning article, but Simple is just as bad, if not worse. These “experts” that equate .278 at AAA with a similar average at the ML level drive me nuts. My god, they should be screaming to get Garcia back then, who was hitting .374 there when he was traded. Idiots.

  3. Tigers winning pct with Avila in the game: .682 (45-21)
    with Pena: .479 (23-25)

    There would be the rare event when neither or both play in the same game, but not enough to negate the big difference.

  6. And Jackson stood there like the house by the side of the road and watched it go by.

  7. you can use those same PCT of wins and losses using the name Scherzer…..it certainly isn’t Pena the problem in games he catches

    1. Scherzer is only in one of every five games, while Pena and Avila are virtually the only two catchers (Holaday has only been in 4 games so far). The question is, is there something to the claim that the Tigers need Avila due to his superior pitch calling and framing abilities (this was mentioned in an article recently)? I tend to be skeptical myself, and certainly give Avila a lot of flack, but catching ability is incredibly difficult to evaluate as compared to other defensive positions.

  9. That was a dumb play with two stikes on Martinez. With Hunter coming home, he is virtually forced to swing. I get the scary feeling that Leyland is thinking again.

    1. Because Cleveland is only 7 games behind and KC 6.5 going into play tonight. Tomorrow Cabrera will play because CLE is now only 6 games behind and KC 6.5 games behind. The race is far from over. KC with best record in the AL since the All-Star break and they are coming to town this weekend for five games. What do you expect Leyland to do, sit the guy? Cabrera has shown that he can still hit (co-AL player of the week last week all while playing with this injury), he just can’t run well. Considering that speed is not a part of Cabby’s game anyhow, it makes perfect sense to keep him in the lineup. This team has enough trouble scoring runs WITH Cabby in the lineup, we don’t need to try our luck with Cabby on the bench.

    1. I think he is being saved for a strategic PH role late in the game. Probably for Iglesias.

    1. Except for their games in CLE, this is how the Away Tigers have played all year, with a very mediocre 23-28 record.

  29. Nothing new there. These walk-off losses are getting monotonous. The Away Tigers are so predictably uninspiring that I am beginning to wonder if they are really worth the time investment, especially since so many of these games are soooooo loooong.

    1. All year long its been a case of get the extra inning game to the 14th and we’re money (3-0). Unfortunately we are 2-11 in extra inning games that go from 10 to13 innings in length. That is not a formula for success. You are right. These extra inning games all feel the same. Monotonous. Very few scoring chances and the scoring chances that we get are pissed away. This team rarely fails to frustrate.

  30. Well boys…………..I haven’t posted since the July 1 game @ TOR when we got our doors blown off in the opener of a four game series. Of course the club bounced back to take the next three in the four game series with TOR, took 3 out of 4 @ CLE and I just decided I’d stay away with the team looking as though they finally had a pulse. Later came the 12-game winning streak and still I decided that I must stay away from this site because it obviously was good luck for the team. “Well I’ve had alls I can take, and I can’t takes no more” as a wise man once said.

    This team needs to get better in situational hitting. We continue to be pathetic when it comes to R3<2O situations and tonight it cost us a game. I am referring to VMart's failure in the 3rd inning with men on the corners and one out with a 1-0 Tigers lead. A sac fly and its 2-0 and maybe the White Sox start to think to themselves "hey we won last night and tonight Scherzer's on the mound and nobody expects us to win this game". Instead we let them wriggle off the hook to where the White Sox probably think "we're still in this game". Our hitters make our pitcher's margin of error so small at times because we refuse to do the simple things (get men over, lift routine fly balls to CF to score runs) on a consistent basis. To me that was a pivotal play. We win that game 4-3 in nine innings instead of losing 4-3 in 11 innings if VMart gets that run in. Last night we left how many guys on base??? 12?? This schizophrenic ballclub only seems happy when it is making things hard on itself. The fact that we are staring a sweep in the face at the hands of the lowly White Sox is astounding to me.

    Second thing: Phil Coke needs to be given his outright release. His ONE job is to get leftys out. He can't do it with any type of consistency and I just don't see how the Tigers can continue to look to him to get tough leftys out. Someone is sure to ask, well who is going to replace Coke? Does it matter? Any kid from Toledo could do this poorly for the Tigers. Hell, I'll take my chances with Putkonen or Reed (both righties) to do a better job of getting lefties out than Coke has done. I'm not kidding or being facetious. Coke has been that bad this year. If the Tigers are serious about winning it all this year Coke must not be a part of the postseason roster. Sorry to unload on you guys, but who else cares about it as much as we do?

Comments are closed.