Well, the World Series has yet again not gone my way. You’d think I’d be used to it by now. At any rate, all that’s left for the Total Amateur Analysis until next April is to occasionally chime in on any relevant offseason moves. First thoughts: I don’t want any of our “big guns” to be traded, especially Magglio, but if they MUST trade somebody, I’m a little surprised no one’s brought up Carlos Guillen’s name. He’s only signed through the end of 2010, he’s a decent run producer, and his ability to play multiple positions (first base, third base, left field, and possibly shortstop) would make him attractive to far more teams than Magglio (who can pretty much only play right field). Also, it doesn’t make much sense to trade Magglio for another team’s young catcher or shortstop when the front office has made clear that they think very highly of Dusty Ryan and Cale Iorg, both of whom could be starters in the next couple years. As far as free agents go, apparently Scott Boras has been trying to push Jason Varitek on the Tigers. I do NOT want Varitek. I know he’s got the reputation of being good with pitchers, but he’ll be 37 years old, he had a horrible year offensively and he can’t throw. I also don’t want Eric Gagne, Joe Borowski, or Chad Cordero (though Cordero’s problem is that he just can’t seem to stay healthy). I know the Marlins are willing to listen to deals for Kevin Gregg, and he’s a pretty hard thrower, but he can get himself into trouble with walks and he actually lost his closer’s job late in the season. Those are all the thoughts I have for now. In addition, the site will be reverting to the Phantom design in the new few days, so you’re all gonna have to bid farewell to the Pudge picture, cuz it’ll be gone for good, most likely. Also until April, most of the stuff I’ll post will primarily not be related to baseball.

In Other News: As usual, I’m stoked about Halloween. In terms of decorations and costumes, my mom usually will either go totally overboard or not do much at all. This seems to be one of the more “subdued” years (although she did carve a bunch of holes into a pumpkin and stick a bunch of mice made out of polymer clay into the holes to make it look like the pumpkin was infested with mice). I got a pretty good haul of Halloween candy purchases at both Kroger’s and Wal-Mart, although I’m now kinda wishing I hadn’t bought the bag of “Gummi Body Parts,” cuz they don’t look that appetizing. Meanwhile, tonight I am looking forward to handing out candy (You think 5-year olds like Gummi Body Parts?) and watching Garfield’s Halloween Adventure at some point (that’s kinda become a tradition of mine ever since I found a file of it online). I’ve also discovered the X-Entertainment website and its Halloween Countdown, although I’m still plowing through the archives and I haven’t read the current countdown at all. But that site is why I’ve gone on a yogurt binge. And it’s kids’ yogurt, too.

This World Series is still reminding me of 2006, and that’s not a good thing. The Rays need Carlos Peña and Evan Longoria to come through, and it’s just not happening, kinda like how Polanco went 0-for-17 two years ago. At least we still had the red-hot Sean Casey. The Rays don’t have anyone that’s hot. B.J. Upton and Carl Crawford are “mildly warm,” but no one else seems to have any mojo whatsoever. And things really aren’t going your way when you’re giving up home runs to the opposing pitcher, unless the opposing pitcher was someone like Micah Owings or Dontrelle Willis or one of those who can occasionally run into one. As far as the hitless 3-4 hitters go, it looks like Peña is closer to coming out of it than Longoria. Peña has taken quite a few walks and he’s seen a good number of pitches in his at-bats. Longoria’s just swinging at everything.

This series has also featured some of the worst umpiring I have ever seen. There has been at least one botched call in every game so far. Now, two of the botched calls have gone Philly’s way, and the other two have benefitted the Rays, so it is an equal opportunity botching, but it’s still an issue. By the way, while it is not the end of the world if the Phillies should win, they’re not a team I particularly care for. It’s not that I hate them with a passion, but there very few matchups where I would root for the Phillies rather than the opponent. Now, if they were playing the Indians or the Red Sox, then yes, I would be rooting for them. But it is what it is.

If the Phillies do win, there will be at least a little bit of taint to it cuz of the spot on Joe Blanton’s hat that Joe Maddon brought up last night. I don’t know what that spot is, but I definitely noticed it as well. And it’s not the first time I’ve noticed it. As a matter of fact, he had an identical spot on his cap just about every time he faced the Tigers back when he was with the A’s (and it was a lot easier to see, cuz the bill of the Oakland caps are yellow rather than Phillies red). I did some digging to prove my point. Here’s a screenshot of Blanton from a game he pitched against the Tigers on July 30^th of 2007, and as you can see, there is a very visible dark spot on his hat:

Here’s Blanton (and the spot) again, this time on August 31^st of 2007:

And for comparison purposes, here’s a picture of Blanton from last night (and no, I didn’t put the yellow arrow in there):

I’m not accusing Blanton of doing something illegal (and I’m waiting for them to bring up Kenny Rogers), since I don’t know much about this sort of thing, but if it’s just dirt from his hands, he’s remarkably consistent when it comes to where he touches his hat. But…since I’ve now demonstrated that it’s always there, I wonder why Joe Maddon never noticed it before.

My instincts continue to serve me well, although I wish they wouldn’t in this instance. I can’t stay long, but I will say this: Watching this World Series, I’m reminded a whole lot of 2006. And that’s not necessarily a good thing. The Rays aren’t hitting, they’re making a bunch of errors, and their pitchers just don’t look right. Sounds like the Tigers two years ago (although with the Rays, it’s the infielders making the errors and not the pitchers, for the most part).

Well, the NLCS certainly didn’t go my way, and now the ALCS is getting to be dicey as well. You know, with as much heat as the Tigers’ bullpen took this year, I can’t recall them ever giving up a seven-run lead. There were games where the Tigers were up by a large margin early on that they eventually lost, but in every instance I can think of, the other team did at least a little bit of the damage against the Tigers starter. It was never *just* the bullpen. At any rate, I DID say in my last post that I wasn’t gonna take anything for granted (unlike TBS, which was popping the champagne around the sixth inning or so) cuz I’ve seen Boston come back way too many times. Unfortunately, the Red Sox are once again media darlings (Which shouldn’t be that surprising when you consider that ratings-obsessed Fox executives would rather have the large-market Red Sox in the World Series), which is gonna drive me nuts. It’s really amazing how yesterday all the columnists and experts were writing stories about how “the Red Sox won’t do it this time” and now they’ve all done a complete 180 and suddenly every column is on how “they’re gonna do it again.” I was seemingly one of the few people NOT to question having Scott Kazmir start the game instead of James Shields. I thought it was actually a good plan, because the Rays had a little bit of a cushion and if something went wrong, you still had Shields pitching at home, where he’s much better anyways. It turns out that Kazmir wasn’t the problem. I’m also not going to question Joe Maddon’s decision to not bring in a lefty to face David Ortiz. I’m not that familiar with the ins and outs of the Tampa Bay pitching staff, but from what I gather, Grant Balfour is one of their big setup men. It’d be kinda like their equivalent of a Joel Zumaya or Fernando Rodney. Also, there were two out and David Ortiz was in the middle of a big slump. And the eighth and ninth innings just were a textbook demonstration of why you can’t walk people and why you can’t make errors. At any rate, I think Game 6 will be huge. James Shields is the Rays’ big game pitcher, moreso than Matt Garza. Also, there are still a lot of questions being asked about the health of Josh Beckett. One way or another, though, the Rays definitely do NOT want to have to face Jon Lester again.

With the Phillies in the World Series, I’ve been giving some thought to how they would match up against either of the two AL teams. A Phillies-Rays matchup would be a tough call. Overall, I think the Rays have better starting pitching, but the Phillies have a more structured back end of the bullpen, in that they have a definite closer and it’s someone who has not blown a save in over a year. And both offenses hit lots of home runs and steal a lot of bases (and while Tampa Bay’s offense was not that prolific during the regular season, it’s been hot recently). All in all, they seem to be pretty evenly matched. However, even though I’d be rooting for the Rays in this situation, my gut’s telling me that the Phillies would win. Now, if the Red Sox complete the comeback that all the writers and columnists expect them to make, it’s a different story. The momentum carrying them out of doing something like that would be so huge that they could very well sweep the Phillies (just like they did to the Cardinals in 2004 and the Rockies last year). Just so you know, in a potential Red Sox-Phillies matchup, I’d be rooting for the Phillies. Whoever wins the ALCS, my gut’s just plain telling me that the World Series just ain’t gonna go my way this year.

Not much postseason discussion today, except to say that the Dodgers are looking a little overmatched now that the Phillies have decided to just pitch around Manny Ramirez every time he’s up, and that the Rays are oh-so-close, but considering that Boston has already come back from both a 3-1 and a 3-0 deficit in recent years in the ALCS, I’m not gonna count them out (especially since Dice-K pitched well in Game 1, Josh Beckett has had more time to get healthy, and Jon Lester’s poor performance in Game 3 was likely a fluke). With that out of the way, onto the rest of the post…

Sunday night’s episode of The Amazing Race sucked cuz my (early) favorite team got eliminated through a combination of altitude sickness and getting hit with a time penalty for not reading a clue correctly. Perhaps the worst part is that there is a team that is beginning to develop a personal vendetta against another team, and when that happens, it gets old really quickly, but the cameras are gonna show you every minute of it cuz it’s “good television.” If Mark & Bill (my favorite team) had not gotten hit with the time penalty, they would’ve been just safe and one of the teams involved in the personal vendetta would’ve been eliminated. Unfortunately, the time penalty allowed them to sneak in ahead of Mark & Bill, so now I gotta deal with it for at least another week. Plus, I have to pick a “new” favorite team. I’m initially hedging toward the mother-son team, mostly cuz they haven’t done anything stupid yet (such as vendettas or rampant bickering).

For the past few years, I’ve remembered bits of a Halloween special I saw once when I was about six years old (actually, we may have taped it), but I could never figure out what it was. I knew there was a scene with a witch trying to make a boy turn some sort of gremlin-like creature into stone, and the boy ends up breaking the witch’s wand. I also remembered the witch hosting a game show between the boy and the gremlin. Well, after digging around on the Internet, I finally found someone else who remembers it (complete with a rather funny and sarcastic synopsis of it, I might add). Apparently, the witch was played by Rue McClanahan and the special only aired once and was never re-aired or put on video/DVD or anything. I’m not gonna go looking for it, but it’s nice to finally find out what that was.

Hey, there’s really no phrase that’s the baseball equivalent of “Monday morning quarterbacking” so I gotta stick to what I have (although I may have coined the phrase “armchair managing” last year). The little bit of football commentary is that, yes, UT somehow beat Michigan over the weekend, and the newspapers around here are going nuts. For my part, I don’t like Michigan and while I attend UT, I’m not really into their sports teams either, so I’m mostly just happy that Ohio State won. Anyways, I spent my weekend watching LCS games. It didn’t start off too well, as the Dodgers lost games 1 and 2 of the NLCS and the Rays lost game 1 of the ALCS, but now that both teams are kinda backed up against a wall, they have won the first of the “must-win” games. Game 1 of the NLCS was frustrating because Derek Lowe pitched really well for five innings then totally fell apart in the sixth. Game 2 was frustrating because the Dodgers could not get the opposing pitcher out, of all people, and his 3 RBIs kinda ended up being the difference. After a thorough discussion on the particulars of retaliation when one of your hitters gets brushed back or hit, Hiroki Kuroda finally did the honors for the Dodgers last night, so hopefully that’s the end of that (and Manny Ramirez needs to keep behaving himself, cuz the Dodgers need him), and the Dodgers won Game 3 last night, so we’ll see what happens tonight. So far this season and postseason, every time the Dodgers and Phillies meet up, the home team wins. If the Dodgers want to get to the World Series, they’re gonna have to win in Philadelphia at some point. The same thing goes for the Rays in the ALCS. They’ve gotta win one of these three games at Fenway, although most Rays fans seem to be conceding tonight’s game because A) the Rays tend not to do that well against left-handed pitching, B) Jon Lester has been very good for the Red Sox most of the year (The Tigers beat him early on in April, and I haven’t watched him much since, save for the ninth inning of his no-hitter, but when I saw him in the ALDS against the Angels, he seems like a totally different pitcher), and C) Matt Garza has struggled recently. If that’s the case, then they’re gonna have to figure out either Tim Wakefield or Dice-K (assuming he’s the Game 5 starter). Given the makeup of the two teams though, it’s kind of ironic that the Rays lost the pitching duel and won the slugfest. One thing’s for certain, though: Josh Beckett is not healthy. He is two much of a clutch pitcher to have had two bad outings in the postseason for this to be a mental thing.  

In Other News: Between the UT-Michigan thing and Barack Obama setting up his debate camp in the area, the media sure has descended upon Toledo.

Last time, we took a look back at all the things that went wrong this year. Today, I’ll give you my thoughts on moves the Tigers may make for 2009. I’m just presenting a few thoughts from an outsider’s point of view, and I’m certainly no Dave Dombrowski. Before we get into the nitty-gritty though, I want to make two key points about 2009:

1. Do not resign 2009 to being a rebuilding year.

I don’t know exactly when it happened and I don’t know why it happened, but at some point during the last few weeks of the season, a great deal of the media and other blog sites shifted their perception of the Tigers from being “a good team that had a bad year” to being “a bad team that needs to tear it all down and start over again.” There’s a whole slew of them that just want to trade away Magglio and be done with it. Now, I may be patient when it comes to the Tigers not making the postseason, but I can’t abide going into a season knowing it’s “rebuilding time.” I kinda sat through twelve straight years of that. I don’t want to do it again anytime soon. Actually, you could make the argument that I have more right than almost anyone to complain and resign myself to a rebuilding year, considering the fact that my favorite player got traded, my second favorite player had the worst year of his career, and my third favorite player is being used by half the media as trade bait. But I’m not gonna do that. Considering the fact that the Tigers still have a lot of good pieces, I think they should go into 2009 looking to contend. If, by mid-July, it’s not happening, then it would be reasonable at that juncture to consider selling a couple of those pieces off in order to build for 2010. That’s a more rational approach than just giving up right now.

2. Keep in mind that any goal of contending in 2009 rests on a multitude of assumptions.

Some of these assumptions are riskier than others, and usually it’s dangerous to assume anything (as 2008 so blatantly taught us), but in this case these are assumptions that must be made. You HAVE to assume Justin Verlander will bounce back. You HAVE to assume Armando Galarraga won’t have a sophomore slump (as much as it pains me to do so, I must point out that this is one of the riskier assumptions). You HAVE to assume Jeremy Bonderman and Joel Zumaya come back healthy and effective (the same goes for Freddy Garcia, if indeed the Tigers do sign him). You HAVE to assume that guys like Magglio and Cabrera continue to produce the way they have been and you HAVE to assume that Gary Sheffield and Brandon Inge will get their averages and production back up (another risky assumption, at least as far as Inge is concerned). Still, from where the Tigers stand right now, there’s really nothing to lose from making these assumptions, so they might as well go ahead and do it. Otherwise, what’s the point?

With those two caveats out of the way, let’s move forward with the specifics:

Manager/Coaching Staff

I know there’s been some fans going after Jim Leyland and/or Dave Dombrowski, but I’m not gonna do that yet. It’s a little unfair to turn on them after one bad year. I mean, look at the White Sox. They won the World Series in 2005, missed the playoffs in 2006, had a horrible season last year, and made it back to the postseason this year, and Ozzie Guillen’s been there for the whole thing. I’m willing do give them the chance to prove that 2008 was a fluke. If 2009 turns out bad, then it’ll be time for closer examination. Now obviously, you can’t have a year like this and not expect some sort of coaching change, and it looks as though Chuck Hernandez and Jeff Jones have taken one for the team. Still, it might not be all bad to see if someone else can bring in some new ideas. I can’t give much insight on the bullpen coach, but I’ve heard a few things about prospective pitching coaches. Some fans have entertained the thought of hiring Kenny Rogers as the pitching coach, but most news outlets have continuously brought up Leo Mazzone or Rick Petersen. On the other hand, apparently not extending Leyland’s contract might make it difficult to attract a good pitching coach.

Potential Trade Bait

I’ve already spoken against trading Magglio, but it does look as though the Tigers are gonna have to trade somebody away in order to get all the pieces they need. I know there’s a whole lot of people who want to get rid of Gary Sheffield, and I might be more open to that if not for the fact that having him hit his 500^th home run as a Tiger is a very attractive proposition, considering no Tiger has ever done it. If Sheffield doesn’t do it, we probably won’t get another chance until Miguel Cabrera gets there, and that’s several years away. I’m definitely no expert on the farm system, but I don’t think they have much at the Major League-ready or close to Major League-ready status in terms of pitching (I’ve heard there are some good arms on the way, but they’re still in the lower ranks of the minors). What the Tigers seem to have in excess are outfielders, especially with Guillen moving to left field. As much as I hate to say this, and as much as they won’t want to, they may be forced to part with someone like Matt Joyce, Jeff Larish, Marcus Thames, or Clete Thomas, unless there’s someone in the minor leagues that I don’t know about. Which is a distinct possibility…

Starting Rotation

Well, we already know that the only definite locks are Verlander and Galarraga, and presumably Bonderman once he’s healthy. There is the possibility that the Tigers could sign Freddy Garcia, and a smaller possibility that they might try to go after Derek Lowe. That leaves one (long-term) slot. Barring another signing, trade, or the emergence of someone in Spring Training, the most likely candidates for this last spot would seem to be Zach Miner, Nate Robertson, or Dontrelle Willis. Based on their performances this year, one would have to say that Miner is currently the favorite. However, I’m not real keen on having an entirely right-handed rotation. Ideally, you’d probably want to have three righties and two lefties or the other way around (plus, an additional problem that a five-righty rotation presents is an added vulnerability to stolen bases, unless your catcher can REALLY throw). Still, having five effective righties is way better than having three effective righties and two ineffective lefties. On that note, if neither Nate Robertson nor Dontrelle Willis steps up, Miner’s probably your man, if for nothing else than the fact that he seems to have a lot more command as a starter than as a reliever.

Bullpen

Obviously, finding a closer is the big priority. Frankie Rodriguez has already been ruled out, which is fine cuz teams like the Mets and Angels are likely to get into some sort of bidding war. Brian Fuentes’s name has been bandied around a lot, but the problem with him is that he’ll probably be the premier closer on the market once K-Rod finds a home, which may drive his price up. I believe Eric Gagne is also a free agent, but I’d be real nervous if the Tigers signed him cuz he’s struggled with the last two teams he’s been with. I’d be even more hesitant about Joe Borowski. I also heard someone mention Brendan Lyon. I wouldn’t mind maybe having him in a setup role, but he struggled down the stretch with the Diamondbacks and eventually lost his role as closer. As far as the rest of the bullpen is concerned, I would imagine Rodney and Zumaya would be back if they’re both healthy, although with Zumaya’s penchant for weird injuries and Rodney’s tendency to show up at Spring Training with shoulder tendinitis, I would still work on maybe acquiring a couple other setup guys just in case. I don’t think there’s a Tiger fan on the face of the earth who wants to see Kyle Farnsworth back, so let’s count him out. I’d be willing to stick with Bobby Seay as one of the lefties, but it’d be nice to get another southpaw to join him. Aquilino Lopez was decent enough in a long relief role, as long as the bases were empty (he was horrible at trying to strand inherited runners). I kinda gave my input on the others last time, so let’s move on.

Brandon Inge

I was all set to lobby once again for having Brandon return to third base, but it turns out I don’t need to, and this is a very good thing. Having him at any position other than third is nothing short of a tragic waste. And I think they learned this year just how valuable his defense is. I know there’s concern about his hitting, and it is a very valid concern. However, Brandon started the season off pretty hot (this was while Granderson was out and Inge was the centerfielder). He was hitting over .300 and he led the team in RBIs for the first ten games or so. Once he started catching more, though, his batting average tanked (and yet, he still managed about 50 RBIs, which isn’t bad considering he was hitting close to .200). Hopefully, now that they’ve gotten back out from behind the plate, his average’ll pick up again. I think .250 with power would be the ideal scenario for him, but he takes away so many hits that I’m willing to live with less than that.

Shortstop

It looks likely that Edgar Renteria won’t be back unless the Tigers absolutely can’t find anyone else (they may be doing Renteria a favor, though, cuz it seems Renteria just performs better in the National League). It’d be nice to find maybe a lefty or a switch-hitter, but I’d take a good right-handed bat over a so-so left-handed bat any day. They’re probably gonna focus on defense, which isn’t a bad thing to focus on. However, if it’s possible, it’d be kinda nice if they could find someone with speed. That way, they’d have another option besides Granderson in the base-stealing department. That said, I’m not well-versed in who may or may not be available. I’ve heard J.J. Hardy’s name mentioned but that’s pretty unlikely. David Eckstein and Omar Vizquel are getting too old (although Vizquel hasn’t lost much defensively). Julio Lugo has speed, but his defense is sub-par. Orlando Cabrera is also a possibility, but as thin as the free agent market is on shortstops, they may have to overpay to get him (same with Rafael Furcal, who carries the added disadvantage of being injury-prone). If all else fails, they might be able to get by with Ramon Santiago, but I don’t think they want to.

Catcher

Dusty Ryan has potential. He certainly showed that when he was catching almost every game down the stretch. However, it also became apparent that he has trouble blocking balls in the dirt, and, while this is a skill that can be learned (or so I’m told), he may not be ready to be the starting catcher just yet. The media would like the Tigers to find a left-handed hitting catcher, but I’m keeping the same philosophy that I had for the shortstop (plus, I don’t know why, but I just seem to prefer right-handed catchers).  They brought up Greg Zaun’s name early on, but Zaun is gonna be 38 years old, plus he didn’t have a good year offensively. The two names I keep hearing a lot recently are Gerald Laird and Miguel Montero. Laird might be a good option. He’s a veteran who throws very well and isn’t bad with the bat (plus, he’s one of the few catchers who can regularly bunt for a base hit), and at the same time he’s only 28, so age isn’t that much of a concern. The problem is that the Texas Rangers are gonna want pitching in return, which is something the Tigers don’t have a lot of to spare. I don’t know as much about Miguel Montero other than he was primarily the backup catcher last year and he bats from the left side. Also, he apparently did not have a single passed ball this year (Brandon Inge had 11 in roughly the same number of games), but he’s not as good a thrower as Laird. Still, Arizona is not as pitching-starved as Texas, so it might be easier for the Tigers to move a position player or two. Also, I don’t know what his status is, but another name that keeps popping into my head is Ramon Hernandez of the Baltimore Orioles. There’s probably a reason why no one’s mentioned him, though. Another possibility is Miguel Olivo (the youngest of the potential free-agent catchers, unless he decides to remain with Kansas City). He’s a good offensive catcher with power and good speed for his position (he’s not gonna steal many bases, but he can hit the occasional triple or score from first on a double). The downside is that he has had a problem with passed balls in his career, but his defense did improve this year.

And now, I suppose that since I kinda proclaimed that my instincts served me well this year, you’re probably waiting for me to back up that claim and tell you what my instincts say about next year. Well, the truth is, I’m not sure yet. It’s gonna depend on the offseason moves. I’ll probably have a better sense by the time Spring Training rolls around. Until then, all we can do is wait.

POSTSEASON THOUGHTS: Well, things looked like they were gonna go the Dodgers’ way last night, but then Cole Hammels settled in and Derek Lowe faltered a bit. Errors’ll kill you. The Cubs certainly demonstrated that. The Dodgers still have some good pitchers coming up, but I still reluctantly give the edge to Philadelphia. It’s harder to gauge the ALCS, because both Tampa and Boston play very well in their own ballparks (you would think that would give the edge to Tampa, but you never know). Still, this year is kinda remarkable in that, all things being equal, I have a 75% chance of getting a team to root for in the World Series. If it’s Dodgers-Red Sox or Phillies-Rays, I’m good. If it’s Dodgers-Rays, I’m even better, cuz I’ll be happy with either of those two winning. The only let down would be if it were Phillies-Red Sox, cuz I don’t particularly care for either of them, although I suppose I’d root for the Phillies cuz I really don’t like Boston. By the way, if you check out any message board for Rays fans, you’ll find out that I’m not the only one who thinks the Red Sox have become the “new” Evil Empire.

I wasn’t sure I’d do one of these, but once I got a taste of the anger, bitterness, and despair that is plaguing columnists and bloggers alike, I came to the conclusion that apparently I am the only Tigers fan on the face of the earth who has the ability to remain grounded and even-keeled about the whole thing (having limited emotional outbursts to the Pudge trade and a couple of frustrating Verlander starts where he was pitching well but not getting any run support). Therefore, I feel I owe it to you to present my thoughts. It’s not gonna be bright and cheery by any means, but I think I’ll do a far better job of avoiding descent into the doom and gloom. This review will be presented in two parts. Today, I’ll be looking at the season that has just ended (albeit in a different format than last year) and providing general thoughts and analysis as best I can. Part 2 will cover general thoughts regarding next year. So, here goes.

It’s been well established that I tend to view the baseball season as a movie anyways, so that seems as good a point as any to start. If 2007 was the sequel that, while not as good as the first movie (2006), still had its moments and provided its viewers with a good time, 2008 was that third movie that builds a lot of hype and excitement but ultimately that tentative feeling you couldn’t shake turns out to be a valid one and it seems as though either the studio did way too much meddling or the filmmakers never realized what made the first movie great in the first place. The Pirates of the Caribbean franchise is a really good example of this. Maybe the reason I’m able to stay fairly even-keeled is that I never fully bought into all the press and predictions and hype like everyone else did. My instincts actually served me quite well this season, starting right around the Cabrera trade. Perhaps you could sense my initial hesitation in the post I made right after the trade was announced. At the time I chalked it up to being stuck in the mindset that for the Tigers, winning is the exception and not the rule (12 losing seasons in a row will do that to you). But still, I paid attention to Spring Training for basically the first time ever, and I was actually starting to get frustrated because I just wasn’t seeing what everyone else was seeing, and I couldn’t figure out why. Maybe it was that Dontrelle Willis wasn’t throwing strikes, or Verlander was getting hit hard, or the offense wasn’t bombing the ball as much as the press said they would, but something just didn’t feel right (and apparently, Rod Allen also felt this way but kept it to himself). Since no one else was making much of it and since I didn’t have much of an understanding of how Spring Training games worked, I didn’t exactly want to come out on Xanga and say, “I’m not sure about all this,” especially not when I spent last season railing against the cynicism on other blogs. So you’re gonna have to take my word for it.

I don’t think there is one single reason for what happened. It was more a case of everything that could go wrong did go wrong, and when that happens, you normally don’t stand a chance. If it was just one or two things, they would probably have been okay, but probably no team would’ve been able to absorb the sheer number of things that went wrong for the Tigers. Still, everyone obviously is pointing to the pitching as the reason why the season went wrong. And that is valid, but that’s not good enough for me. I want to know why the pitching went wrong, especially from guys who used to be better. Now, the reasons are obvious as far as Kenny Rogers (age) and Todd Jones (age + injury) are concerned, and I can’t really vouch for guys I never really saw much before, like Gary Glover or Casey Fossum, but I remember the Tigers hitting them around pretty well last year, so I knew it was a risk having them and apparently it didn’t work (Ironically, Chad Durbin and Jason Grilli both finished their seasons with ERAs of 3 or lower, and I believe Tim Byrdak had a decent year as well). I never really warmed up to Freddy Dolsi, believing he got lucky more than anything else early on, and his lack of command finally caught up with him. In a rare but understandable instance of letting emotion dictate my observations, I was rather hostile towards Kyle Farnsworth before he even threw a single pitch for the Tigers, but he never really gave me any reason to change my viewpoint, so does it really matter where the hostility stems from? Rodney was perhaps a bit more wild than he’s been in the past, but he’s never had pinpoint control. Anyways, those are not the guys I want them to delve deeper into. The media is quick to point out that Justin Verlander lost 17 games, but (outside of the games where he didn’t get any run support), I want to know why. Is it a mechanical thing or a confidence thing or is he tipping his pitches or what? I want to ask the same questions for Dontrelle Willis’s inability to throw strikes, or Nate Robertson losing the feel for his slider and getting pounded or Bobby Seay not being able to get lefties out when he was so good at it last year. Now, the media did speculate a little bit about Verlander, at least early on, but they never really reached a consensus. It’s not good enough to say “they failed.” I want to know why they failed because that’s the first step in figuring out how to fix that (more on that particular philosophy next time). At the same time, though, that doesn’t really tell the whole story. You might say that this season was a tale of three parts. The first part featured decent enough pitching but not a lot of offense. The second part (from about mid-June until, say, July 30^th) had pretty much everything working well on most nights. The third part (trading deadline right up until the end) featured a decent enough offense but the pitching had a meltdown.

There is some speculation, although not as much as last year, that injuries played their fair share in the blame department. That may be true to some extent, but I don’t think they were as costly as they were last year (i.e. Zumaya, Rodney, and Sheffield). Now, it’s possible that having Granderson on the DL to start the year may have gotten into guys’ heads a little bit, plus the fact that he struggled offensively for a while once he came back. With that in mind, it’d be interesting to see what would’ve happened if the Spring Training game in which he was injured was called for rain just five minutes earlier (although it would suck to find out your entire season got screwed in the span of five minutes in Spring Training). Although I’m skeptical that it caused a direct effect, it didn’t help that Edgar Renteria (who batted leadoff most of the time early on) started slow, plus the two and three hitters (Polanco and Sheffield) struggled terribly early on due to injuries (Polanco eventually got  back on track, and it is somewhat reassuring that Sheffield was swinging the bat better in the second half). I’m not sure the injury to Dontrelle Willis had much of a direct impact (other than perhaps putting additional pressure on the other four starters, particularly Verlander), as it was his control problems that was the bigger issue. What it did do, though, is set the stage for Armando Galarraga, and I think we can all agree that his emergence was a very good thing. I’m also not sure about amount of impact that Jeremy Bonderman’s injury had, either, as Zach Miner kinda flourished once he was put in the starting rotation. The offense had its fair share of injuries, too. I mean, all you have to do is look at the original projected Opening Day lineup (i.e. before Granderson got hurt). If you take left field out of consideration (since it was kind of a revolving door throughout the whole season), of the other 8 guys, the only one who was not hampered at any point by some sort of injury (at least, up until he was traded) was Pudge (And yet, for some reason he drew the most questions about durability). Hell, you can even throw Brandon Inge in there if you wanted to, cuz he had that oblique strain. However, there was rarely more than one guy out at a time, so presumably there should’ve been enough firepower to absorb the loss. But…for three whole seasons now, this team has shown that the offense is a little bit TOO symbiotic. When one guy goes down with an injury, the rest of the offense seems to shut down (Polanco in ’06, Sheffield in ’07, etc). I think the one area where injuries played a really big part was the bullpen. Zumaya and Rodney are kind of a no-brainer, as that ended up being the same issue as last year. Todd Jones’s injury is pretty much what started the whole bullpen spiraling out of control. This is one thing I actually foretold right here on Xanga. I think it was sometime in May or June, and I don’t remember the exact post (and I’m not gonna go looking, although you are certainly welcome to), but I specifically stated, “If something happens to Todd Jones, this team’ll be pretty much screwed cuz they don’t have anyone else who can close.” Well, both things happened.

Now obviously you don’t want to blame the season on bad luck, nor should you, but generally, it seems that when a team has as many offseason dealings as the Tigers did, it’s pretty rare for that many deals to go wrong unless you’ve got a really bad GM (and I don’t think Dave Dombrowski fits that description, plus I believe the Cabrera-Willis deal and possibly the Renteria deal had some heavy influence from Mike Ilitch). I don’t think anyone in either the business or the media should’ve been expected to believe that of all the deals, the only ones that were successful would be Miguel Cabrera and Armando Galarraga (Hell, did anyone even make note of the Galarraga deal when it first happened?). As Dave Dombrowski already explained a few days ago, when they got Renteria, they knew about his limited range, but at the time this trade happened, Miguel Cabrera wasn’t even a gleam in the front office’s eye and everyone figured Brandon Inge would be the third baseman for the next million years or whatever, so it’s easy to make the assumption that Inge could make up for Renteria’s lack of range, because it is relatively justifiable. However, things didn’t turn out that way, and while Guillen made for being a decent third baseman, it’s obviously not the same as having Brandon Inge stationed there and the Tigers paid for it by having the opposing team hit a lot of ground ball singles to the left side. And on the pitching end of things, with the exception of Galarraga, it seemed that it no matter who they brought in, it just didn’t work. I get the feeling they could’ve brought in a Cy Young candidate and their numbers would still tank. I’ve already touched on Casey Fossum, Gary Glover, Freddy Dolsi, and Kyle Farnsworth. I don’t have a lot to say about Denny Bautista, cuz for a while it looked like he’d be able to hold the fort down until Rodney and Zumaya came back, then he struggled with his control a little bit, then he got injured, then he came back very briefly, and then he got traded to Pittsburgh, after which I completely lost track of him and so I have no idea how he finished the season. I was kind of surprised that he was traded, to tell you the truth. I know he was struggling with his command somewhat near the end, but that was right before he got hurt, and with as hard as he throws, it’s not like the Tigers to give up on an arm like that so quickly (Remember, this is the team that stuck with Jason Grilli for, like, 3 years). And then there’s Francisco Cruceta. They were making kind of a big deal about him, like how they had to battle it out with several other teams (including the Yankees) to get him. Then he got stuck in the Dominican Republic until a month into the season. He didn’t last very long and eventually got sent down to Toledo and was never so much as mentioned again. Whatever happened to him?

I’m gonna wrap things up today with a few final thoughts on the Pudge trade. Although this obviously would not have been my preference, now that Dave Dombrowski has admitted this trade was a mistake, I would like to point out that at the very least, the Tigers could’ve used those extra draft picks. Also, I know how much he struggled with the Yankees (to the point where it looked as though he didn’t play at all during the final week of the season). I’m just about convinced that his slide would not have happened with the Tigers. It was too instantaneous for it to be totally blamed on age or position wear-and-tear. If he had, though, it would’ve been really painful to watch. Still, someone’s gonna be willing to take a flyer on him. Unfortunately, it won’t be Detroit.

That’s it for our look back at 2008. Stay tuned for Part 2, when we look ahead to 2009.

Thought I’d check in. Yes, the season review will be up shortly, but I’m still working on it. In the meantime, I have been watching as much of the ALDS and NLDS as I can (which is still not much). I’ve enjoyed watching Curtis Granderson in the TBS studio, although it is very obvious just how much more experienced Cal Ripken and Dennis Eckersley are at broadcasting. Curtis is smart, though, so he’ll get the hang of it, and he’s doing a real nice job considering the fact that he hasn’t done that much broadcast work (Although it is kinda weird to watch him ask questions and demonstrate Manny Ramirez’s home run). I haven’t been able to watch any of the Phillies-Brewers series, but it looks as though CC Sabathia continues to not pitch well in the postseason. I haven’t seen much of either ALDS series. I saw a little bit of the Tampa Bay-Chicago series yesterday, and even less of the Red Sox-Angels game the night before. I have seen quite a bit of the Dodgers-Cubs matchup, though. Now, of the 8 teams that are in the postseason, the World Series matchup I’d want to see most would probably be the Dodgers and the Rays (Dodgers cuz I like them, Rays cuz they’re the best story of all the AL teams). To that extent, things seem to be going my way so far, especially with the Dodgers having beaten the Cubs twice at Wrigley Field. Now, as far as the other matchups go, the prospect of a Dodgers-Brewers NLCS sounds more favorable than Dodgers-Phillies, but it looks as though that might not happen (Granted, the Dodgers have to win the NLDS first). On the AL side of things, I’m a little more torn. I don’t like the Red Sox, so I don’t exactly want to see them win, but at the same time, assuming the Rays beat the White Sox, if the Angels win their ALDS, the Rays would lose home-field advantage for the ALCS. It’s quite a dilemma.

UPDATE: I am quite literally the only person in this computer lab. It’s kinda creepy.