PREGAME: The Tigers will try and make it a happy Father’s Day by completing a sweep against the Cubs. Kenny Rogers will make his first attempt at 200 career wins while Mark Prior will make his first attempt at starting this season.

We know that Pudge Rodriguez will get the day off, but I’d hope that Jim Leyland wouldn’t tinker too much with a lineup that has been crushing the ball in the first two games of the series

And on a non-baseball note, I’d like to wish Happy Father’s Day to all fathers today. There’s just something about baseball and it’s ability to bridge generations that make days like today special.

POSTGAME: Congratulations of course go to Kenny Rogers on securing his 200th victory. He did it while being dominant in one of baseball’s most historic venues on Father’s Day. I think the script is complete.

Of course his win was overshadowed by a power display by, well, everyone except Magglio Ordonez and Placido Polanco. If you had told me that in mid June Brandon Inge would be leading the team in homers with Marcus Thames close on his heels, I’d have thought the season would be a disaster. Instead, the Tigers have 6 players with 10-15 homers and Carlos Guillen hovering at 9. I haven’t done any research, but I can’t imagine too many times when the #7 and #8 hitter combine for 4 homers in a game.

Again we saw the talents of Curtis Granderson who picked up only one single in the series but still picked up 16 total bases. And Chris Shelton continues to look much improved. His first homer was a bomb to straight away centerfield. A .900 OPS hitter in the bottom 3rd will definitely help the offense.

PREGAME: It’s a rookie pitching battle today as Justin Verlander takes on Carlos Marmol. We know about Verlander already, but there isn’t much to know about Marmol. He’s only made one start and 2 relief appearances – and been very impressive. In his 10 innings he has 13 K’s against 3 walks, and has allowed only one run.

We’ll see who the true home team is today, with the crowd pro-Tigers yesterday.

POSTGAME: The Tigers continued to pound the ball against the ivy. Even pinch hitter Omar Infante hit a homer – er a triple thanks to crappy umpiring. And despite the fact that the Tigers picked up 14 hits, 7 for extra bases, they were still robbed on several occasions. In fact the last two outs of the 4th, and the entire 5th innings were basically web gem nominees for the Cubs.

Verlander’s control wasn’t entirely there, but he battled through and held the Cubs to one run. Wil Ledezma was awesome in relief coming into a bases loaded situation and stranding all 3 runner. Fernando Rodney pitched about as well as he hit, but with a 8 run cushion you could laugh about both.

With the win the Tigers move to 21 games over .500. That matches their highest point which they last achieved after a Verlander win against Cleveland on May 27th. So since racing out to a 35-14 record, they played .500 ball over the last 20 games.

PREGAME: The Tigers travel to Wrigley Field to take on the Cubs. It’s the occasional match-up like this that makes me actually like interleague play.

On a personal note, I made the trip to Chicago in 2000 to see the Tigers take on the Cubs. My wife and I took in two games. What made it even more memorable is that the morning we left we found out we were pregnant with my son.

But on to the game itself…Nate Robertson will be taking on Glendon Rusch. Rusch has been pretty awful and has allowed 14 homers in his 31 innings as a starter this season. He’s been particularly ineffective at Wrigley allowing a .387 BAA and 10 homers in 13 1/3 innings. Rusch is also the 4th lefty starter the Tigers have faced in the last 5 games.

POSTGAME: That game ended up a lot closer than it felt like it would be early on. I happened to be at home today, so I was able to see the game. While the Tigers only posted 5 runs, they hit the ball hard up and down the order (well except for Guillen). Pudge and Thames both had balls caught at the wall and Shelton and Granderson both had line drives that Jacque Jones made nice plays on. Even Nate Robertson had a hit taken away on a nice diving play by Juan Pierre.

Robertson was dominant, I think he only had one 1-2-3 inning, but he also was never really in trouble.

Marcus Thames homer was to the opposite field, which is a rarity. I mentioned his flyout to the wall which was also to right-center.

Todd Jones pitched an uneventful 1-2-3 inning. And it may be hard to believe, but that was the 3rd 1-2-3 inning he’s pitched this week. It’s just that one of them was followed by a disastorous 4 run inning.

And finally, the most encouraging item may have been Chris Shelton. Yesterday he doubled and walked twice. Today he doubled down the right field line and sent another line drive to the warning track. He also drew another walk today. And even when he struck out his last time up, he didn’t take the monster swing, he looked like he was trying to flilp it to right again. I’m not saying his slump is over, or that he’s even breaking out. But Chris Shelton today looked a lot more like the Chris Shelton of last year.