2014 Season, Game Post

Game 2014.34: Tigers 4, Orioles 1

112 Comments

Detroit (21-12, 1st place) is in Baltimore (20-15, 1st place) for three as the Tigers begin a season long 9-game trip that will even up the home/road games. Coming off of a disappointing conclusion in the series loss to Minnesota and with the 8-game winning streak a distant memory after dropping 3 of 4, and with much tougher teams to face than the Astros and Twins, you might fairly conclude that this road trip… is just another 9 games where we expect Detroit to win at least 6. 

These East Coast game times are going to make it impossible for me to sneak in the lineups in time for the games. I don’t anticipate any surprises for Monday night. The current “A team,” I suppose, with Castellanos back at 3B. 

Rick Porcello vs. Bud Norris. Orioles C Matt Wieters is on the DL. Porcello’s fine season began in fine fashion against the Orioles and Norris back in April. Be warned that this W, well in hand by the 9th inning, nearly fell to a bullpen disaster.

 

112 thoughts on “Game 2014.34: Tigers 4, Orioles 1”

  1. Bullpen Disaster: showing every Tiger game, watch if you can stand it!

    1. I’ve never paid as much attention to the pitch counts of starters as I have this season. Where is torrential rain when (and where) you need it?

      1. Ah, so it is raining in Baltimore. Go away, rain. Come back in the 7th inning, check for Tigers lead. stick around, bring it on.

  2. This has the makings of an ugly road trip…if you can barely beat Houston and the Twins at home, how can you expect to play well against real MLB teams….The Tigers don’t usually play at the level of their opponents on the road…seems like it just takes too much effort for them…lets see if its different under the new skipper or the same old thing. Personally I will take 5-4 or 4-5

  3. The most important road trip of the season so far. We’ll see what this team is made of – are they real Tigers or just pussycats in disguise? Was the 8-game winning streak just a fluke? Can they recover from their disastrous .250 winning percentage over the last four games? Will Cabrera break out of his season long slump, or is this the beginning of the end for the big guy? Should Smyly be forced back to the bullpen? Should Rick Porcello be named Closer (oh wait, that was last year)? Will Phil Coke pitch again? Will Joba shave his beard? So many questions, so few answers.

    1. I like the dramatic tone. I might have to pilfer that. Maybe I’ll change my name to Pillfer. Pillfer the Impostor.

  4. Preliminary results indicate that we have the possibility of another top pitcher (R, Ray) in our hands, and a lefty at that. That gives us six better than average starters. Who do we trade and for what? Do we get any compensation if Max signs with another team when his contract is over at the end of the season?

    1. I’d love to see another good start by Porcello, against a team that can hit.

      1. Ray is a bright spot. I guess we’re a step ahead there by comparison with Alvarez last season. Getting anxious to see Sanchez back in there, settling in, settling down for the long haul, though.

  5. Today’s Tiger line-up:

    1. Kinsler, 2B
    2. Hunter, RF
    3. Miggy, 1B
    4. VMart, DH
    5. AJax, CF
    6. Casty, 3B
    7. AA, C
    8. Romine, SS
    9. Davis, LF

    Tigers kick some East coast butt!

      1. They have rumps and pygostyles. I have real Baltimore Orioles in view as we speak.

  7. I didn’ t like Joba making excuses for his outing yesterday. His whinning sounds like Coke…dude it wasn’t one bad pitch…I wasn’t one pitch to get out of it….you hit a guy..walked a guy and gave up two big hits….how bout shut up and get those guys out… .

      1. I don’t like bullpen guy excuses, either. Don’t they know how lame that sounds? Let other people make excuses for you.

  8. 7 pitch 3 up 3 down for DET in their half of the 1st, followed by a 9 pitch inning by BAL. Both pitchers happy with that start

    VMart will make Norris throw a few pitches

  10. Tough play…but right in his glove…about rhe 10th outfield error…followed by rhe road clown show….here we go!!!!

    1. Davis lost the ball looking out for the wall. Lousy play, coulda had it.

        1. Agree. Kelly woulda had it no sweat. Dirks, too. There’s going to be a bit of a tax on all that Davis speed.

  12. this Norris guy showed a lot of promise while pitching for HOU, but consistency was a hurdle he couldn’t get over (in HOU). Good acquisition for BAL.

  13. This year the umps wrong calls on balls and strikes is the worst I have seen!

  14. Porcello’s pitching pretty well. Won’t hold that 2nd inning against him.

    The called 3rd on Romine was a joke, glad to see Machado get the payback call.

    2nd time through… it’s all over, Norris. Get ready.

  15. You dont have to be consistent against rhe Tigers you just have to be in the Baltimore zip code and the Tigs will swing!!

    1. Actually, the Tigers are good at making contact and getting hits, very good. They don’t draw a lot of walks, but then they are very good at avoiding the strikeout. It seems hard to believe any time they don’t score 5 or more runs, but Detroit is hard to beat for all-around at the plate goodness so far this season.

      1. Most of the avoiding the strikeout is Victor Martinez. Well, Ian “First Pitch Hacker” Kinsler is pretty low too, for obvious reasons. That’s not a complaint, by the way. Kinsler is hitting over .300. It works for him. V-Mart is one of the rare guys who sees a lot of pitches and rarely strikes out. On the other hand, I don’t expect Cabrera to continue to hover around league average on strikeout %.

      1. I haven’t looked it up, but I believe Jackson has a pretty miserable RISP thing happening. Let’s see… yeah. Way down there, jamming bad with Donkey and Romine and the Tigers from Pluto. 5 of his 9 (RISP) RBI are on sac flys, lotsa RISP strikeouts.

  21. Why is it when Avila gets his second strike he might as well just head for the bench. He could be the worst two strike hitter in baseball….oh I forgot about Inge

    2. Thus the “Ingvila” moniker. He is what he is — a .235 ish hitter who occasionally “runs into one” and on the team for his glove and arm.

  22. I have noticed that we are not hearing from those posters that come on cyring about how bad Porceello is. I wonder what happened to those guys…???

    1. Oh, they’ll be back if Porcello lets them. Maybe as soon as next inning.

      I was a bit worried when Porcello had Machado and lost him on one wrong pitch. Nice recovery against Jones, nice grab from the mound also.

  24. Interference. Stupid play by Castellanos. Really stupid. He’s got a little clown show reel going himself.

    1. Krol has been looking an awful lot like Coke for some time. Unimpressive.

  26. Why is Ricky P. taken out after only 83 pitches….. and pitching well?

    1. Don’t know, but he went into the clubhouse for a while between 5th and 6th, and then there was some sort of consultation going on in the dugout around him.

  30. The one thing you have to say about Avila is that he does get to see a lot of pitches before he strikes out or walks.

  31. Hey Romine we arent expecting you to hit .275…but we arent expecting you to be completely useless at bat either…

    1. His pitch. I’m told he’s an outstanding high ball hitter. Would appear to be the case.

  34. what info does the tigers front office have that we dont? why does rick throw 83 pitches and leave?

    1. He either felt sick or pulled something on one of the couple-three strenuous defensive plays he made. Something was going on there between the 5th and 6th.

    1. Pure theater by Hunter. He was practically laughing. Norris played it a little more dramatically.

  37. I would bring AlAl back out for the 9th. I would have left him in last night against the lefty and then brought him back out for the 8th ….. and we would have had a W.

      2. That’s bull, as far as I’m concerned. When a guy is pitching lights out baseball, you stick with him. You don’t know how a guy is going to pitch coming in, you hope he will be good.

        1. I’m satisfied with one good inning from any late-inning reliever under the current circumstances. And it’s no bull that they need to get everyone not named Putkonen out there on a fairly regular basis. That’s baseball and 7-man bullpens. OK, maybe it is bull.

          1. The goal is to win games ….. not to get guy’s work! How many games are thrown away using the “he needs some playing time” and not using your best player?

      1. Walks aren’t a high priority for this team, but 4 is pretty pathetic. He flails I guess. Almost makes one pine for the Delmon Young days.

        1. He looked so good early, too. Lotsa nice takes, classic swing. I guess that’s what happens. MLB pitching figures you out pretty fast.

    2. Especially on the outside off the plate. I think the opposition have figured that out.

    1. A bit tense for me. I like ’em a tad more comfortable when it’s the Orioles at Camden Yards.

    1. Yup. Here, here. This is why they signed him.

      I need a bullpen guy to believe in. I think I’ll do an about-face and join the cult of Alburquerque. Nice job there.

      1. Al has a strikeout pitch…actually, it’s a Strikeout Pitch. When he gets behind in the count, he’s toast, because guys can look for the fastball, but if he gets 2 strikes, it’s pretty much game over.

        1. OK, I just got off the phone with the Research Department. For his career, once he gets two strikes he has given up a .108 batting average and .310 OPS, with a 56% strikeout rate. So yes, two strikes is Game Over (this year’s numbers are pretty much right in line with career numbers).

  41. I asked for a good game by Kid Rick and I got one, so no complaints here. By the way, we traded the right guy (at the time I admit I wasn’t so sure…I think the key factor was that they offered Fister an extension and he declined. Dombrowski is very aggressive about getting the starting pitchers into long-term contracts. Look for Porcello to be the next).

    1. Looking at Nationals blogs, it looks like they offered him an extension also and he declined…apparently he wants to be on the West Coast. This puts the trade in a different light for me.

      Also there are conspiracy theory grumbles (the Tigers knew he had physical problems), but I guess Tiger fans did the same with Boston about Iglesias.

  42. I will take 6 innings like tonight for the next 5 years. He is first or second in every pitching area on the team except innings. We get so hung up on the fact that he pitches 6 innings and outher starters are fantastic because they can pitch 7….. Big frickin deal….he is 26 years old. If he wins 20 games are we going to say it doesn’t count because he only pitches 6 great innings…..GET OVER IT!!!!

    1. Little Ricky is only 25 years old….11 days older than my daughter and the only guy she is eligible to date…unfortunately she hasn’t read the memo!

  43. Spending some quality alone time with Heidi…. they played Tori’s post game comments; he suggests one should go to a pitching machine and take one in the ribs and see how it feels! don’t know about you all but that just sounds like the worst idea ever!

  44. Accoarding to Asmus if Ortiz would have batted in the 8th with a man on base He would have brought in Coke to face him………………………apparently we might be giving Asmus a bit too much crwdit for how smart he is supposed to be!!!!!

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