After dropping Game 1 of the crucial Tigers/Royals series, the Tigers come back with one of their A-list starters to try to even things up, and keep their tenuous hold on first place in the Parity Division.
Don’t worry about Justin Verlander though, he will get things back together, so says Verlander Nemesis Billy Butler:
He’s going to come back to the form he was. That’s just how it is. You don’t have that many trophies, that many accolades, not to.
Well, that may be a little bit of wishful thinking on Butler’s part. Butler may be one of the few batters in MLB who would be truly sad to see Verlander disappear. Butler is a very good hitter, although one having a bit of an off year. But there is no explaining how good he has been against Justin Verlander. Check out these career numbers: .434 BA 1.079 OPS (86 PA). I can’t think of any other batter/pitcher matchup like that, not with a Cy Young caliber pitcher. Definitely one to file in the “that’s baseball” file.
The matchup tonight looks a lot better: Max Scherzer is coming off the best start of his career (although that may make him a “bounce” candidate, to use horse racing lingo), and other than Alex Gordon (7-for-18) nobody on the Royals has ever done much of anything against him. Eric Hosmer (3-for-20) and Mike Moustakas (3-for 18) look like K-bait, as those two and Cain have already combined for 19 strikeouts against Max.
Torii Hunter gets the night off after leaving with a cramp, which is maybe some karma for Torii poking fun at Lebron. Funny stuff though.
Tonight’s JD to the Rescue Lineup:
- Davis, LF
- Kinsler, 2B
- Cabrera, 1B
- V Martinez, DH
- JD Martinez RF
- Castellanos, 3B
- Jackson, CF
- Avila, C
- Suarez, SS
Max has had his two best starts of the season with Holaday behind the plate. Tonight Alex tries to keep up. Austin finally got an RBI, so is bounced back to 7th in the order.
Reaching for the Gentleman Jack in the top of the second.
Not good.
Goodbye 1st place.
It’s a bitter pill to swallow, but the Royals are the better team right now.
Max doesn’t have it tonight. Time for the long reliever. Wait, we don’t have one. Houston, we have a problem.
Fast approaching, whether it is Jeff Jones’ failings or not, to fire the pitching coach. Some symbolic move is needed to “right the ship”.
Strange decision to have Dyson sacrifice there. With the way Scherzer is pitching, he should have been swinging for the fences instead.
Reminds me of the 2006 WS when STL bunted often.
Scherzer hasn’t been seeing Kate Upton on the side has he?
Get him out of there. I don’t care if it means 5 innings of Phil Colke, this is just stupid.
Max Scherzer is having trouble keeping his fastball down, but he has plenty left in the tank.
He’ll hit his pitch count by the 4th inning anyway.
So far 42 pitches this inning and one out.
I don’t know if watching V-Mart go for the batting title is enough reason to pay any attention to these guys.
Is AJ turning the corner? An rbi in two consecutive games!
Avila can’t even find the corner.
“Big swings don’t work against hard throwers.” Rare words of wisdom from Rod Allen.
Cabrera needs some time off.
I think we all do
When your hot, you’re hot.
Man, Cain has a great glove.
And Jim correctly added that Aoki would have never got that ball.
Well, Tigers are not the best team in the division. Funny, a little while back they were the best team in baseball. Now they look terrible! TIME FOR CHANGES. Assmus has to go. Preseason many “experts” said they had the best talent in all of baseball. They are underachieving! The Assmus watch is on. How long before he is let go?
You wrote Assmus. Heh.
It wasnt a mistake
We can only hope the Royals will don Zumyas to celebrate goung into first place?
Seems like the same thing almost every night. Ausmus leaves are starter in no matter how many runs are scored until they hit 100+ pitches. Bring up Ray or someone for a long reliever. Reed is not the answer. Coke is not the answer. Keep us in games to have a chance not get shelled every night.
Anyone got J. Leyland’s number? How about Kenny Roger’s or Nate Robertson’s?? How are their arms? Anyone got their numbers? Seriously, this is one strange and total collapse. I cannot recall another one like it on any MLB club in a long time.
Going to be in the wilderness for awhile, you guys need to get this thing fixed! Fire somebody, send someone up or down, you have till wednesday next week. Work the phones, the internet, reach out to all your contacts. This must stop. Please forward to DD for me…
Hey Coleman! Loved the HR lingo!
It has been a little like watching a 4-5 horse run out of the money lately.
Bring some jerky in case you run into Sasquatch.
Wilderness? Say hello to the Tigers for us. I think you’ll meet them there. Maybe you can lead them back out of it.
It’s mostly just a bunch of bad luck, if you listen to Mario and Rod. Ok, that last play was weird bad luck. Give the wall an assist.
I know it’s a 10-3 blowout, but I’m getting tired of watching Kinsler pop up with a runner on 3rd less than 2 out.
We were warned by Rangers fans about the popups. If you watch his swing, it’s a surprise he ever does anything else. He’s made a successful career of it, though, so he’s obviously doing what he does at the plate more right than wrong.
I was at the 3 game series in KC the first weekend of May. At those games the Royal fans were fit to be tied as their pre-season expectations were so high. I felt very sorry foe their season ticket holders.
something tells me not many KC fans feel sorry for DET season ticket holders.
speaking of DET season ticket holders, DET enters today’s game with an underwhelming 18-18 home record…pretty sad
Did the Upton girl break it off with Max S, too (and Coke as well)? Let’s ban her from the Tiger’s club house and find a way to put her K.C.’s plane out of town for goodness sakes.
If there is a really lame post game post tonight, you’ll know she dumped me too.
I won’t even look at photos of her anymore. She is really bad news.
We appear to have found a Yoko Ono for the Tigers. I expect a solo album from JV and his Plastic Upton Band imminently.
The Tigers have now been outscored by their opponents through 67 games. Marvel not that they are 36-31, but that they are NOT 31-36.
When a starter has a good game and wins, you often hear how the catcher “called a good game.” But when a starter gets pelted with rocks and garbage, I have yet to hear the catcher accused of “calling a bad game.” This calls for further investigation.
Avila’s pitch-framing was bad in that 2nd inning.
He called a really good 1st inning, though.
Gee Brad you out did yourself…10:Runs…I sure a lot of free agent pitchers will be coming here knowig it takes a touchdown or a touchdown and a field goal to get pulled…how about using your long man…oh nevermind!
Tigers starters double as long men. Pretty ingenious, really. Both Verlander and Scherzer have summoned their Inner Putkonen/Alvarez/Whoever to coax a few more runs out of the opposition, and I couldn’t be more proud of them for their double-duty.