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.

Happy Father’s Day Friends! I’m going to spend my day relaxing outside, reading, and cursing the Tigers.

This Tigers tailspin has been going on for nearly a month now. Miraculously, the Tigers have remained in first place during this 8-17 run, but the Royals are hot on our trail, only 1 1/2 games out after their sixth consecutive win yesterday. In fact, the entire division is in the hunt. The Tigers had a larger lead on the division a month ago (7 games) than they do on last place right now (4.5 games).

Like any fanatic, I work hard to make sure that I’m correctly placing my blame, as it somehow makes me feel a little better to be mad at the right people. So, using the incredible tools available at Baseball-Reference.com, I pulled some very basic team and player stats. You can click on the hyperlinked words below for more info.

Games 1-39: 27 wins, 12 losses.

Batting: .278 BA, .757 OPS, 4.8 runs per game

Pitching: Team ERA 3.13

Games 40-64: 8 wins, 17 losses.

Batting: .266 BA, .764 OPS, 4.0 runs per game

Pitching: Team ERA 5.39.

Hitting has been pretty consistent. We’re scoring a little less, which is probably due to some mixture of luck and situational hitting. The Tigers have slipped to middle of the pack with runners in scoring position. But I expect that number to come back up, and the runs per game to climb back towards 5.

Fielding is much harder to split-out like this, but I’ve heard Dan Dickerson say over and over what we’ve gone from top of the AL to bottom four over the past month, so that’s a part of the problem. I think we all see that on a daily basis.

But the pitching has been horrendous, and really, nearly the entire pitching staff is to blame. Take a look at this.

Of the regular guys on the staff, 8 of them have been awful over the past month. Maybe we can exclude Smyly from that label, but everyone else save Sanchez, Chamberlain, and Alburquerque should have to come and mow our lawns for what they’ve put us through. The Tigers pitching staff has been handing out hits and walks like they’re flyers on the Vegas Strip. Not surprisingly, the team ERA for June is worst in the AL, and the team WHIP is second worst.

I expect Scherzer and Verlander to be much better. We’ve already seen it from Scherzer. But Nathan, Reed, Krol, and Coke are legitimate issues, and I fear that no lead will be safe until a couple of moves are made. Hanrahan still isn’t pitching live BP, and Toledo isn’t much help. Dombrowski – work your magic.

Tigers have a shot at a rare series victory today, which is sorely needed for a dozen or so reasons.

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

These World Cup refs are not messing around.

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

34-28, 1st place, 2.5 games up, 3-7 last 10, 1-0 last 1.

Tigers return home from a quick rain shortened three game set in Chicago to face the Twinkies for three.

I’ll be honest. Last night’s Scherzer shutout wasn’t as enjoyable as it should have been, mostly because we still need 10 more of those in a row to get back to where we were mid-May. Couple that with my new Pavlovian response to “closer situation”, and I could barely listen to good ol’ Dan D. But the Tigers win as they are inclined to do every third day, and hope re-springs.

Smyly v. Kyle Gibson tonight

Sanchez v. Deduno tomorrow at 4:08

Porcello v. Nolasco Sunday at 1:08

Bryan Holaday has been doing everything right as of late – hitting, calling good games, not throwing the ball into left field, but unfortunately he bats right handed, so we may not see him until Monday. I know that it’s easy to point heavy blame at Ausmus right now, so I’ll go ahead and do it. Where is the creativity and reason? Where’s the fire? Where’s the rational thinking? Yes, we’re running more, but that’s b/c we have those assets now. I’m still seeing rather traditional managing – not what I was expecting.

Tonight’s [insert name here]’s Due Lineup:

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

This series may be lost, but hey, the season series (so far) is still on the line, as the Detroit Tigers (33-28, 1st Central, 4th AL) yet again look to begin the uphill climb to the straight and narrow. The Chicago White Sox (33-33, 3rd Central, 9th AL) have made them look silly lately, but that can’t go on. Can it? Well, facing Chris Sale, maybe it can.

Tonight’s “Tigers Are People, Too” lineup:

LF Davis
2B Kinsler
3B Cabrera
1B V. Martinez
RF Hunter
LF J.D. Martinez
3B Castellanos
C “Bunt” Holaday
SS South Bound Suarez

P Scherzer

I suppose we can save the festival of pessimism and alarm for after the game. Or for during the game. Castellanos is hitting, Suarez is exciting, and Sanchez will pitch again eventually. Detroit still has Miggy and VMart, and sometimes that actually makes a difference. Go Tigers.

POSTGAME: Oh man does that zero to the far right look good. I think I’ll indulge in a bit of “You Said It” without the credit – you guys know who you are. The Tigers battery was fully charged tonight, eh?

Thank you Vmart aka professional hitter!

3-4 for Holaday, and he called a great game. See you again in 2 weeks Bryan (beat you to it, jud!)

6 shutout innings on 81 pitches. Ace-like.

That 7th inning was his best.

Boras is just counting the money.

Max at 98 pitches. He ABSOLUTELY comes back out for the 9th, right?

with that clutch two out single & RBI, Holaday is now 3 for 4 today… just sayin… Avila (Sr & Jr)

Tell me again who is our starting catcher and why?

Detroit at Chicago, Verlander vs. Danks, and they ought to get it in this time, ‘neath the color of October skies (in June).

Tonight’s “Tigers are better than the Sox” lineup:

LF Davis
2B Kinsler
DH Cabrera
1B Martinez
RF Hunter
CF Jackson
3B Castellanos
C Avila
SS Suarez

P Verlander

Not liking Miggy at DH, for defensive reasons. Verlander and Danks both come in with well-pitched wins versus the opponent earlier this season. The bats showed up for JV; versus Danks, it was that familiar story of plenty of runners and not plenty of runs (1, to be exact). Verlander has two good starts against the White Sox this year, in fact. The second one ended happily with the legendary RBI bunt from Bryan Holaday. A little more such daring might be called for in this game and hereafter, because the Tigers are having one heck of a time plating runners and cashing in. One more runner left standing at 3B and I am going to scream.

OK, Chicago. Game on. We are your overlords.

POSTGAME: OK, we’re no one’s overlords. Bottom of the 6th, game over. Not one our favorite team can be very proud of. This one’s beyond hat tipping, I should think.

Detroit (33-27) out to even it up against Chicago (32-33) tonight, with JV up against John Danks. Expect “The Justin Verlander Thread” after this one. To ponder the question of how Justin could have just no-hit the Sox at the Cell after tying us in knots all season, of course.

OK, let’s keep Victor in the lineup and off the field, please. More Eugenio Suarez! Unless we can reach an agreement on resigning ourselves to the Avila Deal, we may need “The Alex Avila Thread” as well. Less clown show! 33-27? Yeesh. That’s starting to look a little too AL Central for my tastes.

Gotta win this one. Rain could be a factor, so maybe I should say “gotta get this one in.” No more postponements! Tonight’s “Stave Off The Return of the Funk” lineup to follow…