The Tigers look to sweep their three-game series this afternoon in hot Kansas City (temperature 92 and climbing).

Mad Max Scherzer will man the broom against the Royals.  He has been in good form lately, with a 2.14 ERA over his last 5 starts.  Bruce Chen has a 7.48 ERA over his last 4 starts, but always seem to give Detroit trouble.

V-Mart will not be in the lineup:  he suffered a knee sprain on an ill-advised attempt to score. Word to come on how serious it is.  Victor says “I felt a sharp pain in my knee, on the way up (to the clubhouse), I felt the pain go away. I just iced it, and we’ll see how it feels. Everything looks pretty good so we’ll see how it looks (Sunday).”

The lack of Martinez for any length of time would cause serious problems for the Tigers, so let’s hope it isn’t bad.

Today’s Player of the Pre-Game: Gene Lamont

Today Gene sleeps standing up and nobody gets hurt.

Today’s Sweepy Lineup:

1. Austin Jackson CF
2. Brennan Boesch LF
3. Ryan Raburn 3B
4. Miguel Cabrera 1B
5. Magglio Ordonez DH
6. Carlos Guillen 2B
7. Jhonny Peralta SS
8. Alex Avila C
9. Andy Dirks RF

It’s Justin time!

Tonight Justin Verlander looks to follow up his near-no-hit bid against the Angels with a win against KC (and possibly tie CC Sabathia with the AL lead at 16).

In fact Verlander still has an outside shot at the pitching triple crown:  He is 2nd in wins at 15, has a solid league lead in strikeouts at 178, and has only Jered Weaver (1.78) and Josh Beckett (2.20) with ERAs better than his 2.24.

Kansas City would seem to be a good opponent in his pursuit of win 16:  he has won 3 straight vs the Royals, with a 1.19 ERA.

Billy Butler is most likely to be a Royal pain:  he is hitting .389 against Verlander.

Also Detroit is planning to pitch Verlander against Cleveland Thursday on 4 days rest, so, for a change, his pitch count may be an issue tonight.

KC sends out rookie starter Danny Duffy (3-4, 5.05).  As always with Detroit, beware Rookie Pitcher Guy (I would love to see the Tigers’ cumulative stats against rookie pitchers).

Today’s Player of the Pre-Game:  Ryan Raburn

Raburn will make the occasional brilliant play in the outfield, or nice play at 2B. Not so much at 3rd.  Over the last 3 seasons he has 4 errors at 3rd (and only 7 assists) in 44 innings, so it’s been almost an error per game with him.  With Verlander on the mound, the Royals are likely to try to bunt their way on.  Take a deep breath.

Today’s Raburn Roulette Lineup:

1. Austin Jackson CF
2. Brennan Boesch LF
3. Magglio Ordonez RF
4. Miguel Cabrera 1B
5. Victor Martinez DH
6. Jhonny Peralta SS
7. Carlos Guillen 2B
8. Ryan Raburn 3B
9. Alex Avila C

Here’s a Penny for your thoughts:  Night Penny.

For some odd reason, Brad Penny’s turn in the rotation inevitably falls on a day with a daytime game.  12 of his 16 starts (75%) have been day games, while only 40% of the team’s overall games have been in the day.

And if you look at Penny’s career numbers on night vs day games, the numbers are like…well, like day and night.

• Penny by day:  31-31, 5.27 ERA  (2011:  6-6, 5.21)
• Penny by night: 84-65, 3.74 ERA (2011: 1-3, 4.24)

Rod and Mario have mentioned that Penny has said he doesn’t like day games.  And he doesn’t do that well in day games.  So here’s a crazy idea:  why not move the rotation around a bit to get him out of the day game pattern?

Tonight Rick Porcello looks to win his 6th consecutive start, which would be a career best, against Kansas City’s Felipe Paulino.  Porcello is 3-0, 3.15 since the All-Star break, and during that time has only given up 2 walks, against 13 strikeouts.

The Kansas City hitters, though, are on a bit of a hot streak, batting .309 over their last 7 games.  The hottest has been Alex Gordon, who has hit .474 over his last 9 games.

Today’s Player of the Pre-Game:  Wilson Betemit

Betemit makes the Royals pay for trading him.

Today’s Rather Standard Lineup:

1. Austin Jackson CF
2. Brennan Boesch LF
3. Magglio Ordonez RF
4. Miguel Cabrera 1B
5. Victor Martinez DH
6. Jhonny Peralta SS
7. Carlos Guillen 2B
8. Alex Avila C
9. Wilson Betamit 3B

7 IPs, 8 H, 0 BB, 2 ER.  Fist-bump for Fister.

Ryan Raburn has a 1.111 OPS Post All-Star game.

Tigers have welcomed the Rangers bullpen help with game deciding home runs in back to back nights.

Cle lost, CWS lost.

Tigers go for the sweep today.

It won’t be easy against Alexi Ogando.  Ogando went from the A’s farm system as a 19 year old outfielder, to the Department of Homeland Security detention center at age 22, to the Rangers farm system at 26, to pushing Neftali Feliz out of the closers role into the starting rotation, and then into the rotation himself.  And he’s flourished.  As a starter this year he’s posted a 2.88 ERA, 1.04 WHIP and 2.12 BAA, with only 2 pitches.  A fastball that hits 96 and moves, and a devastating slider.  After a tremendous April and May which saw Ogando at the top of the leaderboards in ERA, WHIP and BAA, he was roughed up a bit in June.  But he rebounded with a strong July and will be looking for this 11th win of the season this afternoon.

Tigers send out Brad Penny with the janitor’s broom and hopefully a happy face, as he will likely be caught by VMart today for a day game with another game tomorrow.  If you will recall, Penny was blasted last week by LAA, and had a few choice words for Martinez as the two seemed out of sync all game.

Someone help us out with the lineup when it’s posted.

Thanks to some late inning heroics by Boesch & Boston, the Tigers woke up today up 3 games in the AL Central.  Prior to last night’s win, the Tigers were 3-6 in their last 9 series openers, and are now 15-19 for the year (according to my front of several Post-Its math).  A win tonight guarantees a series win, with a day game to follow and then a weekend set in Kansas City.  The Tigers then face the Indians and Twins in 9 out of the next 12 in what should be a pivotal two week stretch for the Central Division.

Doug Fister gets his first start for the boys in blue tonight.  Fister is a tall and lanky 6-8, 210 righty (who bats lefty!) out of Fresno State.  Fister is in his 3rd year in the bigs, and he’s been improving every year.  He started 10 games in ’09 for Seattle, 28 last year, and then 21 this year before the trade.  He doesn’t strike out many, but he’s trending in the right direction (kind-of 5.31/4.89/5.48 K/9).  His real strength is that he doesn’t walk many (career 1.88 BB/9) nor allow many hits (just over 1 per inning).  He doesn’t throw hard, but he throws a two-seamer, curve and slider with regularity, and effectively.  He surely benefited from Safeco, so while his numbers should dip a little at CoPa, there is no reason why he can’t have success as a #4 or #5 starter here.

Matt Harrison climbs the hill for the Rangers.  Harrison has been nails over his last five starts, going 3-0 while posting a 1.16 WHIP and 2.04 ERA, but he is 1-3 with a 7.11 ERA in six career games against the Tigers.  Harrison is hittable, but he really limits the walks.

Guillen gets the day off to work on his home run trot, and because Raburn is 6-9 lifetime off of Harrison.

Your Please AJax, just take one pitch, Lineup is:

1. Austin Jackson, CF
2. Brennan Boesch, LF
3. Magglio Ordonez, RF
4. Miguel Cabrera, 1B
5. Victor Martinez, DH
6. Jhonny Peralta, SS
7. Ryan Raburn, 2B
8. Alex Avila, C
9. Wilson Betemit, 3B

Your first place Tigers welcome the first place Texas Rangers to Comerica for a three game set.  Though the Rangers have not played well at Comerica as of late (3-14 over the last 17 games here), they are happy to be out of the Texas heat for a while, as it has been 108+ for the past week with no end in site.

The Rangers have been lauded by the pundits as the big winners of the trade season, while the Tigers’ moves have gone largely unnoticed.  The Rangers added Mike Adams and Koji Uehara to a struggling bullpen, arguably the only chink in the Rangers armor.  Adams and Uehara should be on full display during the series, though hopefully it will simply be to get their work in.

In a move that really won’t surprise anyone, Purcey was designated for assignment today to clear room for David Pauley in the pen.  In that same Freep article, DD noted that Al Al is fine and ready for tonight’s game if needed.

Colby Lewis is 10-8 on the year with a 4.00 ERA, with a 1.19 WHIP and 114 K against only 39 walks in 135 IP.  Detroit has had Lewis’ number over his career, as they have beat him up for 30 hits and 19 ER in 23.2 innings, including posting 9 against him back on June 6th.   Lewis allowed 4 earned against Minnesota last time out in 6 and 2/3, but he had two quality starts against Sea and Tor prior to that.  Lewis has alternated between really bad, and really good months this year, and August is setup to be really bad.  Let’s see if we can make that really, really bad.

Scherzer has been great as of late, throwing four straight quality starts with a 1.95 ERA dating back to July 2nd.  Mad Max is 3-0 against the Rangers with a 3.48 ERA in 5 career starts, and was the benefactor of the above mentioned run support in the win against the Rangers on June 6th.

A few notes:

– Benoit has a 1.54 ERA and 32 ks over his last 27 appearances covering 23.1 IP.
– VMart is hitting .522 with RISP over the last two weeks, and leads the AL with a .398 RISP average for the year
– Miggy’s career OPS vs. the AL West is 1.009

Tonight’s Watchout for the Rainout Lineup:

1. Austin Jackson, CF
2. Brennan Boesch, LF
3. Magglio Ordonez, RF
4. Miguel Cabrera, 1B
5. Victor Martinez, DH
6. Jhonny Peralta, SS
7. Carlos Guillen, 2B
8. Alex Avila, C
9. Wilson Betemit, 3B

It’s Cy vs Cy today at Comerica Park, as two leading Cy Young contenders face off.

Jered Weaver is 14-4 with a 1.79 ERA, and has actually been improving–over his last 12 starts he is 8-0 with a 1.28 ERA.  Justin Verlander (14-5, 2.35) has had to work for his last couple victories, throwing over 120 pitches in back-to-back games. He has lost 2 in a row against the Angels and is only 3-4, 4.13 lifetime against them.  Erick Aybar (.429) has had the most success against him.

As the trade deadline nears, the Tigers are rumored to be still pursuing bullpen help, this time Joel Peralta from the Rays.  No word whether he would change his name to Jhoel if he came to Detroit.

Today’s Player of the Pre-Game:  Magglio Ordonez

Magglio was able to knock in a run against a tough Haren yesterday;  now he gets a shot at Weaver.

Today’s Jered-Jolting Lineup:

1. Austin Jackson CF
2. Brennan Boesch LF
3. Magglio Ordonez RF
4. Miguel Cabrera DH
5. Victor Martinez 1B
6. Jhonny Peralta SS
7. Carlos Guillen 2B
8. Alex Avila C
9. Don Kelly 3B

Well how about that.  Jacob Turner will make his major league debut tonight.  Jim Leyland has said he will make one start, then return to the minors. Turner’s ERA is 0.00, which leads all AL pitchers.

Before I even had time to ponder what this meant for any trade possibilities, word comes down that a trade has been made.  The Tigers have acquired starter Doug Fister and reliever David Pauley from the Mariners for 3rd Base prospect Francisco Martinez, Casper Wells, Charlie Furbush, and a player to be named later.

Fister will start Wednesday against Texas.

I’ll miss the Ghost and the Furby, and I think both will turn out to be major league players, but I think the trade is a good one for the short term.  Fister has a nice 3.33 ERA, only walks 2 per 9 innings, 7th best in the AL.  Pauley has been great this season (2.15 ERA), and may take over the Al Alburquerque role–Al-Al has been day-to-day with elbow soreness, and I wouldn’t surprised if the arrival of Pauley sends Al to the DL.

So, what do we think of the trade? Of Turner starting?

Today’s Player of the Pre-Game:  Daniel Schlereth

What I said yesterday.  Porcello made him unnecessary last night;  not tonight.  Turner will be on a strict pitch count.

Today’s Turneriffic Lineup:

1. Andy Dirks CF
2. Brennan Boesch LF
3. Magglio Ordonez RF
4. Miguel Cabrera 1B
5. Victor Martinez DH
6. Jhonny Peralta SS
7. Carlos Guillen 2B
8. Alex Avila C
9. Don Kelly 3B