Game 99: Tigers at Royals

PREGAME: Don’t know if you heard, but the Tigers are 0-6 against the Royals this year. In those 6 games the Tigers have managed all of 11 runs. They been shut out twice. Tonight’s starter Luke Hochevar held the Tigers to 4 hits, 3 walks, and no runs in 6 innings when the teams met earlier this year. He was hammered in 2 of his last 3 starts but allowed just 1 run in a 7 inning outing his last time out.

For the Tigers Zach Miner returns to the rotation. He made one emergency start in 2007, but that’s it dating back to September 2006. You may remember that start as part of the series when the Tigers blew the division. Miner did his part by recording 1 out, amidst allowing 5 runs.

DET @ KCR, Monday, July 21, 2008 Game Preview – Baseball-Reference.com

Game Time 8:10

POSTGAME: Too late for a proper recap. Zach Miner was awesome. He wavered a little bit after a 3rd inning single to Gathright. He started floating pitches outside, but he recovered, got the GIDP, and didn’t let another runner touch second base.

And then the offense. The 3-4-5 trio of Guillen-Cabrera-Joyce came to the plate 18 times and only made 4 outs. That makes for good offense. So does the corpse that was known earlier tonight as Jimmy Gobble who was charged with 10 runs in one inning of work. Manager Trey Hillman will likely be charged with crimes against humanity.

The bullpen wasn’t good. Freddy Dolsi was rocked and Aquilino Lopez was also hit hard – but more of his balls found mitts.

Tigers baseball, just when you think it can’t get any worse, it gets a little better. The White Sox and Twins both lose and the Tigers are 5.5 out. Damn that Saturday game.

Tigers Minor League Wrap: 7-20-08

Toledo 8 Pawtucket 4
Brent Clevlen went 3 for 4 with a homer. Freddy Guzman walked 3 times and singled. Yorman Bazardo allowed 4 runs on 4 hits in 6.2 innings.

Erie 3 Akron 1
Ryan Roberson was 1 for 4 and that hit was a homer. Max De Leon also homered. Lucas French pitched 6 shut out innings. Casey Fien fanned 2 in his 1 inning save.

Lakeland 4 Vero Beach 5
Ryan Strieby homered yet again, his 20th of the season. He also doubled. Guillermo Moscoso fanned 7 and allowed 2 runs on 4 hits and 2 walks in 5.2 innings. Jay Sborz allowed 3 runs on 4 hits and didn’t record an out.

West Michigan 0 Burlington 6
Cory Middleton doubled, and that’s the offensive highlight. Jon Kiblerallowed just 1 run in 6 innings and his ERA is at 1.92. Wilton Garcia and Manny Miguelez combined to allow 5 runs in 2 innings.

Oneonta PPD

GCL Tigers DNP

Game 98: Tigers at Orioles

PREGAME: The Tigers look to salvage a split and stave off baseball irrelevance. The Orioles don’t win on Sundays. They have a 14 game losing streak on Sundays. And the Tigers have their ace on the mound. Maybe if the pitching staff can keep the O’s under 7 runs the Tigers have a chance.

Verlander is pitching on extended rest, which given his workload leading up to the break is probably a good thing. Of course he maybe rusty or overly amped up so that may back fire as well.

Brian Burres isn’t a particularly good pitcher. He doesn’t strikeout many and his walk rate isn’t great either. And he’s left handed. But offense hasn’t been the Tigers problem in this series.

Guillen is back with the team, arriving from the airport just before noon. But he isn’t playing. Instead the infield consists of Cabrera, Inge, Santiago, and Raburn.

DET @ BAL, Sunday, July 20, 2008 Game Preview – Baseball-Reference.com

Game Time 1:35

POSTGAME: Justin Verlander is my hero. He finally managed to shut down the vaunted Orioles offense, pitching a 3 hitter and recording 26 of the 27 requisite outs. And he did it efficiently too. Not a lot of strike outs, but a lot of weak grounders and pop-ups. He preserved the pen on a day when basically nobody was available and/or trusted.

The offense did enough, extending innings with 2 out hits, and getting some power from Marcus Thames and Magglio Ordonez.

The Tigers leave Baltimore achieving the bare minimum. On to KC.

  • On the decision to take Verlander out with one out to go. Yeah, it kinda sucks. And Verlander had pitched well. But how important is the complete game in the scheme of things? It was a 100 degrees and Verlander had lost a couple MPH off his fastball. Eight of the ten pitches he had thrown in the inning missed the strike zone, and pretty badly. Say he leaves him in and he walks another batter, or worse yet gives up a hit, or grooves one when falling behind in the count. Then you’re bringing in Jones to a very high leverage situation.
  • And Jones typically makes a situation high leverage without any help. A walk was followed by a phenomenal play by Inge. It probably would have been a web gem, but no Baseball Tonight because it is important to show the ESPYs.
  • The 3-4-5-6 hitters combined for 2 homers, 2 singles, a double, and 5 walks. That’s some nice production on a day when the top two hitters didn’t get on base.
  • Finally, let’s talk about Brian Runge. Runge is the ump who blew the 10th inning call on Saturday night. His handiwork at homeplate complete, he went over for a stress free day at third base. But given the opportunity to deny the Tigers a run, he jumped all over it. Marcus Thames hooked a deep fly ball down the left field foul pole. Thames kept rounding the base while Runge called it foul. Fortunately he was promptly overruled by home plate ump Greg Gibson. Runge is approaching Angel Hernandez in my book.

Tigers Minor League Wrap 7-19-08: a no-no for Porcello

Toledo 13 Pawtucket 5
Clete Thomas went 3 for 3 with a walk, a homer and 5 RBI. Erick Almonte doubled and homered. Derek Wathan had 3 hits. Chris Lambert struck out 8 and allowed 4 runs in 6 innings. Clay Rapada allowed a couple hits and a homer in 1 inning.

Erie 2 Akron 7
Erie faced Fautso Carmona and they managed 14 hits but hit into 4 double plays. Wil Rhymes, Deik Scram, Jeff Frazier, Max De Leon, and Jeff Kunkel all had multi-hit games. Danny Christensen was knocked around for 5 runs in 4 innings.

Lakeland 4 St. Lucie 1
No hitter for Porcello, and some. Okay, it was a 7 inning game due to the doubleheader, and it took 3 pitchers to do it. But it’s still a no-no. But the pitchers that joined in with Rick Porcello were 08 draftees Rob Weinhardt and Cody Satterwhite making it pretty impressive. Ryan Strieby tripled, homered, and walked. James Skelton added 2 hits and a walk.

St. Lucie 9 Lakeland 1
Ryan Strieby had the lone hit, a homer. Matt O’Brien allowed 10 hits and 8 runs came across to score. Ramon Garcia pitched 2 shut out innings allowing 2 hits and fanning 2.

West Michigan 10 Burlington 4
Brandon Douglas went 3 for 4 with a walk. Alex Avila and Joe Tucker each had 3 hits as well. Alfredo Figaro struck out 5 and walked none in 5.1 innings allowing 2 runs.

Oneonta ppd

GCL Indians 2 GCL Tigers 3
Alden Carrithers was 1 for 2 with 2 walks. Darlin Duran allowed just 1 run on 2 hits in 5 innings.

Game 97: Tigers at Orioles

PREGAME: It will be Nate Robertson and Daniel Cabrera. Cabrera isn’t on pace to walk over 100 batters for the first time in history. But he’s still walking 4 batters per nine innings. Cabrera typically posted above average K’s numbers in his career, but now he’s only fanning 5 per nine innings.

DET @ BAL, Saturday, July 19, 2008 Game Preview – Baseball-Reference.com

Game Time 7:05

POSTGAME: Worst loss of the year. Blown lead. Blown comeback. Blown call. Blown season.

Game 96: Tigers at Orioles

PREGAME: The Tigers and Armando Galarraga take on the Orioles and Jeremy Guthrie. Guthrie has a 3.49 ERA this year. None of his peripherals are exceptional, but he does 2.6 walks per 9. Lefties have a 90 point OPS advantage, but even then they’re only hitting 255/312/405 against Guthrie. He’s most hittable in the first inning so hopefully the Tigers can make some early noise.

Galarraga has pitched okay of late, but has had efficiency issues. He hasn’t recorded an out beyond the 6thinning since June 13th.

Guillen is still in Detroit and Renteria’s hamstring is still hurting. Renteria will play, and of course Guillen won’t. And Freddy Dolsi cut off all of Fernando Rodney’s hair. No word on how it will effect the tilt of his cap.

  1. Granderson, CF
  2. Polanco, 2B
  3. Joyce, LF
  4. Ordonez, RF
  5. Cabrera, 1B
  6. Thames, DH
  7. Rodriguez, C
  8. Renteria, SS
  9. Inge, 3B

DET @ BAL, Friday, July 18, 2008 Game Preview – Baseball-Reference.com

Game Time 7:05

Junkballing: Zach Miner, Tiger Stadium, and injured shortstops

Zach Miner starts again

The question of the 5th starter has been answered – for now. Zach Miner will take the spot formerly occupied by Eddie Bonine and before him Dontrelle Willis. Miner had some struggles with control out of the pen this year. But in two “stretch-out” starts for Toledo he has posted a 12:2 strike out to walk ratio in 8.1 innings. I’m in favor of giving Miner a shot, but I think there will be a pretty quick switch if he starts running every count full and walking people.

Is Tiger Stadium saved?

There have been deadline extenstions, and votes to keep some parts, and votes to knock the whole thing down. But now the Daily Fungo points to a news release on Carl Levin’s web site that there is $4 million earmarked for Corktown preservation and redevelopment. Presumably this is the money that the Old Tiger Stadium Conservancy is hoping to obtain to save a portion of the stadium.

Injured middle infielders littered throughout the system

When the Tigers traded away their stud centerfield prospects middle infield became the organizational position of strength. Instead it’s become the organizational position of DL stays and ibuprofen. Edgar Renteria is battling a hamstring injury that he reagravated tonight.

Cale Iorg, the Tigers big time bonus pick from last year just hit the DL for Lakeland. His keystone partner Scott Sizemore has missed a big chunk of the season with a broken bone in his hand. Danny Worth, another draft pick from last year who has been a defensive whiz for Erie is now missing time. And high ceiling shortstop Audy Ciriaco just went on the DL for West Michigan.

And while they are health now, both Ramon Santiago and Mike Hollimon missed time this season due to separated shoulders.

It must be something they are putting in the water at second base.

Tigers Minor League Wrap 7-17-08

Toledo 6 Pawtucket 15
Brent Clevlen homered twice and Derek Wathan hit a grand slam. But it was no match for the Big Papi led Pawtucket team. Virgil Vasquez was bludgeoned for 3 homers and 7 runs in 3.1 innings.

Erie 7 Akron 5
Deik Scram homered and added 2 singles. Casper Wells was 4 for 4 with a homer, 3 doubles, and a walk. Dusty Ryan also had 3 hits. Kody Kirkland homered and walked. Josh Rainwater allowed 5 runs on 12 hits in 4.2 innings.

Dontrelle Willis pitches for Lakeland - cr Roger DeWitt
Dontrelle Willis pitches for Lakeland - cr Roger DeWitt

St. Lucie 5 Lakeland 2
Dontrelle Willis started and went 3 innings allowing 1 run on 4 hits, 1 K, and NO WALKS. Ryan Strieby homered.

St. Lucie 3 Lakeland 5
Jeramy Laster homered and drove in two runs. Justin Justice tripled and walked. Jonah Nickerson fanned 5 in 5 innings and allowed 3 runs on 4 hits. Rob Weinhardt got a 1.1 inning save with 2 K’s.

West Michigan 7 Beloit 11

Brandon Douglas is enjoying his time in the Midwest League and he went 4 for 5 with a homer and 2 doubles. Phil Nardozzi allowed 7 runs and didn’t make it out of the 4th inning.

Brooklyn 4 Oneonta 5

Chris White went 3 for 4 with a double and 2 RBI. Brian Pounds tripled, singled, and walked. David Stokes allowed 4 runs on 8 hits in 4 innings.

GCL Blue Jays 2 GCL Tigers 4
Alexis Espinoza hit his first stateside homer and added a single. Alden Carrithers also went deep and walked. Brandon Hamilton fanned 7 and allowed 2 runs in 5.2 innings. Nick Cassavechia pitched 2.1 innings allowing only a walk while striking out 5.

Game 95: Tigers at Orioles

PREGAME: As the second half kicks off it will be Kenny Rogers taking on Garrett Olson. Olson has struggled in his last 2 starts surrendering 13 runs in 9 innings. He has a 5.65 ERA this year but is better at home.

Carlos Guillen is out of the lineup because he’s in Detroit. He’s with his wife who needed surgery due to complications from giving birth last week.

The Tigers send out the following lineup:

  1. Granderson, CF
  2. Polanco, 2B
  3. Thames, LF
  4. Ordonez, RF
  5. Cabrera, 1B
  6. Sheffield, DH
  7. Rodriguez, C
  8. Renteria, SS
  9. Inge, 3B

DET @ BAL, Thursday, July 17, 2008 Game Preview – Baseball-Reference.com

Game Time 7:05

Whipping boy powers activate
Whipping boy powers activate
POSTGAME: The second half gets off to a smashing start as everybody’s favorite whipping boys come up big. Gary Sheffield walked and went deep twice. True, one of them was taken away by Jay Payton. Edgar Renteria had two hits and a walk. One of the hits was even a double. And Brandon Inge even managed a two run, go ahead homer to go along with some nifty defense. And in typical Todd Jones fashion he made the ninth inning very interesting. But in his defense his defense didn’t help him at short and he needed 4 outs. Finally, Fernando Rodney even managed to retire the one batter he faced.

Kenny Rogers wasn’t good today. The Orioles battered him with line drives all over the place. His saving grace was some horrendous baserunning. The Tigers managed to turn a 5-4-2 double play and a 7-4 double play. To cap it off they managed a 3-2 put out.

And while there was much consternation about the Tigers-O’s game being the only AL game today, the good news is they picked up a half game on both teams they are chasing in the division and they gained on EVERY team they’re chasing in the Wild Card race.

Is there hope for Renteria?

Edgar Renteria has had a half season that everybody would probably like to forget. The.259 batting average looks great compared to the .301 OBP and .326 slugging percentage. Couple this with the fact that Jair Jurrjens is pitching well and the Tigers are a long shot for the playoffs at this point, and the trade that brought Renteria here looks awful. Given all that, is there any hope left for Renteria? There may be.

One thing going for Renteria is that he has a 22.4% line drive rate. That’s right in line with his career number of 22.8%. The Hardball Times has a measure called PrOPS which is a predicted value for OPS based on batted ball characteristics and other offensive measures. JC Bradbury recently posted the top 3 PrOPS leaders for the first half by position. Renteria actually ranks third among AL shortstops (it’s a really bad year) with a PrOPS of .751. Even if he achieved that number it’s not All Star caliber, but it would qualify as productive.

The difference between Renteria’s actual OPS and PrOPS is the 5th greatest negative difference meaning he’s probably hitting into some bad luck.

So there is hope that Renteria is better in the second half, but what is a reasonable expectation for his final line even if he gets some breaks and manages to maintain his line drive rate? THT put together a spreadsheet that combines Marcel projections with season to date performance to project a final line. Luckily for me, someone else has already run Renteria’s numbers.

His projection for the remainder of the season is 282/342/402 which would be a pretty dramatic improvement. But his horrendous start means that if he achieves that line over the balance of the season, that still leaves him with a .680 OPS when all is said and done.

In addition, despite the career level line drive rate, there are some other red flags (as if we needed more). His walk rate of 6.7% is his lowest since the 6.2% he posted in 2004 and significantly below his 8.2% career rate. The drop in walks is probably in part due to a tendency to chase more pitches. He’s swinging at 27.86% of pitches outside the strike zone. In past years his number has been closer to 20%.

Renteria should be better in the second half. He was pretty awful in the first half. He chased too many pitches, and it was probably compounded by some bad luck. It’s hard to imagine Renteria or the trade looking much worse in the second half. Of course a nice little surge by Edgar and the team that leaves them in the playoffs and everyone feels a little better.

Tigers Minor League Wrap 7-16-08

PCL 6 INT 2
The Tigers sent a few reps to the AAA All Star game with not so good results. Mike Hessman went 0 for 4. Brent Clevlen managed a single and a stole base. But Blaine Neal allowed all 6 runs in the 9th inning.

South 3 North 5
Ryan Roberson represented with a homered and added a second RBI. Dusty Ryan went 0 for 2 and Danny Christensen allowed a run in 2 innings.

Lakeland- PPD

West Michigan 2 Beloit 5 (in progress)
Brandon Douglas, making his Whitecap debut in place of the injured Audy Ciriaco, picked up 2 hits. Kody Kaiser homered. Thad Weber allowed 5 runs in 3.2 innings.

Brooklyn 1 Oneonta 4
Josh Workman went 2 for 4. Darwin De Leon allowed 1 run on 5 hits, 1 walk, and 2 K’s in 5 innings. Aaron Fuhrman pitched 3 shut out innings allowing 4 hits and fanning 3.

GCL Yankees 4 GCL Tigers 2
Luis Palacios homered and drove in 2. Jordan Lennerton went 2 for 3. And there was a Luis Marte sighting. He allowed 2 runs on 5 hits with no walks and 5 K’s in 5 innings.

GCL Tigers 3 GCL Yankees 1

Adam Frost homered. Chao Ting Tang singled and walked. Jordan Tata went 6 innings and he allowed 1 run on 5 hits and 3 walks. That’s some progress.