Monthly Archives: May 2008

2008 Season, Game Post

Game 48: Twins at Tigers

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PREGAME: Remember the last time the Tigers swept a series? They were in New York and went to play the Twins and then got swept themselves. Let’s not do that again.

Did you know the Twins have played 28 of their games in the confines of the dome and are 16-12 there? But when they head on the road they are 7-12? Let’s hope that trend continues as Armando Galaragga takes his turn in the rotation.

For the Twins it will be Kevin Slowey who is making his 5th start of the season. He hasn’t made it through the sixth inning yet, but posts a 16:3 K:BB ratio over 19.1 innings. His achilles heel has been the long ball with 6 surrendered all ready. Last year he averaged over 2 allowed per game as well.

MIN @ DET, Friday, May 23, 2008 Game Preview – Baseball-Reference.com

IN GAME: I think Leyland had a beef. Those were called strikes in that Guillen at-bat:

POSTGAME: Well, it got interesting there for a while. I missed the first 3 innings while at my son’s game so I didn’t see Galarraga walking everybody, but it sounded similar to his last start against the D-backs but the Twins added hits as well.

The Tigers couldn’t get to Slowey and couldn’t take advantage of his tendency to hit homers, but the offense still managed to put runners on base in most innings. And they did double his walk total for the season (and should have more than doubled it – see above graphic) so they did exhibit some patience.

An inspired rally in the 7th cut it to one, and could have tied it save for the comical play involving Marcus Thames running all over the field. Unfortunately the bullpen imploded under the eye of Lloyd McClendon who took over when Jim Leyland was ejected. McClendon let Willis throw 28 pitches and Bobby Seay 38 which would seem to indicate that both would be unavailable tonight.

Willis struggled with his control walking 2 (1 intentional) and throwing 15 balls versus 13 strikes.

Site News

Programming Note

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I’ll be on the It Is What It Is show with Sean Baligian on WDFN 1130 this morning. I’m slated to be on at 10:35 so if you’re interested you can catch the stream. If the audio is available I will post that later today.

UPDATE: Here’s the audio from today: [audio:http://a1135.g.akamai.net/f/1135/18227/1h/cchannel.download.akamai.com/18227/podcast/DETROIT-MI/WDFN-AM/bill.mp3?CPROG=PCAST&MARKET=DETROIT-MI&NG_FORMAT=sports&SITE_ID=1128&STATION_ID=WDFN-AM&PCAST_AUTHOR=Sports_Radio_1130_WDFN&PCAST_CAT=sports&PCAST_TITLE=WDFN_-_Sean_Baligian] or you can download it.

2008 Season, Game Post

Game 47: Mariners at Tigers

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PREGAME: By winning the first two games of the series the Tigers assured themselves that they’ll enter the weekend in 13th place in the American League. Hopefully they have higher aspirations like opening up a 2.5 game lead over the Mariners in the race for first dibs on the waiver wire. (this is called not getting carried away over a 2 game winning streak)

Jeremy Bonderman will try to build on his excellent start in Arizona by reducing the number of foul pop-ups that go uncaught.

Miguel Bastista takes the bump for the Mariners. Batista walks a lot of people, kind of like Bonderman has this year. The Tigers have been pretty aggressive the last two games against pitchers who throw strikes predominantly. We’ll see if they adjust their approach to try and wait out Batista.

SEA @ DET, Thursday, May 22, 2008 Game Preview – Baseball-Reference.com

POSTGAME: I don’t want to knock a sweep, a pounding, a 3 game win streak. But I’m far from giddy. After winning the last 3 the Tigers are still 7 games under .500, and even with the Twins, Indians, and Royals losing at the same time they’re still 3 games out of 2nd. But that’s the hole they have dug.

Plus I’ve been really encouraged before, like when they swept the Yankees to move within 1 game of .500 only to go in the tank again. I guess I need another 10 games at least of good play, not necessarily wins mind you, but good play to start to get that shiny-happy feeling again.

Still, it’s unreasonable to expect them to win anymore than they did over the last 3 games so I can’t help but be happy with the sweep. Yes, the Mariners are playing really bad baseball. And the Tigers got the good fortune to miss Felix Hernandez and Erik Bedard. And the Tigers bullpen had issues in the one game. But the Tigers still doubled up the Mariners in this series. It’s not like they were squeaking out wins. They beat the Mariners to a pulp, or in Rod-ism form, like they stole something.

Slumping players seemed to bounce back a little and Bonder-lander put together a couple decent starts.

Good sweep. Now let’s see it again.

Comment of the day: Courtesy of T. Smith – This is like the Detroit Tigers playing the Detroit Tigers.

On a related note, check out the game thread at USS Mariner. We’ve all been witness to some bad baseball as Tigers fans this year so we can feel their pain. But at least the commentors are creative in their frustrations.

2008 Season, Minors

Tigers Minor League Wrap 5-21-08

Toledo – DNP

Bowie 2 Erie 9
Max St. Pierre hit a grand slam and Wil Rhymes tripled. Matt Righter allowed 2 runs and 2 walks leading to 1 run in 5 innings.

Palm Beach 11 Lakeland 11 (in progress)
The Flying Tigers had an 11-4 lead in this one. Rick Porcello got roughed up a little with 4 runs and 9 hits in 5 innings. He walked none and fanned 3. Cale Iorg had 2 hits, but 3 strike outs. James Skelton fanned 4 times and added a hit.

West Michigan 4 South Bend 1
Audy Ciriaco and Roger Tomas each had 2 hits. Alfredo Figaro allowed 2 hits and 5 walks of 7.2 innings of shut out ball.

2008 Season, Injuries, Roster Management

Dontrelle Willis is almost back and headed to the pen

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WDFN is reporting that Dontrelle Willis will rejoin the team today or tomorrow and will head to the pen while Armando Galarraga stays in the rotation.


UPDATE: Old news now, but the corresponding roster move was Clay Rapada getting DL’d due to bicep tendinitis. Rapada certainly struggled his last time out so which may have cut the rehab session short of another start for Willis.

I’m surprised by the move of Willis to the bullpen, seeing as I just wrote that Willis should take Galarraga’s spot in the rotation. What do you know, I was wrong again.

But I do like that Galarraga isn’t going to the bullpen because I wanted him to remain stretched out as a starter – be that here or Toledo. I’m surprised that they would ask Willis to move to the bullpen. But he seems to be embracing it and was joking around with Todd Jones last night. And if he can work on things with Jeff Jones at the MLB level all the better. The tricky thing is getting Willis stretched out again when he rejoins the rotation.

2008 Season, Game Post

Game 46: Mariners at Tigers

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PREGAME: My goodness, wouldn’t it be nice to win back to back games? The last time that happened the Tigers were in New York.

A chunk of the responsibility tonight falls on Kenny Rogers. Rogers was knocked around to the tune of 11 hits and 7 runs in only 4 innings in his last start against the Royals. The 24 walks and 23 K’s in 47.1 innings are pretty ugly, as re the 5 homers. Rogers has limited Ichiro to a .551 OPS but the rest of the Mariners hit him to the tune of .762.

The hitters should be able to carry over the pounding of last night on to Jarrod Washburn. He’s left handed and not that good. But the Tigers have made lesser pitchers look dominant so I don’t know what to expect. One interesting split for Washburn this year is performance on first pitches. When put in play hitters are only 1 for 16 this year. Small samples to be sure but unusual. Also, even when hitters fall behind 0-1 they still hit 317/358/584 against Washburn this year. The career numbers are a 820 OPS for first pitch in play and 242/285/377 after 0-1 which is more telling. So swing away on the first pitch!
SEA @ DET, Wednesday, May 21, 2008 Game Preview – Baseball-Reference.com

POSTGAME: I missed most of this one. Acutally, I missed all of the Tigers scoring, but say the near implosions by Kenny Rogers.

But looking at the box score (and the parts of the game I saw):
offense=good
bullpen=good
rogers=not so good

All the starters got hits, but it was Marcus Thames and his granny, and Brandon Inge and his double and triple that drove home 6 of the 9 runs.

Zach Miner allowed 1 baserunner in 2.2 innings to pick up a rough night from Rogers.

That’s all I have tonight. Back to back wins are too rare, but still appreciated.

Tigers 9, Mariners 4

Links

links for 2008-05-21

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2008 Season, Minors

Tigers Minor League Wrap 5-20-08

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Columbus 7 Toledo 5
Your Mud Hens homers tonight were brought to you by Mike Hollimon and Jeff Larish. Mike Hessman is inexplicably stuck on 18. Chris Lambert fanned 7 while allowing 2 runs in 5.2 innings.

Bowie 10 Erie 5
Justin Justice doubled and homered. Wilkin Ramirez singled, tripled, stole his 14th base, and walked. Danny Worth and Deik Scram each added 2 hits. Lucas French allowed 6 runs over 7 innings, walking 1 and striking out 4.

Palm Beach 5 Lakeland 2
Scott Sizemore homered, singled and walked. Ramon Garcia went 6 innings allowing 2 runs on 8 hits, no walks and 1 K.

West Michigan 10 South Bend 4
Ronnie Bourquin doubled and knocked in 3. Cory Middleton also had a 3 RBI day. Phil Nardozzi pitched 5 shut out innings allowing only 2 hits.

2008 Season, Game Post

Game 45: Mariners at Tigers

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PREGAME: Well, it’s already been an interesting night at the ballpark. As for the game itself it will pit Justin Verlander against Carlos Silva.

Silva has a 4.17 ERA. In typical Silva fashion he’s allowing his share of hits, and not striking out many, but walking even fewer.

The Tigers will have the following lineup:

  1. Granderson
  2. Polanco
  3. Sheffield
  4. Ordonez
  5. Cabrera
  6. Guillen
  7. Joyce
  8. Renteria
  9. Rodriguez

SEA @ DET, Tuesday, May 20, 2008 Game Preview – Baseball-Reference.com

POSTGAME: It’s never easy is it? Tonight a solid outing by the ace and an outburst by the offense was nearly undermined by the mostly trustworthy arms of Aquilino Lopez and Clay Rapada getting roughed up. And the outfield made 3 errors. And the errors came from the defensive outfielders Raburn-Granderson-Joyce.

But how ’bout that offense. The slumping Edgar Renteria was a double short of the cycle including a bases loaded triple. And the slumping Curtis Granderson singled, doubled, and homered. And the slumping Carlos Guillen hit a bomb to straight away centerfield.

So it’s a win amidst the turmoil. Now heaven help me if they get shut out tomorrow or Rogers biffs.

2008 Season

Everything is broken…arrggghhh

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UPDATE: Leyland responded to the comments. Beck has the transcript and the audio is here. And it looks like Grilli has responded back.

This really was a rant for the ages. Leyland’s gone off before, but it has been to players with only terse summaries for the press afterwards. This was out there for everybody and I think he was 100% right in what he said. You’ve got to listen to the audio for yourself if you haven’t heard it yet. It ended with “Beck. If you write a horse— article you don’t blame John Lowe.”

Also, I wouldn’t expect Nightengale around the clubhouse for awhile. I did talk with people familiar with baseball clubhouses and there was nothing out of the ordinary that night. It’s normal baseball behavior and when you get to the park 5 hours before game time there is going to be downtime. Grilli is saying he was misquoted which could just be CYA backpedaling. But I do find the Guillen quote out of character. And I can’t help but wonder how many, if any, players Nightengale spoke with that indicated no clubhouse problems but it didn’t make the story.

Hey, you may have heard there was an article today about the chemistry in the Tigers clubhouse. I know there has already been a lot of discussion about this in another post, but I wanted the chance to address it. Please read the article first because the points I’m going to hash out below assume you will have read it.

  1. There are quotes in this article that I do find very disturbing. The Sheffield quotes and the Inge quotes don’t bother me too much. Sheffield probably said what he was thinking and in a day or two he’ll explain what he meant. As for Inge, he seems to say lots of things. What bothered me the most are the Guillen quotes in which he seemed to imply that the expectations were unfair. Bull—-. While a 1000 run offense expectation may not be fair, expecting to be a good team was completely in line. The fact that this came from someone who is perceived as a team leader is bad.
  2. Bob Nightengale wanted to paint a picture here. I’ve never been in a clubhouse before a game (or at anytime) but if I pictured one it would be players hanging out, checking fan mail, reading, listening to music, and even sleeping. This doesn’t seem odd to me at all and yet it is painted as a negative. Miguel Cabrera and Magglio Ordonez were singled out for not watching a tape of Dan Haren (leaving the impression that Cabrera had done no preparation). Cabrera homered and Ordonez had 3 hits. I don’t know what the players do to prepare. Maybe they actually did nothing, but to assume they did is quite the leap.
  3. The MLBPA tried to ban Nightengale last year because Jason Giambi and Gary Sheffield claimed that Nightengale took quotes that were off the record and printed them, leading to potential punishment from the commissioner. But then Sheffield talked to Nightengale for this article so I don’t know what to make of it. Nightengale also reported that Magglio Ordonez wanted to be traded in 2005.
  4. It isn’t surprising that this story came from a national writer. In one respect you should take pause because he’s getting a snapshot of the team. In one respect you should give it more credence because he doesn’t have the same pressures as a beat writer having to go in there everyday.
  5. Jason Grilli shouldn’t be talking. He complained of cliques. Of course there are going to be cliques on a team. Most likely they break down along positional and racial lines. In the Tigers case many of those lines are related. Look at the infield – all from Latin America. Four-fifths of the starting rotation is white. I also thought it was interesting that Grilli singled out Sean Casey and Brandon Inge as the type of player they needed. Perhaps other guys from his clique?
  6. Read this article. (It’s different than the other one)

Look. I know stuff is broken with this team. They are playing like crap and way below their abilities. I don’t know why. But I know there is a more that I don’t know. I don’t know what these guys do on a daily basis to prepare. I don’t know how much they care and I know I can’t tell by looking at them what is going on in their heads. I don’t know if they are lazy because of their contracts or if the only thing they care about is winning. I don’t know if they like each other or if they hate each other. I don’t know if they’ve tuned their manager out, or if they are trying too hard, or not trying hard enough. And frankly I don’t care. I just want to see them play some decent baseball damn-it.

2008 Season, Minors

Tigers Minor League Wrap 5-19-08

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Columbus 3 Toledo 4
Clete Thomas doubled, homered, and walked. Brent Clevlen and Erick Almonte each had a pair of hits. Jeremy Johnson allowed 2 runs on 6 hits and 2 walk in 4.1 innings. Yorman Bazardo allowed 1 run on a walk and and a hit in 2.2 innings.

Bowie 8 Erie 4
Wilkin Ramirez and Justin Justice each had 2 hits. Ryan Roberson homered. Luis Marte couldn’t find the strike zone with 6 walks leading to 4 runs in 4.1 innings.

Palm Beach 13 Lakeland 2
Brennan Boesch was 1 for 4 with a 2 run homer. Cale Iorg was 2 for 5. Matt O’Brien didn’t make it out of the 4th inning before allowing 6 runs, only 3 of which were earned, on 8 hits, no walks and 4 K’s. Zach Simons blew up to the tune of 5 runs in .2 innings.

West Michigan 1 South Bend 4
Ronnie Bourquin knocked in the only run and had one of only four hits for the Caps. Brandon Hamilton allowed 3 runs on 3 walks, no strikeouts, and hits. Andrew Hess did a nice job in relief allowing 1 run in 4 innings.

2008 Season, Pitching, Roster Management

The Galarraga rotation debate

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Let’s do an old Rob Neyer construct, Player A versus Player B:

Pitcher A:
Record: 3-1
GS: 6
IP: 40
ERA: 2.48
K/BB: 23/12
HR: 2
OPS against: .618

Pitcher B:
Record 3-1
GS: 6
IP: 35.1
ERA: 3.06
K/BB: 24/14
HR: 3
OPS against: .571

Pitcher B is Armando Galarraga in his first 6 starts this season. An impressive display for a team that needed some quality starting pitching. Pitcher A is Nate Robertson in his first 6 starts last season. Now why would I bring this up? Because even an average-ish starter can string 6 nice starts together. Galarraga has decent minor league numbers, but far from overpowering numbers and stuff. This was a player for whom the best offer the Rangers could get is a player the Tigers signed out of a try out camp – and he had an option left.

Dontrelle Willis has at most one more rehab start in the minors and it’s no coincidence that his rehab starts have coincided with Galarraga’s big league starts. Willis will replace Galarraga in the rotation and it is the right decision.

Yes, you can argue that Galarraga hasn’t done anything to warrant losing his spot and I can’t say you’re wrong. He also did little to get the spot in the first place other than have Willis slip. And with one start and 2 batters I think it’s a little early to say that Willis pitched himself out of the rotation. Yes I’d like to see more control and better results during his time with Toledo, but the Tigers need to see if Willis can be successful and right or wrong his contract dictates that he isn’t going to get Wally Pipp’d.

As for removing another Tigers starter from the rotation, it ain’t going to be Justin Verlander who if he doesn’t return to form would render this discussion moot. And Jeremy Bonderman has managed to post a decent ERA despite awful peripherals. Nate Robertson is the starter with the best walk rate and an acceptable strike out rate. Not to mention that 2 of the aforementioned 3 have new multi-year deals.

That leaves one starter who Galarraga could reasonably supplant and that is Kenny Rogers. Rogers has walked more than he’s fanned and has generally been hit hard as he’s struggled to find the corners. Rogers is also on a one year deal meaning the longer term ramifications are lessened – aside from that whole “he’s like another pitching coach” business. And the Tigers aren’t going to dump Rogers this soon in the season.

Galarraga has been a pleasant surprise, but he’s also been a little lucky. His .180 batting average on balls in play is hardly sustainable even with a good defense. So his ERA is going to climb. I’m appreciative of what he’s done and it sucks that he’ll lose his spot. But the Tigers won’t bail on Kenny Rogers this soon. And while Jim Leyland would like to send Galarraga to the bullpen I think it is a pretty short sighted move. If Rogers continues to struggle, or in the event a starter goes down with injury (anyone notice Nate grab his back after one of his swings?), it would be nice to have someone to entrust a handful of starts to.