When the Tigers trotted off the chilly Comerica diamond with an easy 11-0 win to warm them, I doubt any of them realized they had done something no Tiger team had ever done, which is begin the season with two consecutive shutouts. In fact, the last time any American League team did the double-shutout start was when the 1977 Angels did so, behind Nolan Ryan and good old Frank Tanana (in the NL, the Nationals pulled it off last year). The Tigers have the chance to become only the 2nd team ever (1963 Cardinals) to start off the season blankety-blankety-blank.
It would be hard to pick a player of the game for yesterday: Gose came through as predicted (how about that?), with a single, double, and triple, one to each field; Alex Avila reached base every time he was up, and scored 4 runs; Iglesias was 4-for-4, raising his average to .857; and Kinsler brought home the bottom-of-the-order boys with 4 RBI. Oh, and Sanchez with that shutout thing, topped off by an efficient Nesbitt/Krol/Alburquerque/Soria bullpen outing.
Today’s player of the game is likely to be Weather Permitting, who is probably getting plenty of encouragement to be Permitting.
It’s not all good news in Tigerland. No sooner did Justin Verlander join Bruce Rondon in the pitchers’ DL club, than Joe Nathan crashed the club with an “elbow flexor strain,” after pitching to all of one batter in the opener. Hmm. Is that the same as that “dead arm” thing with which he kicked off last season? Soria will work as the closer in the meantime, which may explain the seemingly odd move by Brad Ausmus to bring Soria in for one hitter yesterday with an 11-run lead.
Today’s Undefeated Lineup:
- Anthony Gose, CF
- Ian Kinsler, 2B
- Miguel Cabrera, 1B
- Victor Martinez, DH
- JD Martinez, RF
- Yoenis Cespedes, LF
- Nick Castellanos, 3B
- Alex Avila, C
- Jose Iglesias, SS
Pitching: Shane Greene vs. Kyle Gibson
Since the Gose as Player of the Game thing worked out yesterday, I’ll go with Shane Greene today, as he leads the Tigers to their 3rd consecutive shutout in his Detroit debut. If not Greene, then Kinsler, who looks to follow up his big game yesterday against a pitcher who he is 6-for-14 against lifetime.
Anyone have any idea when/if the game will start?
They haven’t yet announced a first pitch time, which is usually a bad sign after this long, although the weather looks like it might clear up around 4pm EST.
First pitch is scheduled for 4:40 EST!!
I wish I knew how much of this is the Tiger pitching looking good, and how much of it is…the Twins.
It appears that today the Tigers are disciplined at the plate against Gibson and are also being granted bloops by the baseball gods.
I’m willing to entertain the idea that the Tigers have good hitting coaching now.
Yeah, D & J have been talking about Wally Joiner being able to work with Gose given his athletism.
Jose Iglesias…..MLB Player of the Week?
J.D. Martinez is an absolute beast.
Molitor not impressing with his calls in this game. First w/ a really dumb challenge to the call on a pitch out to 1st and then leaving in Kyle — where’s the strike zone? — Gibson when he clearly had no stuff. Wow. hope it continues.
Greene looks just like Porcello!!!
The usual free swinging Tigers are laying off a lot of pitches the past three days they normally hack at…hope this trend continues
Wow ….. What a start to the season! Are the Twinkies that bad ….. or are the Tigers really that good ….. and entertaining?
From being the absolutely slowest team of base to base two years ago in the MLB…this is quite a change….
For as much trouble as the Twinkies were to us last year..this 3-0 is sweet. I don’t care if the Twinks are good or bad, they play the Tigers tough. Therefore this was outstanding!
i agree… all wins are good, and all ‘division’ wins are even better.
pitchers usually have the upper hand in April, so it was great to see DET offense coupled with stellar DET pitching… but its way early.
something tells me CLE pitching won’t be as accommodating