If you’re new here and like what you see, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Need more info on what subscribing entails? Here’s a primer. Thanks for visiting!Jeremy Bonderman turned in another disappointing performance in his latest start against the Yankees. It seemed to follow a pattern than Bonderman [...]

Prior to Justin Verlander’s last start we discussed his dip in velocity and a change in arm angle is he was looking to make. Verlander had some improved results in his Tuesday night start against the Rangers. Looking at his pitch f/x data he averaged 93.9mph with his fastball and peaked around [...]

As has been widely documented at this point, Justin Verlander’s velocity is down significantly. Either it is a systematic change in measurement mechanisms, or it is a real dip. Given the remarkable disparity and the fact it doesn’t seem to be effecting other pitchers the same way, I’m inclined to believe it is [...]

Being at the game last night, I’m way behind on the injury updates. But let’s get caught up…
Rodney
It’s not quite official, but it’s looking like Fernando Rodney might be toast - at least for this season. He is headed to Alabama for a consult with Dr. James Andrews. Given his injury prone [...]

From time to time this year (as time permits), I’ll delve in to MLB.com’s pitch f/x data to analyze a starters outing. Tonight we look at Jeremy Bonderman’s start against the Kansas City Royals on April 3rd.
Pitch Mix
This season MLB.com started classifying pitches. This seems pretty convenient, but from what I’ve seen so [...]

Good thing there’s no game today, because there is a lot to link to!
Tigers have second highest payroll
The Tigers official Opening Day payroll is $138.7 million which places Detroit in 2nd place - far behind the Yankees. My unofficial total of $134 million, which didn’t include some of the players making near the league [...]

An article at the Wall Street Journal delved into Jeremy Bonderman’s first inning struggles. Former pitching coach Bob Cluck wondered whether or not Bonderman’s struggles are attributable to umpires needing an inning to adjust to the movement on Bonderman’s pitches.
The stats seem to support this theory. The last seven times Mr. Bonderman faced [...]

Given the rash of bad news with injuries, shellackings, and visa problems hitting the Tigers bullpen, today was a nice change.

Denny Bautista continued to pitch well. He went 2 scoreless innings with 4 K’s and is going to be hard to leave behind when the team heads North.
Jordan Tata, who wasn’t a strong candidate [...]

The Tigers are going the split squad route today with a home game against the Reds (Dontrelle Willis) and a road tilt against the Indians (Yorman Bazardo). For those with MLB.tv they’ll be able to catch the road game which is set to feature Rick Porcello.
Also of note today, Todd Jones is slated to [...]

What do you get when you take an unsettled bullpen, a closer who kinda makes people nervous on a good day, and two craptacular spring outings? A recipe for Todd Jones hysteria.
Today Todd Jones turned in his second awful outing of the spring in what turned out to be a 9-7 Tigers win. [...]

Jon Paul Morosi reports that the Tigers bullpen headaches have the team talking trade. Morosi notes that there have been “general discussions” with the Cubs. Chicago has become a favorite trading partner of Dombrowski with the two clubs completing five trades during DD’s tenure.
Morosi notes that the Cubs may be interested in a [...]

Jim Leyland has come out on several occasions and said that Jeremy Bonderman is one of the keys to any success the Tigers might enjoy in 2008. Bonderman’s second half swoon, which I attribute largely to his elbow pain that he finally fessed up to, clouded what was starting out to be a phenomenal season. An ERA of 8.50 over his last 9 starts, combined with the arm troubles meant that Bonderman finished with the highest ERA and lowest innings total since his rookie season. Like with Dontrelle Willis, we’ll delve into the pitch f/x data and see what we can find out about the veteran 25 year old pitcher.