PREGAME: It’s an Opening Day rematch of Jeremy Bonderman and Roy Halladay tonight in Toronto. The Tigers have put together a few more walks and hits the past few days, but they’ll have a stiff test tonight.

Jim Leyland has juggled the line-up moving Pudge Rodriguez to the #3 spot and pushing everyone else down a spot. Beck reports that Pudge is 10 for 21 lifetime off of Halladay. My take on lineups is basically “whatever,” but when Carlos Guillen is hitting 6th something doesn’t feel right.

Speaking of match-ups, Bonderman avoided Matt Stairs in the opener, but his nemesis returns to the lineup tonight.

Game Time 7:07

POSTGAME
Sure I’m bummed about the loss, but it is hard to be upset. It was a spectacular game with just incredible pitching on both sides. Yes Jeremy Bonderman deserved better, but neither pitch deserved to lose.

And I know there are people probably ready to jump on Fernando Rodney, but it was an infield single and 2 bunts. He didn’t get shelled and he threw strikes. It was just and unfortunate ending to a tremendous game. And that first bunt, yes it looked awkward and Rod Allen said it was Casey’s play. But Rodney got there first, was moving in the right direction and still couldn’t make the play. I’m not sure Casey would have gotten it either.

Of course not much offense to speak of tonight, but I don’t blame the hitters.

Tigers 1, Blue Jays 2

PREGAME: So the Tigers already have a pattern in this young season. Drop the series opener, and then come back and take the rest of the games in the series. So make of that what you will as Detroit opens a new series in Toronto.

Has a dome ever looked more appealing? Gone will be the talk of cold impacting hitting and fielding and everything else. Let’s just hope the turf doesn’t effect any extremities.

If the offense responds tonight, the temperature will be given the credit. However, the Tigers showed signs of life last night. Despite the 11 scoreless innings, they did have 18 baserunners – they just couldn’t get the big hit until the 12th.

For the Tigers it will be Mike Maroth who will look to extend the 14 1/3 inning scoreless streak put up Tigers starters the last 2 nights.

Tomo Okha will take the mound for the Blue Jays. The Tigers as a team haven’t faced Ohka since 1999. But some of the current Tigers have had success in very limited at-bats.

Gary Sheffield and Magglio Ordonez will swap duties tonight. Maggs will shelter his knees from the artificial surface while Sheffield will try to get into the flow of the game playing right field.

It will also be the first start for Mike Rabelo. He’ll be hitting 8th. And as a switch hitter will bring another lefty stick to the lineup.

Game Time 7:07

And great job everybody last night in the game thread. That was fun.

POSTGAME
Nice win tonight. The Tigers got enough offense, and some help from the Toronto defense, to push across 5 runs. It was especially nice to see Brandon Inge swing the bat the way he did. He put the ball in play each time up, which was a win. Plus, 3 of the 4 balls were hit hard. It didn’t even look like the same guy at the plate as last night.

Mike Maroth somehow managed to hold the Blue Jays to 2 runs despite allowing 9 hits (5 for extra bases) in 6 innings. They were tough innings, but he helped protect a bullpen short on arms. The double play by Troy Glaus may have been the difference in the game.

Granderson struggled in his 2nd straight game, this time picking up 3 strikeouts.

Jose Mesa was about what I expected. He made some nice pitches, but then he walked Jason Smith on 4 straight. Joel Zumaya came on and looked quite awesome. Though the baserunners scored, the second one was on a jam shot.

Thanks for stopping by!

Tigers 5, Blue Jays 4
Fangraphs Win Probability

PREGAME: Interesting match-up of young pitchers tonight with Justin Verlander taking on Adam Loewen.

Verlander is coming off a start in which he limited the Royals to one unearned run on 2 hits. It wasn’t a perfect outing though with 5 walks.

Loewen was the 4th overall pick in the 2002 draft. The left hander went 5 innings in his first start this year allowing 2 runs on 5 hits, 3 walks, and 2 K’s.

With the left-hander on the mound, the Tigers will bat Ivan Rodriguez lead-off. Luckily his foot is feeling good enough to keep him in the lineup. It will also be the debut of Marcus Thames at first base.

Game Time 7:05. This one is on FSN +. The channel number will vary by your provider, but a complete listing can be found at Fox’s website.

POSTGAME: From Fangraphs:

Kind of tired after that one. So I’ll let the graph tell most of the story.

• Great outing by Verlander who was money, save for a blip where he couldn’t get the ball down.
• Great outing by Fernando Rodney who seems to have gotten his groove back.
• Great outing by Wil Ledezma who has been awesome. I’d love for him to be able to slide into the rotation
• Brandon Inge looked great in his first two plate appearances and awful in his last 3
• Thank you Craig Monroe!
• Here’s hoping Mike Maroth can make it through 6 tomorrow. The pen consists of Mesa and Zumaya tomorrow night. (Seay can probably go again and Jonesy will if need be)

Tigers 4, Orioles 1

PREGAME: The Tigers hope to get their offense going and Neifi Perez gets his first start of the year…let that sink in for a minute.

Perez will be starting in place of the struggling Brandon Inge and batting ninth. The rest of the lineup is what we’ve come to expect.

The Tigers will throw Nate Robertson tonight. Miguel Tejada is 5 for 13 with 2 homers in his career against Nate.

The Tiger bats will try to beat up on Jaret Wright. Magglio Ordonez who hits well in Camden Yards, and who has doubled in each of his last 2 games, is 8 for 18 with a homer off of Wright.

In his only other start this year Wright was gone in the 3rd inning after surrendering 4 hits and 5 walks.

Game Time 7:05pm

POSTGAME: Absolutely outstanding pitching by Nate Robertson tonight. He was uber efficient needing only 86 pitches through 7 1/3. He gave up only 4 hits, while fanning 5 and walking one. I said it in the comments, but he should have been given a shot to finish that game. That said, very nice 1-2-3 by Jonesy in the 9th.

The Tigers also got some very good defense. Curtis Granderson picked up an outfield assist on ill-advised baserunning, and an accurate one hop throw to 2nd. Craig Monroe made a nice play digging a ball out of the corner and sending a strong accurate throw to 2nd just missing Kevin Millar. Neifi made a couple nice plays at third and Polanco’s play to end the game was sweet.

The offense is still struggling, save for Curtis Granderson and Placido Polanco. The Tigers first 2 runs were fortunate to say the least with both runs scoring without a ball leaving the infield.

Gary Sheffield continues to struggle with a couple more strikeouts including one with the bases loaded.

Jim Leyland frustrated me on several occasions tonight. I already mentioned pulling Robertson, but then the two “strike-em-out-throw-em-out double plays” were both questionable decision with guys who were struggling at the dish.

But enough doom and gloom. The Tigers picked up the win. I’ll choose to just relish in the fact that I’m disputing the quality of the win for a change. Even with all the good of 2006, those 12 years prior are still pretty fresh in my memory.

Tigers 3, Orioles 1

PREGAME: It’s Opening Day in Baltimore, a day of renewed hope and optimism for O’s fans. The last time the Tigers were in Baltimore (don’t worry, I’ll stop these “last time the Tigers” things soon), Orioles fans staged a walk out protesting Peter Angelos ownership. It was a game I happened to be at.

Today Chad Durbin makes his first start of the season, and 57th of his career. His overall numbers are nothing to get excited about, but he’s up here because of what he did in AAA last year. For Toledo he struck out 3.24 batters for every one he walked and posted a 3.11 ERA in 185 innings.

He’ll be opposed by Daniel Cabrera who has filthy stuff, but no control. He struck out more than a batter an inning last year, but walked more than 6 per nine innings. The Tigers will put out there regular lineup against right handers of Granderson/Polanco/Sheffield/Ordonez/Guillen/Rodriguez/Casey/Monroe/Inge.

Game time 3:05

POSTGAME: So much for yesterday’s late inning heroics jump-starting the offense. The Tigers once again struggled to generate any offense. Even when they managed to get into hitters counts, they still struggled to make solid contact.

After the first 2 innings things were looking pretty good. The Tigers made Cabrera throw 21 pitches to only 3 batters in the first inning. In the second they saw 17 pitches, had a couple of hard hit balls and plated their first run. After that he only threw 66 pitches over the next 4 innings. The Tigers made a lot of routine outs, and when they did reach base the innings were cut short with double plays.

Meanwhile Chad Durbin mowed through the first 2 innings on 21 pitches. Everything was great until the 3rd inning when the wheels came off. A couple solid hits, a couple weak hits, and the Tigers were down 4 runs. He looked to gather himself well in 4th inning before surrendering a couple runs in the 5th.

Durbin gave way to Wil Ledezma in the 5th, and while he’ll get another chance or two, he may run the risk of giving way to Ledezma in the rotation as well. Ledezma looked great again today with 2 2/3 innings allowing only a run producing bloop single.

While Durbin struggled, he wasn’t awful and there’s a good chance they lose that game the way Cabrera was pitching anyways. Removing Durbin from the rotation is probably premature at this point.

Fortunately (or unfortunately depending on your point of view), Jose Mesa managed a strong inning.

Tigers 2, Orioles 6

PREGAME: First of all, Happy Easter to everyone (or at least those that celebrate).

It’s the rubber match and it will be Jeremy Bonderman taking on Brandon Duckworth.

This will be the first start of the year for Duckworth, who has a tendency to allow a lot of baserunners. Over the last 3 years his WHIP is 1.83 across 101.3 innings pitched.

Bonderman is making his 2nd start and looking for his first win.

Game Time 2:10

POSTGAME: I love how I tease the game with a stat, like about Duckworth:

who has a tendency to allow a lot of baserunners

and then have the exact opposite happen. Duckworth only allowed 4 hits and a walk. This was despite the fact that the Tigers made him throw pitches and routinely found themselves in hitters counts. In fact, Duckworth threw 51 41 (math is tricky) balls and 49 strikes, yet Tiger batters couldn’t make solid contact. It’s kind of hard to explain.

Fortunately Jeremy Bonderman had a very strong outing with the slider working quite well. He fanned 8 and his only walk was the intentional variety to Mark Teahen who had driven in both runs (I wonder if Teahen will be Bonderman’s new Matt Stairs). He went 6 innings and kept it close enough – with the help of the bullpen to set-up some 06ish heroics.

Magglio Ordonez finally made solid contact and was 2 feet away from a homer to right-center. A full pitch walk to Carlos Guillen was followed by a no-doubter line drive to left on the first pitch to Ivan Rodriguez. And with one swing an afternoon of angst and frustration about the offense was almost forgotten.

Other thoughts:

• Carlos Guillen reached base 3 times and seems to be settling in after a slow start to the spring.
• Marcus Thames drew a couple walks. Not to discredit Thames eye, but until Brandon Inge starts making solid contact the number 8 hitter isn’t going to see a lot to hit.
• Fernando Rodney had pretty uneventful inning – which was great to see. He surrendered a double, but that was among 3 weakly hit balls.
• Todd Jones turned in his second routine save in a row.
• Gary Sheffield struck out twice to bring his total to 5. What is it about the Tigers and strikeouts?

Tigers 3, Royals 2

PREGAME: Mike Maroth returns to the scene of his last start last year, where he was hammered for 3 homers and 6 runs while only recording one out. Of course he was hurting and landed on the DL following it. (The Tigers actually came back and won 13-8).

Meanwhile the Tigers will take on Gil Meche, he of the very much laughed at contract this winter. Still, the Tigers struggled against him last year. Meche only allowed 5 runs in 20 innings spanning 3 starts. He posted a 17:7 K:BB ratio against

This is the one game that won’t be seen anywhere for the Tigers this season. The 2:10 start time falls during Fox’s exclusive window, and the Royals just weren’t enough of a draw to get a national game.

POSTGAME: This 6-5 Tigers win was more along the lines of what we saw last year. There were 3 homers, all solo, powering the offense. The starting pitching kept the team in the game and handed over a lead to the bullpen. The relievers limited the other team to 1 run over 4 innings. And everything was backed by solid defense.

Good times.

PREGAME: Ah, a return to Kansas City where the Tigers began their out-of-nowhere season last year with a 2 game sweep to start the season, and clinched a playoff spot with a 3 game sweep in September.

The Tigers will throw Justin Verlander against the Royals. Verlander kind of feasted on Royals last year, allowing only 2 extra base hits and 2 runs in 21 innings. Of course, the 2006 ROY didn’t have to deal with 2007 ROY preseason candidate Alex Gordon.

The Tigers will face their first southpaw in Jorge De La Rosa. De La Rosa only has 144IP in his career and he has nearly as many walks (106) as strikeouts (114). The newly patient Tigers could exploit this number, espeically on a bitter cold night where gripping the ball could be a challenge.

Game Time 8:10

POSTGAME Enough with the excuses about wind in the outfield. Craig Monroe had his second ball this season drop in front of him. Magglio Ordonez screwed up 2 plays in the outfield, one was on the ground so I don’t think the wind impacted it. Plus, the Tigers hit pretty much every ball in the air and the Royals didn’t have a problem with it.

Other comments:

• Jose Mesa wasn’t fooling anyone, and the ball was up. The results speak for themselves. Monroe’s gaffe allowing the second run wasn’t Mesa’s fault, but the damage had already been done. He was pretty bad in spring training allowing 23 baserunners in 13 1/3 innings. I wonder how many chances he’ll be given.
• Verlander looked great early on, but then the control completely disappeared. The five walks didn’t cost him, except for shortening his outing.
• Craig Monroe’s double was only the Tigers 4th extra base hit.
• Two very nice plays from Brandon Inge. He needed some help from Casey on his first throw, but it was a heck of a play to come up with it in the first place.
• Very nice first outing for Wil Ledezma coming in to bail out Mesa and only allowing a walk in 1 2/3.

Royals 3, Tigers 1

Game Postponed: The Tigers called this one early. It will be made up on September 10th at 7:05pm

PREGAME: Ah, the rubber match. Detroit evened the series at one game apiece yesterday (barely) and now they’ll try and take the deciding game as well.

The Tigers will send out American League Rookie of the Year Justin Verlander. Verlander had some ups and downs this spring. Due to the prolonged season, he didn’t start throwing until spring training and it was clear that he was a little behind the curve in terms of mechanics. He’d look great, then implode for an inning or two. But he closed out the spring very strong and looks to be ready to go.

He’ll face left-hander Gustavo Chacin which means we will likely see Pudge Rodriguez leading off. As long as someone is on base for Gary Sheffield it should be okay. Sheffield has taken Chacin deep 3 times in 15 at-bats.

Game Time 1:05pm

PREGAME: We’ll see if this one gets played or not. The weather forecast is February-esque, so the ring ceremony might look a little odd with the recipients wearing winter gloves. It is almost a guarantee we’ll see the Placido Polanco hoody though.

If they play it, Nate Robertson will be on the hill for Detroit. Robertson owns Reed Johnson, but has had some ups and downs against the rest of the lineup. He doesn’t want to pitch to Frank Thomas (5 walks in 20 plate appearances). He shouldn’t pitch to Aaron Hill who posts and 8 for 10 line.

Sean Casey looks to be the only Tiger excited to face AJ Burnett. While the current roster doesn’t have many at-bats against Burnett, only Casey has demonstrated success going 13 for 23 (with a triple?!).

Game Time 1:05pm

POSTGAME: Just got back, and my fingers are still thawing. Quite the emotional swing in this game to say the least.

Nate Robertson never had a 1-2-3 inning, and like Rodney on Opening Day he seemed to struggle to put hitters away. He threw 104 pitches in 5 2/3 innings and 47 were balls. To his credit though, he kept the ball down with the exception of the Hill homer. As we saw in the 8th inning, anything in the air could have been trouble.

Jason Grilli was only marginally responsible for the 7 runs in the 8th inning. He did fall behind too often, but he induced enough weak swings to get out of the inning with minimal damage. Some wind, some bad luck, and some really bad defense by Ordonez were the big culprits.

Other thoughts:

• Ordonez defense almost soiled a solid day at the plate where he reached base 4 times.
• Really, really bad game today for Brandon Inge. He fanned his first 3 times up, and nearly made 2 errors on very routine balls where his infield mates bailed him out.
• Curtis Granderson now has all 3 of the team’s extra base hits.
• Despite his big day with the bat, if Toronto had scored another run we might be looking at a couple baserunning decisions while Granderson was on 3rd after his triple. First, he failed to tag on a shallow fly that required a diving catch in rightfield. Then, with Ordonez at-bat he had a chance to score on a wild pitch. I don’t know if it was Granderson or Gene Lamont, who seems to be especially cautious in the first 2 games. When in doubt he’s held runners at 3rd in these first 2 games.
• When Craig Monroe struck out in the 2nd inning it was his 5th K in 5 games. But he actually bounced back nicely. He drew a bases loaded walk, hit a sharp grounder to short, and lined out to right field in subsequent at-bats.

I took some pictures, and will post those later tonight.

Final Score: Detroit (1-1) 10, Toronto (1-1) 9

Super POSTGAME: So I took my camera and had decent seats. Mind you I’m not a photographer, and I don’t have a top of the line camera, but I thought I’d share a couple of the better ones anyways. You can find the set from today’s game here.

I also flipped the camera to video mode to capture Kenny Rogers getting his ring. I guess he got to the park just in time. He received a warm welcome, as did all the players, but it was too bad the weather was so awful. It really kept the crowd down.

PREGAME: The return of the game posts, also known as “it’s about time baseball season is back.” If you’re new to the site, this is where we discuss the game at hand.

The Tigers will send out Jeremy Bonderman. Bonderman is expected by many (myself included) to make a big leap this year. He’ll get his first chance against a very formidable offense, on a pretty big stage. He has been highly effective against most of the Blue Jays with the exception of Vernon Wells. Wells is 5 for 12 with a couple doubles and a couple walks. Fortunately, Bonderman’s nemesis Matt Stairs (10 for 21, 3 walks, 3 homers) will not be in the lineup today.

The Tigers will be facing perhaps the best right hander in the American League in Roy Halladay. Current Tigers have had very little success against Halladay with a combined 7 extra base hits. Four of those belong to Pudge Rodriguez is is 10 for 18 off of Halladay.

Game Time is 1:05pm with Pennant Raising ceremonies and booing of Governor Jennifer Granholm and Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick set to begin at 12:30. The game can be seen Fox 2 and FSN Detroit and heard on 1270 WXYT.

As a reminder on commenting rules, it is basically 1. Don’t swear, 2. Be nice, 3. Don’t be a jerk
Fangraphs will have live win probability calculations all season long (for more on WPA see here).

Blue Jays Lineup

1. LF Reed Johnson
2. 1B Lyle Overbay
3. CF Vernon Wells
4. DH Frank Thomas
5. 3B Troy Glaus
6. RF Alex Rios
7. C Gregg Zaun
8. 2B Aaron Hill
9. SS Royce Clayton

Tigers Lineup

1. CF Curtis Granderson
2. 2B Placido Polanco
3. DH Gary Sheffield
4. SS Carlos Guillen
5. RF Magglio Ordonez
6. C Ivan Rodriguez
7. 1B Sean Casey
8. LF Craig Monroe
9. 3B Brandon Inge

POSTGAME:
Well, they came up a little short today on a rough first inning by Bonderman, and a rough last inning by Fernando Rodney. What was really impressive is that threats were very limited in between. The loss is far from devastating, but getting a solid outing from your starter and putting 3 up on Roy Halladay normally gives you a good chance to win (as my buddy Russ said on the way home). To let it get away is a little disappointing.

Because I was too giddy to sleep last night, and worn out by the day, just some bulleted thoughts on the game:

• Carlos Guillen looked simply amazing defensively. Sitting in leftfield I didn’t have a great view of everything going on today, but I did have Guillen in my sights and it was something to see.
• I was a little surprised to see that after his rough first inning, Bonderman was actually much more efficient that Halladay. A lot of the credit goes to the Tiger hitters who didn’t offer at a first pitch until Sheffield’s at-bat the second time through. In fact, the first 8 hitters all took the first 2 pitches.
• And along those lines the 2 strike approaches were sound. Granderson fell behind with 2 strikes in his first AB before drawing a couple balls and ripping a single. Carlos Guillen later fell behind 1-2, fouled off 2 pitches, and hit a line drive deep to right that was hauled in by Rios.
• The Tigers actually had a few well hit balls, 2 by Guillen and 2 by Sheffield, that just didn’t fall. Sometimes that’s the way it goes. By the same token, the Blue Jays were just a couple feet short of 2 home runs as well.
• Craig Monroe, not a good day at-bat
• Strange outing for Fernando Rodney today. He was consistently getting ahead (6 of the 7 batters he faced he got 1st pitch strikes), yet couldn’t close out the at-bat. He was ahead 0-2 to both Frank Thomas and Troy Glaus before both reached base.
• One more note on Rodney, it was last year I believe that Chuck Hernandez was trying to limit the number of change-ups that Rodney through, to get him to concentrate more on his fastball. In the Glaus at-bat he threw him 3 straight changes. Maybe it is something to address again?