That was…interesting, to say the least. I ended up seeing most of it at home, then I listened to it on the radio on the way to and from my doctor’s appointment, but on the way back, there was a huge storm so the reception was kinda spotty in places, but it seemed very bizarre to be listening to a baseball game at that time (I had the same reaction during Spring Training, when I would be watching a game and it would be snowing outside). I got home just in time to see the final pitch—literally. At any rate, I was surprised that the game was still on once my appointment was over. Nate Robertson flirted with danger the whole time, but he was able to make the big pitch when he needed to, and really, of the 11 hits, three were infield singles and one was a checked-swing roller into right field. I missed Rodney’s outing entirely, but it looks as though he pitched well. I also missed Todd Jones giving up the RBI single to Albert Pujols, but considering the fact that Pujols apparently owns Todd Jones, he’s probably lucky that it was only a single. I did hear Bobby Seay’s inning on the radio, though.

Well, between spotty radio reception and the doctor’s appointment itself, I missed just about every critical moment of this game. Clete Thomas was about to receive the 3-1 pitch prior to his first bases-loaded walk just as I got to the parking garage, and you know how radios don’t work in parking garages. By the time I got out of the appointment and out of the parking garage to a place where I actually had reception, Michael Hollimon was batting in the bottom of the ninth, so I had just missed Gary Sheffield hitting the game-tying home run, but once again, Sheffield’s swing looks healthy. But I was able to see the walk-off…walk, so to speak. Meanwhile, what’s up with Polanco getting ejected? That’s even more surprising to me than Marcus Thames. Polanco seems to me like one of the most mild-mannered players on the team, and definitely one of the LAST players I'd expect to be ejected. And I do know that he’d only been ejected once before in his career (and I only know that cuz I looked the stat up after playing MLB The Show and seeing Polanco get ejected in one of those games, and as you can’t control whether or not your player argues with the umpire in this particular video game, I wanted to see how realistic that was). By the way, throwing the bat and the helmet was probably not a smart move.

Well, Interleague Play comes to an end this weekend, and to close it all out, we’re taking on the Colorado Rockies. They were the NLCS champs last year and were on fire until being totally overmatched by the Red Sox in the World Series. They came out of the gate really struggling, but they had been playing better until they were swept by Kansas City. Tonight, Eddie Bonine takes on Ubaldo Jimenez. Jimenez throws very hard, and has had control problems in the past, but has been pitching very well as of late. Eddie Bonine pitched much better in his last start, but got a no-decision for his efforts. I’ll be at work tonight, so I’ll be joining in late. By the way, it’d be nice if the Tigers could win tonight. Their recent pattern has been to lose the first game of a series and win the next two, and that’s fine, but it’s a really stressful way to do it.

Well, I ended up seeing more of this game than I thought I would, but I still missed Galarraga’s entire outing. It’s kind of painful, cuz he needed 5 2/3 innings to get himself to the marker where he would “qualify” for league leader stats, and he fell one inning short. At any rate, Jim Price, the Tigers’ radio analyst and probably Galarraga’s #1 fan, summed up the outing as “you’re not always gonna have your best stuff.” Galarraga’s line would probably have been better had it not been for Rick Ankiel, who just seemed to have his number. Ankiel did most of the damage to him. The bullpen did all right, but Miner and Zumaya walked too many people. In Miner’s case, I understand why you’d want to pitch around Rick Ankiel, but if you walk him, you gotta finish the deal by getting the next guy, and Miner didn’t do that. Bobby Seay and Todd Jones held their own, though. Granted, Todd Jones was helped out by Guillen doing his best Brandon Inge impression. That was a nice play.

I guess the guys’ career numbers against Kyle Lohse did indeed trump Lohse’s recent pitching performances, cuz they hit him pretty well. They were probably sad that he got knocked out of the game by the rain delay. However, they didn’t appear to have much of a problem scoring against the Cardinals’ bullpen. I had pegged Guillen as the “most overdue” in the home run category, and he came through, plus he was a triple away from the cycle. Meanwhile, Gary Sheffield is giving every indication that he’s finally healthy. He also had four hits, including the big walk-off single.

I took a look back at the Marcus Thames ejection. Geez, that was quick. And I’ve never seen Thames act like that before. In fact, according to Retrosheet, he’d never even been ejected in his career prior to last night. Also, apparently during rain delays, fans at Comerica Park get “treated” to the Todd Jones Variety Show. His Magglio impression was rather creepy. But oddly funny, though not as funny as the fact that someone in the Tigers’ dugout had a video camera and was taping the whole thing. And hey, if you stuck around to watch it, you may have been lucky enough to be rewarded with a baseball or a bag of sunflower seeds. By the way, was I the only one thinking of that Yankees game last year? You know, the one where Guillen finally hit a walk-off home run at 3:30 in the morning? I still haven’t gotten over how strange that game was.

It’s a quick turnaround, as it’s a day game today (You know, another weird thing is that the Tigers won the middle game of last year’s series against the Cardinals by a score of 8-7 as well). Nate Robertson was pitching very well until his last start, although he got the win in that game. He wasn’t particularly effective last year against the Cardinals, but he won that game as well (then again, even though the Tigers swept the Cards last year, no one really had an easy time of it except Andrew Miller). The Cardinals, meanwhile, aren’t sure who they’re starting. They want to start Todd Wellemeyer, whom the Tigers are familiar with from his days in Kansas City. However, Wellemeyer has pitched a lot better as a member of the Cardinals. Meanwhile, look for Dane Sardinha to start behind the plate. Leyland said as much before the game yesterday, but I would expect it to happen anyways just because last night’s game didn’t end until after 1:00 AM. I’ve actually seen Dane Sardinha in person before (that one Mud Hens game I’ve been to). From what I’ve read, he’s a good defender, a decent thrower, and he works well with pitchers, but he’s not gonna bring a whole lot offensively, though he’s got the ability to run into one from time to time. At any rate, I’ve got a generally favorable impression of him. Maybe cuz he’s from Hawaii. I’ll likely miss the end of this game as I have a doctor’s appointment, but I’ll do my best.

Well, with a pitcher like Kenny Rogers, sometimes things like that will happen. They had an interview with Pudge during the postgame show and usually when they interview him after a loss (which is not very often) and they ask him about how his pitcher was throwing, he generally tends to give the hitters a little too much credit, but this time I think he was right. Kenny maybe didn’t have his best stuff, but he also wasn’t getting the low strike that he needs. The Cards realized this, laid off that pitch, made him work and get the ball up in the zone, and balls that weren’t necessarily hit hard found holes or fell in. The same thing happened to Freddy Dolsi and Casey Fossum to some extent. There were a lot of broken bat singles in that span. Fernando Rodney was still pretty wild, but he did set down the Cardinals in order.

The ironic thing about this game is that the Tigers probably hit the ball harder than the Cards, but such is life sometimes. Hey, they had three home runs. You’d think that would normally indicate success. Cabrera’s barely got out, but it was to the opposite field. Pudge hit his a LONG way. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him hit one that far. Normally his go into the Tigers’ bullpen, not the visiting bullpen. That was his only hit on the night, but he could’ve easily had two if not for some good defense from Adam Kennedy to end the game. And it was good for Sheffield to homer in his first game back (I don’t know about you, but I’m glad to be back to having the DH). What I don’t get is the fact that everyone’s making such a big deal that it’s his first home run since late May. If I recall correctly, he hit that home run about three days before he went on the DL. It’s not like he’s been in a homer drought since then.

Now for a couple Fashion Police points: First off, you already know what I think about Cabrera and the high socks, especially socks with logos on them. But I thought I had his pattern figured out. Now he’s messing it up for me. Still, he’s got some really nice-looking shoes and those are his saving grace. Speaking of socks, I have decided that the Cardinals have the ugliest socks in all of baseball. I kept getting dizzy from looking at those stripes. They’re just about as distracting as the Gaping Void of Darkness black socks that are sported by the Orioles and Astros. Finally, during his postgame interview, Pudge was wearing one of the weirdest shirts I have ever seen. I swear there were sequins on it.

Well, everyone’s hoping the Tigers stick to the pattern they had on the road trip: Lose the first game, win the next two. The Cards will start Kyle Lohse, aka The Free Agent Pitcher That No One Wanted But Now Every GM Is Kicking Himself Over. Most every Tiger has seen him before, and they all have very good numbers against him, but he’s been pitching so well this year, that might not matter. On the other hand, there are a few quiet whispers about an All-Star appearance for Armando Galarraga. However, I feel I must raise a red flag over this. Without Albert Pujols, the Cardinals seem to be playing in a style very similar to the Minnesota Twins. And the Twins are the only team that has beaten Galarraga. Something to keep in mind. Also, apparently yesterday (and I somehow missed this) Leyland said he wasn’t going to be as strict about the catching platoon, but that Brandon Inge was going to catch this game. Well, all that can be put on the shelf now, cuz Brandon’s oblique has finally landed him on the DL. I kinda saw that one coming. That’s unfortunate, cuz as much as I wanted Pudge to have more playing time, that’s NOT how I wanted it to happen. At any rate, Dane Sardinha has been called up from Toledo to fill the backup catcher duties.

Hey, I figured I oughta tie in that whole Star Wars thing I did a couple weeks ago. At any rate, it was a well-pitched game from Justin Verlander. He did walk too many (granted, two of them were intentional), but it didn’t come back to haunt him, except the walk to the pitcher (Apparently, he hadn’t learned his lesson). The 10 strikeouts were cool, but I’m not one of those people demanding that Justin rack up strikeouts, mostly because strikeouts can get one’s pitch count up in a hurry. And that’s exactly what happened in this game. I’d prefer him to stick around longer, even if that meant fewer strikeouts, but it is what it is. I am puzzled by one thing, though. Verlander spent the majority of the afternoon throwing the fastball right by everyone, but once Zumaya, who throws even harder than Verlander, came in, the Padres were nearly all over his fastball. And as for Todd Jones…well, the ball to the knee reiterates something I said a month or two ago: As much as Tigers fans like to complain about him, if the Tigers were to lose Todd Jones for an extended period of time, they’d be pretty much screwed, cuz they don’t really have anyone else who can close.

The Tiger hitters were a little more stumped by Randy Wolf than I thought they’d be, but Magglio chose a good time to break out of it. And am I just making the whole thing up about the back spasms? I know I heard that somewhere, but I haven’t seen it anywhere else. Meanwhile, Pudge FINALLY got himself a legit home run (which means that both guys on the team who were “given” home runs by opposing outfielders this season homered in this game), and that leads me to believe that the 0 for 2 he had on Friday had more to do with Greg Maddux than fatigue, as he had the same amount of rest before Friday’s game that he did before Sunday’s game. However, despite all the whining and griping I’ve been doing over this platoon situation, I do believe that the extra rest accounts for most, but not all, of his recent offensive upswing. I’d dearly for him to prove me wrong on that, but I’m not sure how that’s gonna happen, unless Brandon Inge injures himself again. And I do think motivation plays a bigger role than a lot of guys think it does. I mean, his numbers started going up immediately after the platoon was announced. Immediately. If it was just a matter of fatigue, I would think it’d happen a lot more gradually. Still, if you want an emotion to pin on it, I kinda feel like the kid who knows he’s been getting away with something he shouldn’t and all of a sudden finds out he’s not gonna get away with it anymore. Meanwhile, Marcus Thames did NOT homer, which all of a sudden seems weird. It’s like realizing that Curtis Granderson only has two triples this year and his stolen base percentage isn’t very good (granted, they’ve been pitching out on him a lot more this year). There’s just something wrong about that.

So now we’ve reached the point where we’re oh-so-close, but we’ve been there before, only to slip back (and unfortunately, as good as the Tigers have been against the NL this year, the rest of the AL Central has been equally as good, for the most part). Now it’s time to take on a much-improved Cardinals team, albeit one currently lacking the services of Albert Pujols. They got swept by KC, then took two out of three from Boston. At Fenway. And they made the third game an extra-inning affair. Go figure. According to their broadcasters, the Cardinals’ MO this season seems to be that they lose the first game in the series, only to come back and win the next two. Now, that hasn’t been the case in their last two series, but it’s something to keep an eye on. Tonight, Braden Looper starts for the Cards, and he’s been pitching exceptionally well. So I’ve read. Kenny Rogers will face St. Louis for the first time since the World Series, where he was spectacular. It’s the only game the Tigers won in the World Series. It’s also gonna be the 1968 World Series tribute game tonight, although I have no clue what all that entails.

Well, it wasn’t the prettiest game in the world, but we got a win out of it and that’s what counts. I mean, hopefully Nate Robertson hasn’t gotten back into the “big inning” pattern that he was in at the beginning of the year. Granted, two of the runs should never have happened. Walking the pitcher is a BIG no-no (and it’s one that he’s now done twice), but Jody Gerut’s ground ball that should have been a routine out was what set up the two-run double. Still, Nate did go six innings. The bullpen got a little help from Magglio, but other than that, they held their own.

I had forgotten that the only time the Tigers faced Cha Seung Baek last year, he was opposing Nate Robertson. At any rate, the first Tigers rally of the night (when they went up 4-3) came because they got a lot of help from San Diego. First the two-base error which allowed Granderson to get to third and set up the Polanco sac fly, and then the Magglio home run which only became a home run cuz it bounced off Jody Gerut’s glove and over the fence. That’s the second time that’s happened to the Tigers this season (the first accounts for the only home run Pudge has hit all year). As for the rally in the seventh inning, well, just about everyone was questioning Leyland’s decision to pinch-hit Marcus Thames for Granderson (the FSN guys, the guys on the radio, even the San Diego broadcasters). I wasn’t exactly questioning it, but I was concerned that taking Granderson’s glove out would come back to haunt them, but it turned out rather nicely. By the way, Marcus’s home run ball was caught by one of the San Diego relievers in their bullpen, which was kinda funny. Meanwhile, Polanco’s hitting streak was snapped, and Brandon Inge continues to take HUGE swings. I would think that’s the LAST thing you’d want to do when you’re dealing with an oblique problem. Still, I give him a lot of props for laying down the sac bunt after Clete Thomas had doubled, which made Jeff Larish’s job a lot easier, and hey, Larish came through.

Well, today wraps up our tour of National League parks for the year. Justin Verlander will take on Randy Wolf, and you know all about Verlander despite his numbers. Randy Wolf is left-handed, but he was pitching well up until his last start, which was against the Yankees.

Ack. As it turns out, I gave up on this game one inning sooner than I should’ve. Once Khalil Greene hit the home run, I turned off the TV and went to bed. I normally wouldn’t do this, but I had to be up REALLY early today (Anyone who is fully dressed and picking up their prescriptions at eight in the morning is out of their mind). The television in my bedroom does not have cable, so I turned on the radio and tried to fall asleep to that, but I didn’t fall asleep until after the game was over (specifically, I dozed off during the postgame show, woke up again just as it was ending, switched over to the Marlins game on MLB.tv, and fell asleep for good sometime before they lost in extra innings…and by the way, the Tigers could tell the Marlins a thing or two about walk-off losses in Oakland). At any rate, Eddie Bonine pitched rather well (He also absolutely drowns in his jersey). He gave up the two home runs, but he had a quality start. Oddly enough, the problem came in the eighth inning, when the bullpen just had all kinds of problems. Rodney literally couldn’t throw a strike. Too many walks. And too much falling behind hitters. I still really haven’t formed an opinion about Casey Fossum. Zumaya got the strikeout, but he also gave up a lot of hard hit balls.

Well, I chose Greg Maddux over Jake Peavy, and I’m still willing to live with that decision. Curtis Granderson had him figured out, at least. And I know I have no way of proving this, but I totally called the back-to-back pitchouts that cost Granderson a caught stealing. There seemed to be a lot of flying out to the warning track in right field. I’m not quite sure what that was about. Marcus Thames’s consecutive home runs streak came to an end, as did Pudge’s hitting streak (Yeah, but was that fatigue or was that Greg Maddux?). And did I hear correctly that Magglio’s had back problems recently? It would certainly explain the 1-for-18, but if that’s true, I’m surprised Leyland hasn’t rested him. Then again, Magglio IS the only Tiger who has played every game so far.

Well, tonight is another late night, but this time I don’t have to get up early, so I should be able to stick around for this one. It feels like forever since the last time we saw Nate Robertson, but as I recall, he did a nice job in his last start. The Padres, meanwhile, will start Cha Seung Baek, whom the Tigers know from his days with the Seattle Mariners (in fact, he got traded not so long ago). He’s a pitcher that the Tigers have gotten to earlier this year, but he’s also shown the ability to pull a Reyes Effect every once in a while. He recently did it to Cleveland, and he did it to the Tigers last year. Brandon Inge is finally behind the plate for this one, and I’m gonna let the standard gripes about this slide for now, cuz even I think Pudge needs the break after catching four games in a row, which I never advocated, I might add. However, I’m still somewhat mixed about it. On the one hand, it theoretically grants me a Verlander/Pudge battery tomorrow. On the other hand, assuming the platoon is back in place, it takes Pudge out of order for the 1968 World Series Tribute game against the Cardinals on Tuesday. I don’t know what that entails, but if it’s a throwback night, I’d like to see Pudge in it (the other two games that I *really* want Pudge in are the Negro League game next month and, for very obvious reasons, Latin Night on August 9^th). By the way, does anyone else find it ironic that this whole platoon was ostensibly done, in part, to prevent Pudge from succumbing to the wear and tear, and yet, it is Inge who seems to be the one suffering from wear and tear?

Ack, I know I’m running extremely late with this post. At any rate, I watched some, but not all, of the game. From what I can tell, Galarraga didn’t have quite the sharpest command he’s ever had, but he did pitch well enough to win and he was able to come up with a big pitch when he needed to get out of trouble, and bottom line, that’s what you want.

I get the feeling that had Barry Zito stayed out there for more than two innings, the Tigers REALLY would’ve unloaded on him. I never really saw Zito in his heyday. The only other time I’ve seen Barry Zito face the Tigers was in Game 1 of the ALCS a couple years ago. At any rate, Marcus Thames’s consecutive-games homer streak has come to an end, but the hits-as-home-runs streak is still intact. It was Polanco who had the big day, with four hits. And Magglio got his first and only hit of the series (I guess Magglio just doesn’t like hitting in the Bay Area, cuz he doesn’t hit well in Oakland either). Meanwhile, Pudge had a hit but really wasn’t doing much to help his own cause. Then again, since this ordeal started, I never once advocated him catching three games in a row. At the same time, though, I’m not entirely convinced that fatigue is what causes guys to swing at stuff out of the strike zone.

It’s now time for another installment of Amusing Things Behind Guys Who Are Being Interviewed. It happened during the pre-game show. Rod Allen was interviewing Edgar Renteria about his 2000^th hit, and well, I didn’t even bother circling it this time cuz it’s just that obvious:

Prior to this interview, Pudge never really struck me as one who would mug the camera, but there you go. The funny thing is that the editors attempted to cover this up by showing the footage of Renteria’s hit, but they missed the tail end of it. Silly editors.

Well, it’s time for the final National League-style series of 2008. To that end, the Tigers’ll have a rematch with their 1984 World Series foes, the San Diego Padres. For most of this season, the Padres have pitched well but their offense has been virtually nonexistent (except for Adrian Gonzalez, who’s actually having a real good year). However, for most of the month of June, they had been hitting pretty well prior to being swept by the Yankees in their most recent series. At any rate, like I did with the Dodgers and Giants, I picked one pitcher that I absolutely did NOT want the Tigers to face. That pitcher was Jake Peavy, and for once I actually got my wish. Now, they WILL have to face Greg Maddux, who is also a Cy Young winner. He’s known for his exceptional command and his ability to field his position very well. Eddie Bonine will oppose him in his second big league start. Hopefully, the numbers’ll look a bit better this time for him. I’m assuming that Brandon Inge will indeed be catching the first game, as I have yet to hear otherwise. That’s fine, I suppose. I’ll resume the battle at a later date. Maybe Sunday.

Short post today, cuz I’ve gotta go to work soon. Suffice it to say, the pitching was pretty good last night. They did scatter nine hits, but not much in the way of damage. Kenny Rogers was very good again, and finally got a win to show for it. Zach Miner was also good, and though Todd Jones got into trouble in the ninth, he got out of it (and besides, only the Bengie Molina single was hit hard).

I tell you, Marcus Thames has been spoiling us. That’s now five straight games. And last night was kinda funny, cuz it took until his last at-bat, and initially it looked as though he had a walk. But then he hit it to dead center (the woman in the stands with the Barry Bonds cutout was funny, although the fact that she kept talking to it was a little creepy). Ryan Raburn also had a bomb of his own. Man, did that travel far. It’s also amazing when you consider the fact that the Tigers had been no-hit for five innings.

Today, it’s a day game that I’m going to miss entirely due to work. Armando Galarraga takes on Barry Zito. Galarraga’s still been very good. Zito has struggled mightily this year, but he was a very good pitcher once upon a time, and that can show up at any point. I’m assuming that Brandon Inge will catch today (as long as his oblique is better), and I’m okay with that, although Pudge nearly blew his chance in consecutive games last night (though Leyland says that the platoon will, in fact, continue anyways, it is something to keep in mind).

Well, that certainly wasn’t the return that anyone wanted Fernando Rodney to have. He threw too many changeups, and Bowker (whom I’d never heard of) finally started sitting on one, and he got it, and he didn’t miss it. As for the other pitchers, Verlander was very good, and probably had another inning left in him (damn those National League rules that make the pitcher bat). He struck out seven, so something was working for him. Freddy Dolsi had a good seventh, but not a good eighth, and Casey Fossum only faced one batter, but he retired him. By the way, there’s been all this talk about Freddy Dolsi, but I haven’t seen a single interview with him. Is his English that bad? It’s kinda like Timo Perez last year.  By the way, it kinda sucks that they lost cuz I was actually able to watch the game in HD, and that was really sweet.

It’s kind of a shame that Rodney didn’t have it, cuz from what I can tell, hanging four runs on Tim Lincecum is very hard to do. That halted his consecutive quality start string. Meanwhile, Marcus Thames is just on fire. He now has the team lead in home runs and he’s done it with a lot fewer at-bats. Might as well milk him for all he’s worth as well, just like they did with Matt Joyce and Clete Thomas. It’s just as well, because Maggs seems to be a bit cold right now. Just a bit. Meanwhile, Pudge is kinda quietly putting up a lot better numbers in recent days, and maybe, just maybe, it’ll pay off. Apparently Jim Leyland said something before yesterday’s game that sounded very similar to my proposal from a few days ago. Keep your fingers crossed. Of course, this is all assuming that the reasons put forth in the first place were, in fact, the “real” reasons, and there are times where I feel they are not. Still, they ARE trying to get him on the All-Star team, which looks to be a lost cause at the moment (and that goes for just about everyone; what’ll probably happen is that Terry Francona’ll just stick Magglio on the team as the “required representative” and be done with it). By the way, as strange as it sounds, Pudge is now tied for the team lead in stolen bases with six. And, by raw numbers, he’s currently the team’s best base stealer because he hasn’t been caught yet. Guillen, who also has six, has been caught twice. But hey, they all battled in the ninth inning. And it took a spectacular play from Omar Vizquel off the bat of Polanco to end the game.

Well, there’s nothing to do but get back up and go at it again tonight. And it’s a battle of lefties. Kenny Rogers goes up against Jonathan Sanchez. Kenny’s been real good recently. I don’t know a lot about Sanchez other than that little blurb they put in the game preview. Apparently, he doesn’t have the most wins on the team, but the Giants tend to win the games he starts. So…he’s kind of like the Giants’ version of Armando Galarraga? At the very least, that’s something to be watchful of.

And so, the starting pitching ended the homestand on a high note. Nate Robertson pitched really well, and had it not been for the rain delay he would’ve had a shot at the complete game (though I think the rain was more of a good thing than bad, which I’ll explain momentarily). Bautista put up two good innings as well. Bobby Seay and Todd Jones combined to make things unnecessarily exciting in the ninth, but I’m willing to give them a mulligan.

As for the offense, well, thank goodness for the rain delay. That’s something you don’t see real often. The Tigers were kinda handcuffed by the lefty, but once the right-hander came in, the floodgates opened. Usually it’s the other way ‘round. Marcus Thames is certainly on a roll, cuz all of a sudden he’s tied for the team lead in home runs and he’s had about 100 fewer at-bats than Maggs or Cabrera. I’d also like to discuss Brandon Inge for a second, if I may. Recently, I’ve noticed that he’s been taking really huge swings when he’s at the plate, and consequently doing a lot of swinging and missing (plus, I’d think that with the strained oblique, that would hurt a lot). The only time he actually shortened his swing was on the home run (which turned out to be huge). Then his next time up, he went back to the big swing. Go figure.

Tonight, the Tigers are back on the west coast for six more games without a DH. First off, it’s the Barry Bonds-less San Francisco Giants, who are kind of middle-of-the-road in that they’re not a great team, but they’re doing much better than a lot of people thought they would. I guess you could say they’re holding their own. Anyways, like with the Dodgers, I picked one pitcher from the Giants’ starting rotation for whom I did NOT want the Tigers to face. That pitcher was Tim Lincecum. Unfortunately, as with the Dodgers, the Tigers weren’t so lucky, and they will see him tonight. His ERA is ridiculously low, even for the National League. The Tigers will try their best, as they do have Justin Verlander going for them, and he was simply marvelous his last time. There is an issue that I’m surprised no one has addressed. With the exception of the first homestand of the year and the Red Sox/Yankees homestand, offense really has not been much of a problem for the Tigers at Comerica Park. They’ve scored a bunch of runs in Detroit and have had a couple 4-2 homestands prior to this 8-2 performance. On the road, now that’s a different story. Most of their shutouts have occurred on the road, as have most of the games where they score 2 runs or fewer. Anyways, it’s something to keep in mind. The fact that they’re on the west coast is also something to keep in mind. But...Fernando Rodney's back.

In Other News: I was kind of in an Agatha Christie-ish mood (no idea why), so I decided to head to the library today in search of books. I discovered that the library’s mystery section is rather odd. They’ve got about twenty books by someone named Mary Jane Clark, whom I’ve never heard of, but as for Agatha Christie books, well, they have three. That’s it. Three. And I’ve already read one of them.