PREGAME: It appears that the Tigers Saturday/Sunday invincibility only applies to intra-league games as they have been stymied in their first 3 match-ups with the senior circuit.

Dontrelle Willis gets the ball for the Tigers and fans will get to see what is better, his hitting or his pitching. Despite his struggles in his last start, Willis’s stature in the rotation seems somewhat more secure with the news that Bonderman will be out for a couple more months.

Russ Ohlendorf is your typical back of the rotation starter. One of these days the Tigers will need to thump an opposing pitcher. Maybe this is the day. Five of the eleven homers that Ohlendorf has allowed this year have come on the first pitch. This could play into the Tigers approach.

Oh yeah, and they’ll be wearing 1909 throwback uni’s. Always a good time.

Detroit vs. Pittsburgh – June 14, 2009 | MLB.com: Gameday

POSTGAME: When the lineup was posted this game felt like a lost cause. When the Tigers sacrifice bunted in the first inning to play for one run and the plan backfired it was demoralizing. When Dontrelle Willis walked in 2 runs in the first inning it was the beginning of a disaster.

Nothing about this game felt good except for the fact that Don Kelly had a nice game. Willis was bad. Really bad. Miguel Cabrera and Curtis Granderson combined to not get the ball out of the infield. And Josh Anderson batted third. This was a couple days after Leyland was quoting he thought Anderson wasn’t cut out to be a leadoff hitter. Yeah, batting 3rd should fix it.

I think this is pretty good timing for an offday.

PREGAME: So it’s just the Tigers now. No more Red Wings or Pistons or Lions. Just a singular focus on the Tigers.

Tonight the Tigers will face Zach Duke. Duke walks very few hitters, so he finds himself pitching deep into games on a regular basis having gone at least 7 innings in 8 of his 12 starts. What makes it particularly impressive is that he doesn’t need many pitches to do it and he’s only topped the 100 pitch mark 6 times. With the Tigers proclivity for swinging early and often Duke could probably go 10 innings. Opposing hitters are only OPSing 476 against Duke when putting the first pitch in play.

The Tigers will turn to Armando Galarraga to drive in runs from the 9-hole this evening. Galarraga has made a quality start his last 3 outings, but he hasn’t earned a win since April.

Detroit vs. Pittsburgh – June 13, 2009 | MLB.com: Gameday

POSTGAME: I saw very little of this game, and none of the game that mattered. I was at a dance recital and followed along on mobile gameday so my thoughts on this game are formed based on a barage of “line drive to left” and “line drive to center” and “line drive to right” and…well you get the idea. So not seeing any of the plays in question may hamper my ability to comment accurately about the game. But I’ll try and you tell me if I’m wrong.

• Armando Galarraga was awful and was throwing batting practice. That the game was over in 2.5 hours and Pittsburgh had 16 hits I’d guess that at least Galarraga wasn’t nibbling and he gave up runs efficiently.
• Nate Robertson came in and changed the complexion of the game…twice. He took over with runners on first and second and nobody out and retired the side stranding the runners thus keeping the game within reach. Huge inning for Nate. But then he gave up a grand slam in the next inning destroying the Tigers chances. Huge inning for Nate.
• Marcus Thames and Ryan Raburn provided a boost with “in play run(s)” which was nice
• The Tigers swung early and often because as I’d watch the pitch-by-pitch with 15 second auto refresh there were outs being made and there wasn’t even time to display the pitch or the “in play out(s)”
• Did I miss anything?
• Despite Galarraga going out in the 3rd, the bullpen is still in really good shape for Dontrelle’s start tomorrow. With Porcello going 7 innings, the pen was well rested coming into the game. And with an off day Monday and nobody throwing too many pitches today, everybody should be available if an “all hands on deck” situation arises.

PREGAME: I can’t help but wonder if there are more Tigers fans in the stands tonight that Pirates fans. I think Tigers fans would be well represented with many planning to make the relatively short drive to see their team in a gorgeous ballpark. But with Game 7 tonight, I’d guess many Pittsburgh fans would be blowing off the Pirates for the Penguins, and will it just be Tigers fans who made the journey left in the stands?

Whoever decides to go will see Rick Porcello take on Ian Snell. Porcello is looking to regain his May-ish form after 2 outings that weren’t great.

Snell hasn’t had a very good season. He’s walking a batter every other inning and not striking out very many and the result is an ERA over 5. He has been much better at home where he’s only allowed 1 of his 7 homers.

Detroit vs. Pittsburgh – June 12, 2009 | MLB.com: Gameday

POSTGAME: Rick Porcello is the answer to what ails ya. Porcello had an incrdible individual effort both on the mound and in the batters box. Porcello went 7 innings and threw 99 pitches (a career high) and held Pittsburgh to 1 run, which was in part gifted due to a blown call at 2nd base.

But that was only half the story for Porcello. He also had 2 singles and drove in the first 2 runs. Who needs designated hitters?

Other stuff:

• Fernando Rodney was much better this time out. He threw 12 pitches, and 11 of them were strikes.
• Zach Miner as the primary set-up guy? He’s turned in a few nice relief appearances in a row now.
• The offense was far from stagnant tonight with 11 hits and 4 walks. That only 3 came around to score was odd and annoying and frustrating, especially with 4 of the hits being for extra bases.
• Placido Polanco with an excellent game with 2 doubles, 2 singles and a sacrifice bunt.

PREGAME: The Tigers have already won the series, but they really have a chance to put an exclamation point on it today. With Edwin Jackson on the mound, Tigers fans expect a dominating pitching performance because we’ve been so spoiled this year.

Gavin Floyd is on a roll of his own though. In his last 4 starts he has a 2.12 ERA with 31 strikeouts and 8 walks in 29.2 innings. He’s only allowed 1 homer in that span as well. So despite the 5.35 ERA on the season, this isn’t a struggling pitcher. But the Tigers haven’t done much against struggling pitchers anyways.

Detroit vs. Chi White Sox – June 11, 2009 | MLB.com: Gameday

POSTGAME: At least it was interesting and the loss was much easier to take with the series already in hand, but the Tigers had to watch the White Sox win a walk-off. That it got to a bottom of the 9th was probably the biggest surprise though.

Gavin Floyd absolutely dominated the Tigers. Ramon Santiago homered, but that was really the only damage against him. Meanwhile, Jackson gave the Tigers a chance to win, but his control wasn’t on and he couldn’t get the call on breaking balls low in the zone and he was done after 5 innings.

Thankfully Curtis Granderson took Bobby Jenks deep to tie the game in the 9th. Listening to Hawk’s call was fun in that it sounded like he was punched in the gut. Listening to him when Podsednik bounced one between first and second to win was miserable.

PREGAME: It seems like only yesterday we were anxiously awaiting the Tigers first round pick, and waiting to see if the Wings would clinch, and kind of dreading a Buehrle-Willis pitching match, and trying to figure out how to fix my refrigerator. Well, it was only yesterday. The Tigers got their flame thrower, we’re still waiting on the Wings, the Buehrle-Willis pitching match-up wasn’t so bad, and my refrigerator still doesn’t work.

With that in mind let’s turn our attention to the less dreaded Justin Verlander and John Danks pitching match-up. Verlander has been kind of awesome for about 6 weeks now. BUT…things haven’t always gone swimmingly for Verlander at the Cell. In his career he has a 5.92 ERA and 11 homers allowed in 51.1 innings.

Danks has been struggling this year, sort of. He only has one quality start in his last 5 outings and his ERA is 5.10. BUT…his peripherals aren’t as bad as his ERA. He’s actually striking out more batters this year than last, but he’s also walking more meaning the ratio has dipped from 2.79 to 2.25. Not as good as last year but not bad either. What has hurt him is that he’s allowed 1.35 HR/9 this year compared to .69/9 last year.  And really, it’s not like the Tigers have been feasting on struggling pitchers anyway.

Detroit vs. Chi White Sox – June 10, 2009 | MLB.com: Gameday

POSTGAME: The Tigers had lost 4 games in a row, people were freaking out and the Twins were only a couple games back. Then Edwin Jackson pitched a complete game 1 run effort striking out the heart of the Angels order to end the game with 98mph heat. That started a run of 5 wins in 6 games culminating with Justin Verlander pitching a complete game 2-1 effort and punching out Josh Fields (who came in for Paul Konerko when Verlander jammed him on a ground ball) with 98mph heat. I like symmetry.

Verlander was incredible once again with only one bad pitch to Thome against 121 pretty good ones. Some of you may be expecting me to be upset about the pitch count, and I’m not in the least. This is the time to extend him, in a tight game where he’s still got gas against a team he’s owning, on a night with a depleted bullpen. This is when you lean on your guys.

The offense wasn’t much to speak of, but Adam Everett homers always deserve mention. The other run came on a bases loaded walk so the Tigers weren’t really crushing Danks. But with a series win assured, there isn’t really anything to complain about.