The number that pleased me most from last night’s game is “1”.

Not because Nathan only gave up 1 run, though that may be cause to celebrate.

Not because in what is being regarded as Coke’s finest outing all season he only gave up 1 hit.

But the number I’m thinking of is 1 walk issued by Verlander. After talking about Verlander’s location issues in yesterday’s pregame, he was a sniper last night, walking only 1 against 8 Ks in 7 innings. I too was initially perplexed as to why he didn’t go 8, but I think that Ausmus was protecting Verlander a bit, which I don’t have a problem with. Highlights here.

Scherzer climbs the hill looking for the sweep this afternoon against righty Josh Tomlin.

A few notes:

– Ian Krol was sent to the DL last night with “shoulder inflammation” which is otherwise known as “crappy pitching.”

– Hunter is available to pinch hit today, and is expected to start on Tuesday.

1. Kinsler, 2B
2. Jackson, CF
3. Cabrera, 1B
4. Martinez, DH
5. Martinez, RF
6. Castellanos, 3B
7. Avila, C
8. Romine, SS
9. Davis, LF

Justin Verlander’s name comes up again in the rotation, and this will be his 8th shot at getting back into form. In the last 8 Tiger starts, we have 6 QS, and 2 non QS – Verlander and Scherzer. Those guys are allowed to have off-games, but we pay them in part to prevent slides like this. Neither JV nor Scherzer is doing his job this year.

Matthew Leach of MLB.com posted a tremendous article about Verlander’s decline yesterday. Leach makes a compelling argument that Verlander’s location is really the problem; which makes me thing that this can be fixed. It’s an arm angle, or a landing spot, or something in the mechanics. The velocity is there, and I think the movement is there on the secondary pitches. But he has got to want to get better.

LHP Pat McCoy has been called up from Toledo, and he’s not on the 40 man. Move coming shortly.

7:15 PM start tonight against the kid Bauer. Bauer has been decent enough this year – 4.20 ERA and a 1.40 WHIP, and he held Detroit to 2 ER over 6 a month ago.

1. Kinsler, 2B
2. Jackson, CF
3. Cabrera, 1B
4. Martinez, DH
5. Martinez, RF
6. Castellanos, 3B
7. Avila, C
8. Suarez, SS
9. Davis, LF

Yesterday’s win was a lot like getting a Valentine’s card from the cute girl in 4th grade. It’s awesome for a minute, then you realize that eventually, everyone gets one.

For whatever reason, the local press still continues to paint a rosy picture on the state of the team. Bob Wojnowski wrote today that the Tigers “dodged a complete disaster” yesterday by taking one from the Royals.  Hold on a sec Bob, we need to get on the same page here. Losing 3/4 to anyone at home in the midst of a .333 month is a complete disaster. It doesn’t mean that the team can’t get on the right track, but losing 8 games in the standings in June spells death for a lot of less talented teams. The Tigers fate hangs in the summer.

I will admit that some tough questions are finally being raised. The Freep published a comment by Jayson Stark which suggests that Verlander’s consistent high pitch counts have caught up to him. Would he be more effective in the bullpen? How long is long enough to make such a determination. Probably not 8 starts, but 20 – 30? A whole season? I fear this will be an ongoing conversation.

Also, is Alex Avila tipping pitches? He says no, but what else is he going to say? Seems like this would be an easy theory to prove.

Unfortunately, you can’t read anything Tigers right now without mention of Ausmus’ ill-fated comments. Perhaps Ausmus-gate 2014 can serve as a welcome distraction to the losing that has been going on for a month.

Porcello v. Kluber tonight.

1. Kinsler, 2B
2. Jackson, CF
3. Cabrera, 1B
4. Martinez, DH
5. Martinez, LF
6. Castellanos, 3B
7. Kelly, RF (Hunter supposedly back on Sunday)
8. Holaday, C
9. Suarez, SS

This afternoon the Detroit Tigers have a chance to do something they have yet to attempt in 2014: pass another team in the standings.

They will be doing it without Evan “Charges Pending” Reed, who got the DFA boot in favor of reliever Chad Smith. Smith, from USC, was a bit of a gamble pick in the 2011 draft–after the draft he had Tommy John surgery, then sat out a year. The gamble seems to have paid off, with Smith progressing smartly through the Tiger system. Smith brings a good sinker ball that can reach the low 90’s, and had a 1.87 ground ball to fly ball ratio at Toledo. It’s a bit of a departure from the high heat approach of an Evan Reed, but right now departures are good.

Hopefully Drew Smyly can depart from the starter trend in this series; I’ll take 4 runs in 6 innings. Otherwise we get to listen to Mario and Rod rave about how the Royals offense is hot and clicking on all cylinders like they have the past 2 days (funny how Verlander runs into “hot” offenses every start). Another dose of that and Jeremy Guthrie–Jeremy Guthrie!–pitching like Cy Young, and there will be rending of garments.

Troubling stat of the day: over the last 7 games, Miguel Cabrera has a higher OPS (.641) than Don Kelly and Austin Jackson, and that’s it.

Note:  Jason Beck tweets that currently Verlander is throwing a side session in the bullpen, with Ausmus and others looking on. So they are working on stuff.

Today’s We Try Harder Because We’re in Second Lineup:

1. Davis LF
2. Kinsler 2B
3. Cabrera DH
4. V Martinez 1B
5. JD Martinez RF
6. Avila C
7. Castellanos 3B
8. Kelly CF
9. Suarez SS

Torii sits again, as the hot JD Martinez tries to stake his claim on the 5 spot. Alex is bumped up in the lineup to 6th. Ausmus is playing the matchup here: Avila was 4-for-9 with 2 HRs against Guthrie in 2013. Kelly subs for Ajax to add another lefty bat.

Well, that hardly deserves a postgame post, does it?

Here is this week’s cumulative Ace Summary, sponsored by Hit Parade:

• 10 Innings
• 17 Runs
• 22 Hits
• 3 Walks
• 7 Strikeouts
• 15.30 ERA
• 2.50 WHIP

Well, at least we’re in 2nd place.

JD Martinez went 3-for-4 in a losing cause (and was robbed of a HR by Cain), for his 2nd straight good game at the plate (not so good in right field).

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:

1. Davis, LF
2. Kinsler, 2B
3. Cabrera, 1B
4. V Martinez, DH
5. JD Martinez RF
6. Castellanos, 3B
7. Jackson, CF
8. Avila, C
9. 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.

“Troublesome” hardly covers it Mr. Verlander, but now that I think of it, maybe you should stop working on the stuff you are working on, because it’s only getting worse.

The numbers were bad: 7 runs in 6 innings, with 12 hits and 2 walks, which adds up to a meaty WHIP of 2.33 for the game. One more of these starts should be enough to tip Verlander over the 5.00 ERA mark (he sits at 4.98 right now). But even worse was watching the clouds gather inning by inning, knowing the downpour was inevitable.

It didn’t help matters that Reed followed Verlander with a meltdown encore (which included one of the ever-popular pitcher’s errors), but there were bright spots in the game.

The 9th inning scrub rally was nice, and signs of life from JD are always welcome. Rajai made the best of getting back in the lineup, with a 3-5 day with 2 RBI, 1 SB, and an assist at home (not many of those in these parts). And Blaine Hardy had a good first outing–now somebody sequester him so he doesn’t catch Blowpenitis.

We’ve got 3 more to go with these guys, and the weak starter out of the way, so I hope to see some good baseball this week. And we’re still in first, as we always say. Thought I’d better get that one in while the getting’s still good.

Well, the Tigers won a game and a series (at home even! which brings their home record to a disappointing 18-16). So that was a good win, but not quite in the sense of a game well played. Porcello did pitch well for more than 5 innings, but then hit that 90 pitch roadblock that Vince has mentioned. The hitting, though–especially with men in scoring position–left something to be desired, with Austin Jackson prevailing as the STBD King. Jackson now has these bizarre splits:

• .109 BA .344 OPS – RISP (61 PA)
• .217 BA .649 OPS – Men On (113 PA)
• .277 BA .736 OPS – Bases empty (140 PA)

What do you do with that?

Anyway, the Tigers did manage to pull off the walk off, thanks to the second dropped fly ball by Arcia (both scored as hits), and a throw from shallow center that kicked off the side of the pitcher’s mound (and you thought our outfield was bad).

Sometimes you win games you shouldn’t; in fact, over the course of a season winning teams need to have a bunch of these.

It won’t be so easy this week, with the hottest team in Major League Baseball coming to town, yes, the 7-wins-in-a-row, 1 1/2 games out of 1st, Kansas City Royals. KC leads with lefty Jason Vargas, who has been hit hard by Ian Kinsler in two previous outings this season (4-for-6, HR). The Tigers counter with Justin Verlander, who has struggled, but is, uh, working on it: “I mean it is troublesome, yeah, but just need to continue to work on what I’ve been working on,” he said. See, nothing to worry about.

Royals vs Tigers

• Mon 4/16 7:08  Justin Verlander (6-6, .4.61) vs Jason Vargas (L) (6-2, 3.30)
• Tue  4/17 7:08  Max Scherzer (8-2, 3.05) vs Yordano Ventura (4-5, 3.20)
• Wed 4/18 1:08  Drew Smyly (3-5, 3.58) vs Jeremy Guthrie (3-6, 4.04)
• Thu  4/19 1:08  Anibal Sanchez (3-2, 2.44) vs Danny Duffy (L) (4-5, 2.83)

Note the unusual back-to-back weekday day games. Thursdays game is a rescheduled game from an earlier rainout.

Today’s Lineup:

1. Davis, CF
2. Kinsler, 2B
3. Cabrera, 1B
4. V Martinez, DH
5. Hunter, RF
6. Jackson, CF
7. Castellanos, 3B
8. Avila, C
9. Suarez, SS

Davis gets himself back in the lineup against the lefty…despite a career 3-for-15 against Vargas. Despite the lefty, Holaday gets a rest after his one grueling inning last night.