The story on Craig Monroe throughout his career is that he’s a 4th outfielder that has some legitimate, albeit inconsistent power. Monroe will turn 28 during spring training in 2005 so we should be seeing the peak of his production. Fortunately, 2004 seemed to be a big step forward for Craig.

Craig finished the season hitting a very respectable .293/.337/.488. That amounted to a considerable improvement over his 2003 season .240/.287/.449. His OPS+ of 115 was solid and he saw playing time at all 3 outfield positions.

Monroe got significant playing time early in the season when Dmitri Young went down with his broken leg. He struggled early on, but then his average began to rise during May and by the end of June he was hitting .279. However, Monroe’s power had all but vanished. His slugging percentage was a pitiful .371 at the All Star break.

Unfortunately, Craig had a stint on the DL in late July. However when he returned, he returned in dramatic fashion. Before going on the DL, Monroe had 4 homers on the season. Upon returning on August 8th, he crushed 14 dingers over the last two months of the season. He slugged .764 and .547 in August and September respectively. He also managed to keep his batting average in the .290’s during those months.

Also noteworthy for Craig are his lefty/righty splits. In 2003 he destroyed left handed pitchers. In fact the disparity between the way he hit lefties and righties was way outside the normal bounds. Right handed hitters are expected to have an OPS 9% better against lefties than righties. In 2003 Monroe was 61% better against southpaws so the expectation was that he would probably hit righties a little better, and lefties a little worse in the future. This played out in strongly in 2004.

Last year Craig’s OPS against left handers was .722, but against right handers it was .881. The result is that instead of the expected ratio of 1.09, it was .82. After the dramatic correction last year, his career ratio is 1.12 which is much closer to what is expected. The really good news is that his 2003 numbers against lefthanders were more indicative of his talent than his 2003 numbers against right handers.

If Monroe can continue to improve in 2005 his bat should be good enough to keep him in the lineup. The Tigers outfield will be crowded next year, but Monroe has an advantage in that he can competently play all 3 positions. He doesn’t have the range of a typical centerfielder, but can make spot starts there. Rondell White will get the bulk of the playing time in left. That leaves right field as the primary position available for Monroe. He has the power to actually play a corner outfield position which is more than can be said for Bobby Higginson.

I believe that Monroe will be arbitration eligible, but he should still be able to be retained for well under $1 million (and if he’s not arb-elg, he could be a bargain at $330k). Given that Monroe is coming into his peak seasons, I don’t know that the Tigers can find a free agent bat that can match Monroe’s at a similar price. The fact that he was able to establish last year that he can hit right handed pitching was an encouraging sign. Monroe still strikes out a lot, tries to pull too many pitches, and doesn’t walk enough. However, short of the Tigers signing Carlos Beltran, Monroe should be part of the Tigers plans next season.

Since I last posted the Tigers season ended, the Red Sox won a World Series, and the Tigers withdrew their offers to No. 1 pick Justin Verlander only to sign him a week later. All this without commentary. So here’s where I catch up.

Thoughts on Justin Verlander. When news came that the Tigers broke off negotiations I actually viewed it as a positive. Not that they wasted a first round pick, but that they weren’t going to be stupid with money. There was definite frustration that Greg Smith missed on assessing Verlander’s signability, but Verlander’s (or his agents) demands were unreasonable and I applaud the Tigers for risking getting burned in the public to stand their ground. Since Verlander’s dad came back to open up negotiations, and things got resolved quickly, it looks like the Tigers did the right thing.

Thoughts on the season You know what, it’s just too late to recap the season. I will say that I was pleased with the improvement. However, I think that the team still underperformed. Their offense and starting pitching were good enough to get them another half dozen wins. The good news is that the fans actually paid attention. The trick is to keep them interested next year. Another sub .500 season won’t cut it, and the coaching staff will feel the brunt of the heat.

Future of the Blog While I have taken hiatuses (hiatii?) in the past, I take pride in the fact that I’ve managed to keep this thing going through some pretty bad seasons. So I’m sure not going to stop now.

Without day to day Tiger news, I figured I needed something to write about to keep the blog from going dormant during the winter. Probably once or twice a week, I’ll be writing up a piece on Tiger players who have some question marks surrounding them. Mostly these question marks arise because of contract issues (the arb eligible players), or they are a player most likely to be traded (Maroth, Sanchez, Inge…). I’ve decided Craig Monroe will be first up.

Of course I’ll be commenting on free agent signings and free agent misses, as well as any trades or other transactions.

So I’m sorry about the delay, but hopefully you’ll still check in once a week or so and see what I’ve been up to.

That was from my offensive preview this season. In the end, he only made it to 135 games, but his RC27 of 7.6 bettered my prediction by 50%. For the season he finished with 108 runs created. Suffice it to say that Carlos Guillen by far exceeded my expectations (let’s face it, he blew us all away).

Now comes the news that Guillen’s season is done, the result of a hustle play in a meaningless September game. He was playing the game the same in September has he played all season, all out. His effort however was just one example of Guillen’s consistency this season.

A look at his offensive numbers over the course of the season reveals that he only had one “bad” month (August). And by “bad” we are talking about .260/.312/.440. Now keep in mind, that the .752 OPS during Guillen’s worst month was still the 5th best among starting shortstops this season. (In other words, for the season, there are only 4 SS’s besides Guillen who are hitting better than .752).

Here are some more splits:
Home: .320/.375/.492
Away: .316/.384/.590

Pre All Star : .321/.391/.558
Post All Star: .307/.359/.516

vs LHP: .269/.315/.457
vs RHP: .348/.416/.594

Okay, so he hits right handers much better than left. But like I mentioned before, those numbers are still better than most of the shortstops out there.

Defensively, Guillen did have 17 errors and his fielding percentage was middle of the pack. His Zone Rating of .837 was 10th best among AL shortstops. However, that is a vast improvement over the .782 that Ramon Santiago had last year. He also seemed to share a chemistry with double-play partner, and mentee (or what ever the opposite of mentor is) Omar Infante.

A final numerical way to look at his contribution to the Tigers is Win Shares. His 25 Win Shares are tops on the team. While his total Win Shares will change since he’s done for the season, he will probably still be on top because Pudge is next closest at 20 WS. It’s also noteworthy that Guillen put up these tremendous numbers while making starts at every spot in the batting order except 8 and 9.

Unfortunately the timing of the injury will leave him short of a couple benchmarks. He’s 3 doubles shy of 40, 3 runs shy of 100, and 3 RBI shy of 100. Also, he is 17 plate apperances shy of 600 which means he misses out on $150,000 of incentive money.

In any case, Guillen endeared himself to all Tiger fans when he signed a 3 year contract extension during the season. The Tigers finally have a star that likes playing for Detroit. He signed early and missed out on free agency during a career year because he was happy here.

It is ashame to see Carlos Guillen’s MVP caliber season cut short due to injury. Fortunately, he’ll be back next year. Whether he can post the same numbers remains to be seen, but it won’t take away from one of the best seasons Tiger fans have witnessed in the last decade.

Almost a month ago, on August 18th Jeremy Bonderman was shelled by the Chicago White Sox. He gave up six runs in 3 2/3 innings. Doubts about the Tigers bringing Bonderman to the big leagues too early were at an all time high (myself included). Detroit decided to stick with Bonderman in the rotation, but with the condition that he wouldn’t think so much. The plan was to “let Bonderman be Bonderman.”

Side Note: I’m not sure what to make of it, but this philosphy of having struggling Tigers players stop thinking has had tremendous success. Brandon Inge stopped thinking last year after being recalled from the minors and has become an offense force since then. Recently, Craig Monroe and Carlos Pena stopped thinking and have both been torching the ball. Alex Sanchez probably deserves mention here as well, but I just don’t know how to account for him.

In Bonderman’s first start without thinking he again faced the White Sox. This time he pitched a complete game shutout where he struck out 14. (Bonderman is the only AL starter to strike out more than 13 in a game this season). He followed that up with a respectable start in Fenway in which he allowed 3 runs in 6 1/3. A patient Red Sox team did manage 4 walks against only 4 strikeouts. The next two starts against the Devil Rays and Royals resulted in only 2 runs in 15 innings and 17 strikeouts.

Last night against Cleveland he wasn’t as sharp as he only lasted 5 2/3, but in giving up 3 runs did well enough to get the win. What was notable though is that Victor Martinez’s home run in the 6th inning, was the first dinger that Bonderman has allowed since a grand slam to Aaron Rowand back on August 18th. As you probably remember, Bonderman was giving up quite a few homers early in the season-especially for someone who pitches in Comerica.

What may have contributed to Bonderman’s recent ability to limit home runs, is that since he stopped thinking, he’s become much more of a severe ground ball pitcher. Over his last 6 games he has allowed 55 grounders and 23 fly balls for a GB/FB ratio of 2.39. Prior to this string of games, his ratio was 1.25 and last year it was 1.41.

As dire as Bonderman’s season looked a month ago, his recent string of games has made his season numbers look respectable – especially for a 21 year old. He’s 7th in the AL in strikeouts despite only having pitched 166 innings. What’s more is that his K/9 of 8.3 is third behind only Johan Santana and Pedro. That’s some pretty impressive company at any age. And while his ERA of 5.17 is a bit high, his dERA (or DIPS or Defense Independent Pitching) is actually only 4.37.

Now to be fair and temper some enthusiasm, Bonderman’s most successful recent starts have come against the Royals, White Sox, and Devil Rays which aren’t offensive juggernauts. Also, whether or not he has turned the corner or is just on a hot streak remains to be seen. Keep in mind that Jason Johnson, Mike Maroth, and Nate Robertson have all had similar stretches of dominant pitching this season. In any case, this recent stretch has shown just how good a pitcher Bonderman can be.

There has been alot of talk lately about how the Tigers will have a significant amount of money to play with this offseason. Hefty contracts to players who haven’t been contributing do come off the books. However, it will cost the Tigers significantly more to keep their current players as many get raises or become arbitration eligible.

Damion Easley ($6.63 million), Matt Anderson ($4.3 million), and Danny Patterson ($2.8 million) make up about 20% of the Tigers’ payroll this year, and Danny Patterson is the only one to contribute anything. Add in a $500,000 buyout the Tigers made to Danny Patterson and that’s $14.23 million that Tigers can use to go out and get a front of the rotation pitcher or Carlos Beltran right? Not exactly.

Carlos Guillen is due for a $1.5 million raise next year. Actually, Guillen has already accrued enough plate appearances to garner $550,000 in incentives this year, and with another 75 plate apperances will gather another $350,000. Also, the Tigers will be paying Pudge an additional $2.9 million. Jason Johnson will get an additional $1 million next year, as will Urbina if the Tigers pick up his option (and it’s a $500,000 buyout if they don’t). Speaking of buyouts, to avoid paying Matt Anderson next year the Tigers have a $400,000 buyout on his option year. Setting aside Guillen’s incentive money, and assuming they pick up the option on Urbina, that’s $6.8 million eating into the FA money.

Then there is the case of the cheap young Tigers who won’t be cheap anymore. Mike Maroth, Alex Sanchez, Brandon Inge, Gary Knotts, Nate Cornejo, and Carlos Pena all become arbitration eligible I believe. Leaving out Cornejo who probably won’t be in line for a sizable raise those other 5 guys are significant contributors and make a combined $1.71 million. Now with Maroth there has been talk about him being dealt in the offseason. However, anybody taking his spot in the rotation will probably be making more than the $330,000 that he’s currently making. Alex Sanchez could be let go because the Tigers have a cheap option in Nook Logan. I don’t think uber-sub Inge is going anywhere, and he’s earned himself a raise next season.

As for Pena and Munson (Munson is also arb-eligible but is coming off a $1.5 million dollar contract already) the Tigers will have to pay a little bit more to keep both of them. Munson might get a little less, and Pena should get some more. However it appears that the Tigers (or Trammell) have given up on Munson completely. While Trammell has been playing the hot hands a lot lately, Munson has 18 AB’s since his two homer game on August 8th.

So while there are some large “dead” contracts coming off the books, and the Tigers will have a little more money to play with it will probably be more along the lines of $6-7 million instead for $14 million.

Now Mr. Illitch could always authorize Dombrowski to increase the payroll. That isn’t an unlikely scenario with the Tigers increase in revenue. Attendance should come in just under 2 million fans, which also brings in additional concession, parking, and merchandise dollars. Plus with the improved product on the field, and the fact that the Tigers season ticket holders are almost guaranteed to renew to get All Star tickets, the team can even raise ticket prices. TV ratings are up and commercial space is actually in demand which should result in a better contract next year.

Does this mean that the Tigers will be as agressive this year as last year? We can only hope. The difference is this year the Tigers won’t have to overbid just to get people to talk with them.

Miscellaneous:
-Thanks for your patience during this long blog drought. My move went well although we’re still not unpacked. At least I’ve had some time to watch the Tigers the last few nights.
-I have to say I was as thrilled as everyone with Jeremy Bonderman’s outing on Monday night. It ranked as the 9th best pitched game in the AL this year according to game scores. Remarkably, Tiger starters have 3 of the top 10 pitched games in the AL this year. Mike Maroth’s gem against the Yankees, and Jason Johnson’s duel with Johan Santana against the Twins are the others.

I’m sorry about the severe lack of posting over the last couple of weeks. A vacation, a move, some family illnesses, and a whole lot of work have kept me very busy. I’ve barely even seen the Tigers the last few weeks, let alone had time to write about them or do any analysis.

Just give me about another week, and I’ll get some more posts up here. I just wanted to let you know that I haven’t abandoned the blog or the team, it’s just sometimes life gets in the way…

In the meantime the Tigerblog crew has been posting regularly, and Brian keeps teasing us with some big project for next season. I just hope he doesn’t get so famous that he no longer has time to be my accountant.

Once again the Tigers started off the month on a down note by dropping their first 5 games. A tough one run extra inning loss to Cleveland was followed by an ugly sweep in Colorado. The Tiger bullpen absolutely collapsed in the thin air of Denver and the starters weren’t particularly effective either.

After Colorado the worn out pitching staff headed to New York to face the Yankees. Nate Robertson was shelled early and often, meaning that the already tired bullpen had to pick up the slack. The Tigers had already lost 5 in a row and had two more to play in NY and 4 games in Minnesota before the break.

Jason Johnson gave the Tigers just what they needed with 8 innings of one hit ball and the Tigers had the first win of the season. They took the rubber match as well before heading on to Minnesota.

The Tigers dropped the first game despite a strong outing from Mike Maroth. He was done in by a combination of infield hits and bad fielding. Surprisingly the Tigers took the last 3 from Minnesota capped off by a complete game shut out by Jason Johnson.

After the break the Tigers hosted the Yankees for a 4 game series at sold out Comerica Park. In a even hard fought series the Tigers and Yankees split. The highlight was Mike Maroth’s one hit complete game shut out.

At 44-47 the Tigers were almost in contention. Unfortunately they dropped 5 of the next 6 against the White Sox and Indians. This eliminated any talk of the Tigers being buyers at the trade deadline. Fortunately they finnished the month by going 5-2 and pulled to within 4 games of the elusive .500 mark.

Comings, Goings, and Doctor Appointments
After his latest poor outing Gary Knotts informed the team that his shoulder was hurting. Knotts was placed on the 15 day disabled list and AA reliever Roberto Novoa was called to take his place on the roster. The recently recalled Wil Ledezma assumed Knotts spot in the rotation.

Danny Patterson both went on the disabled list and came off in the same month with shoulder bursitis.

The Tigers were short handed in the outfield while Craig Monroe and Alex Sanchez both saw time on the disabled list. Nook Logan filled in admirably for Sanchez until Alex was ready to come back.

July also saw the return of Chris Shelton and the demotions of Craig Dingman, Franklyn German, and Steve Colyer (twice)

By the Numbers
The Tigers managed to keep scoring runs, despite a sharp drop in batting average and on base average. Their slugging percentage remained high, and they hit 41 homers for the month.

The story is similar for the pitchers. They held opponents on base average down, but the power numbers were up and the results were more than 5 runs a game allowed.

Who’s Hot
Now that Carlos Guillen has made the Hot list every month this season, is he still hot? For the month he was .337/.405/.625. His month was topped only by Marcus Thames who like Guillen had 6 dingers to go along with .344/.391/.750.

Dmitri Young also had a solid month hitting .307/.379/.505.

Jason Johnson was tops among starters posting a 3-1 record in 6 starts and a 3.40 ERA over 45 innings. Unfortunately he was the only starter to have a really strong month. Mike Maroth was decent also picking up 4 wins with a 4.36 ERA.

After a rough start to the month, the bullpen really picked things up. Leading the charge was …Al Levine… Levine allowed only one run in 13 innings. Right behind him was Esteban Yan who allowed only 3 runs in 14 innings while striking out 11.

Who’s Not
After Pudge’s tremendous June, he has definitely slipped. For the month he hit .244/.313/.395.

Also struggling is Bobby Higginson who is hitting .207/.293/.299 despite still playing everyday (24 out of 28 games).

The young corner infielders continue to struggle as Munson and Pena have .684 and .617 OPS’ respectively while striking out a combined 38 times.

Jeremy Bonderman has had some bad luck lately resulting in short starts. That combined with 9 homers allowed left him with an ERA over 6 for the month.

Gary Knotts tried to pitch through arm problems and allowed 29 earned runs in only 24 innings.

While Levine and Yan pitched great, Danny Patterson and Jamie Walker both stuggled. Granted, Patterson only made 4 apperances, and the bulk of Walker’s troubles can be attributed to one bad outing.

Lowlight of the Month
Any of the three games in Colorado. They were all bad so take your pick.

Highlight of the Month
Without question it had to be Maroth’s one hitter against the Yankees in front of a sold out Comerica Park. The buzz coming out of that weekend was incredible and the Tigers were actually relevant after the All Star break. Good Times

Honorable Mention: Jason Johnson’s pitching duel with Johan Santana. Both pitchers were on top of their games, and it’s going to be one of the finest pitching match ups of the season.

Looking Ahead
The Tigers finally get a reprieve from playing Central teams, and instead get to play their next 15 games against teams in the playoff hunt. After hosting Texas and Boston the Tigers head out west for series with Oakland and Anaheim. They cap the road trip with 3 more games against the White Sox.

They’ll get a slight break with a series against the Mariners before hosting the White Sox (again). They finish up the month on the road against Boston and Kansas City.

Maybe.

Much has been made about how the Tigers lead the league in errors (90) and are dead last in fiedling percentage (.977), so it’s easy to assume the have the worst defense in the American League. While errors and fielding percentage are inherently flawed metrics, being the worst at both still isn’t a good sign.

Then again, last year the Tigers committed the most errors, and had the worst fielding percentage, but according to UZR (ultimate zone ratings) they were only a slightly below average unit. UZR said that the Tigers defense cost the team 13 runs more than an average defense last year, which over the course of the season is pretty minor. Unfortunately I couldn’t find any “in season” UZR’s for this year so we’ll just have to look at other stuff.

Defensive Efficiency is simply a measure of how effective the defense is at turning fieldable balls (stuff in the field of play so not home runs) into outs. The Tigers actually rank okay in this metric. They convert 69.5% of balls hit in play into outs. The league average is 69.1% and the Tigers rank sixth in the American League.

Sixth is not bad considering the number of errors the Tigers have accumulated. So how have the Tigers managed to generate so many outs despite the errors? Well, the nature of the Tigers’ errors are a little bit different than the rest of the league. Of the Tigers 90 errors, only 41 of them allowed runners to reach base. This means that the other 49 errors were allowing runners to get additional bases. So 46% of the Tigers errors allowed runners to reach base. The league average is 56%, and the Tigers were the only AL team below 52%.

Taking a closer look at the errors, 22 were committed by the outfielders, which is 5 more than the next worst outfield. The infielders have committed 49 errors, and their .979 fielding percentage is only third worst in the league.

So are the Tigers the worst defense in the league? The fact that they rank in the top half in defensive efficiency tells me that they probably aren’t. However, the sheer number of errors has to place them well within the bottom half of the league. As for how much the defense has hurt the team, I’m not sure. As for the disparity in the types of errors, I’m not sure which would utimately cost the team more. While the errors that aren’t letting runners reach base seem very costly in that runners are moving closer to scoring (and in some cases scoring), the errors allowing runners to reach base prolong innings and wear out pitchers.

The source of Gary Knotts’ recent struggles seems to be a sore arm.  I don’t know how long he’s had the problem, but I’d guess it happened during the Yankees game on the 17th.  Knotts was pretty effective early in that game, but then was touched for 3 runs in the 5th, and couldn’t make it through the 6th.  Since that 5th inning his OPS against is 1.344 with half of the batters reaching base.

If this is the case, and Knotts was injured for several starts, this is the second time this year a starter has gone out mulitple times with a sore shoulder.  Cornejo and Knotts both tried to be warriors and it cost the team multiple games.  I know that Bob Cluck is worried about protecting his pitcher’s arms, and he’s done a pretty good job the last two years.  I appreciate the warrior mentality, but there seems to be a reluctance on the starter’s part to let Cluck protect them.

This warrior mentality is taking a toll on Pudge as well.  He’s clearly in pain, and it is affecting his game both defensively and offensively.  His pitch selection since the All Star break has been horrendous.  Defensively, he’s reaching on pitches in the dirt instead of blocking them.  Opponents are also having a field day running on him  lately.  He’s only thrown out 24% of basestealers, which ranks third worst in the league.  To his credit, his reputation has resulted in only 33 attempts in 700 innings behind the plate, but eventually teams are going to figure this out.  Pudge needs several days off, regardless of whether he wants to accept them.  I know Tram has deflected to his star’s wishes, but it’s time that Pudge sits.  He’s too good to burn him out in July.

Roster Shuffle:
So with Knotts on the 15 day disabled list, he will be replaced on the 25 man roster with AA reliever Roberto Novoa.  Novoa was acquired as part of the Randall Simon trade with Pittsburgh.  Taking his spot in the rotation will be Wil Ledezma.  The Tigers want to limit his innings to 150 this season.  If Ledezma pitches about 6 innings a game, he should be able to get about 5 starts.  This will get the team close to September 1st when the Tigers can expand their active roster.

Now I have some issues with the 150 inning limit.  I fully endorse protecting Ledezma’s arm.  Last year he accumulated his first significant innings since 2000.  In fact, in his entire professional career he has only thrown 135 innings.  However, a 150 inning limit might not be the best way to protect him.  First of all, I don’t know that a major league inning is equivalent to a minor league inning, and 111 of Ledezma’s inning’s this year were with Erie.  Furthermore, he dominated Erie, so I have a feeling he wasn’t throwing a ton of pitches.  In fact, he only threw 24 walks in those innings at Erie.  So while adding 40 major league innings to 110 minor league innings might keep Ledezma at his limit of 150 innings, I’m not sure it’s the 150 inning limit they envisioned at the beginning of the season.

In any case, we’ll get to see Ledezma make 4-5 starts and see if he’s progressed from last year.

Links of Note:
Baseball Prospectus has a free article about the Tigers and whether they should be buyer’s or sellers.

Baseball Think Factory (or Primer) has made a list for each team of the best players to play their entire careers with the same team. He kind of cheated with the Tigers by making Charlie Gehringer the 3B because he played a couple games there. This did clear the way for Whitaker to make the team as a second basemen. Here is the link to the article.

The Tigers had a great win yesterday in Chicago, and as I’m typing this they are comfortably in front of the Indians tonight.  However, a week that saw them lose 5 games to divisonal rivals probably dropped the Tigers out of any sort of buyers mode they may have been contemplating. 

The team is 8 games behind the Twins, 7.5 behind the White Sox, and 3.5 games behind the Indians.  Even a sweep in Cleveland would leave them in 4th place by a half game.  Then again, every time it looks like it’s time to write off the Tigers, they manage to come back and play some inspired baseball.

Other stuff:
-With the emergence of Marcus Thames, and the submergence of Bobby Higginson, it is time for Higginson to become the 4th outfielder on this team.  While Higginson’s .356 on base average should still earn him starts against right handers, his .373 slugging percentage is unacceptable from a corner outfielder.  Higginson has made some outstanding defensive plays lately-that throw yesterday from the foul pole was incredible-but if the Tigers are truly playing to win then you should have to earn your spot in the lineup.

-Thankfully Tram has dropped Higginson from the number 2 spot in the lineup.  Instead, Carlos Guillen has hit 2nd behind Omar Infante.  Seeing Omar and Carlos at the top of the lineup I can’t help but think back to Sparky’s lineups in the 80’s with his second baseman and shortstop at the top of the order.

-Speaking of Omar Infante, Pat Caputo has an excellent article about the many personal hurdles Omar had to overcome.  In the last 2 years Infante has had to deal with the death of his father and older brother.  Oh yeah, and he’s only 22.

-ESPN.com has a stat called the Cy Young predictor.  The formula came from Rob Neyer and Bill James and their book The Neyer/James Guide to Pitchers.  As of tonight, Nate Robertson is 18th in the American League.  Now I know that Robertson won’t win the Cy Young, and to have your best pitcher be 18th typically wouldn’t be a big deal.  But the fact that a  Tiger pitcher at least made the top 20 is noteworthy.

-During the broadcast tonight, it was mentioned that Alex Sanchez is set to begin his rehab assignmnet in Toledo tomorrow night.

-The Tigers struggles in one run games have been well documented.  They are 5-16.  However, the three teams in front of them in the Central have been a combined 51-29. 

-And finally, DTW whipping boy Greg Norton has been outrighted to Toledo. 

Those with young kids will recognize the title as lyrics from Bob the Builder, but the Tigers put together a solid team effort over the weekend to earn a split with the mighty Yankees.  While my ability to comment on the games is limited because I was only able to listen to parts of the  game on Saturday and Sunday, I still have some ruminations…
 

• I attended Friday’s game, and it was probably the best game that I’ve witnessed since the final game at Tiger Stadium.  The offense was clicking, Maroth was almost unhittable, and the defense stepped up nicely.  However, what I will remember most is Brandon Inge’s catch against the wall in centerfield, and all the starters waiting to congratulate him on the field before heading to the dugout.

  This year’s Tigers are a TEAM for the first time since I’ve been doing this blog. While other Tigers have been vocal (Higginson) or emotional (Young), Pudge seems to be the first true leader this team has had since Trammell retired. Combining Pudge, and the professionalism of guys like Rondell White and Carlos Guillen the Tigers finally have a clubhouse that can take care of itself. Moments like we saw Friday night are why I find myself saying, “I love this team.”

• Saturday’s game was another strong effort, where the Tigers just came up a little short.  They didn’t play bad, but those timely hits they needed just ended up in the Yankees gloves, most noticable Eric Munson’s shot down the line.  There is no shame in playing competitively against the Yankees.
• I think the question everybody had to be asking themselves going into Sunday’s game was whether or not the Yankees would be another Angels for Nate Robertson.  Nate’s only pitched 3 bad games this year.  Two were against Anaheim, and the other was against the Yankees.  Well Nate quickly took care of those worries by pitching a strong game.  The Yankees did hit some balls hard, but fortunately for the Tigers most of them were right at people – kind of a reverse of the night before.
• I find it odd that Trammell took Nate Robertson out with only 86 pitches.  I can understand pulling him if somebody got on base, but let the guy start the 9th.  Just because the offical rules of baseball say when a save can be awarded, it doesn’t mean you have to bring in your closer.  On the other hand, Trammell let Maroth go for the complete game shut out, and didn’t have anybody warming up in the 9th.  I’m glad that Tram left Maroth in, and Mike finished the game with 126 pitches.  However, if Gary Sheffield would have gotten on, then Mike would have probably been going over 130 pitches, because there was nobody ready to bring in.  To Tram’s credit, he’s been careful with his pitchers this year, and Maroth’s outing was the longest of the season by a Tiger starter.  However, considering Mike’s pitch count, and the fact he’d lost several mph’s off his fastball I would have liked to have seen somebody ready in the pen.
• Lynn Henning had an interview with Carlos Pena in today’s News.  To Henning’s credit he asks the tough questions about how Pena hasn’t produced like a first basemen, and Carlos’ penchant for striking out.  Pena didn’t have answers of substance, but it was nice to see Henning asking the questions.
• Nate Cornejo’s days as a pitcher maybe numbered.  He’s heading to Alabama to see Dr. James Andrews and the anticipated diagnosis is the dreaded frayed labrum.  While doctor’s are proficient at fixing elbows, they haven’t been as successful with repairing labrums.  For more on the labrum check out this article.

I’m heading down to tonight’s game, and hopefully at least 30,000 others will join me.  The Tigers took care of business from a marketing perspective this weekend by playing 4 competitive games with a full house.  I’d love to see them keep it up.

The Tigers defense was stellar last night, as it turned every ball in play into an out.  Unfortunatley 5 balls found the seats and the Tigers came up short and lost to the Yankees.
 
I’m finally back, after I decided to take an extended All Star break, just in time for the Tigers’ latest biggest series of the year.  Because this series is against the Yankees, and because the Tigers have been playing well enough to have people excited, the Tigers are selling out (or coming awfully close) each game of the 4 game series.  The Tigers have an opportunity to really put on a show in front of a full house, which is why this series is so important. 
 
They need to at least split the series, and play good baseball to sustain this good will.  Last night’s loss, while disappointing, wasn’t a bad loss.  It wasn’t blown by bad relief pitching, or shoddy fielding.  The Tigers just got beat, which is okay.  Jose Contreras was dominating.  He absolutely destroyed Eric Munson, who has been hitting well lately.
 
I’m heading down to the game tonight and hopefully they can bounce back.  Mike Maroth started out real strong in his last outing against the Twins.  But then in the 7th, his defense let him down and he was forced to try and get 5 outs that inning, and the Twins capitalized and turned his outing upside down.
 
Injury Notes:  Greg Norton is 4 for 30 in 8 games on his rehab assignment.  Nate Cornejo’s rehab was suspended because of soreness in his shoulder.  Danny Patterson began his rehab assignment last night.