Category: Fungoes

Wow.

How can you complain about game one of the Twins series? Can’t.

Verlander was phenomenal.

The offense explosive at long last.

Bullpen work = top notch.

I was really hoping to be able to write something about the line score having a zero in the E column and for eight innings it looked good.

I watched the game on ESPN2 rather than the FSN North option on the satellite and got to hear Buck Martinez gush about the Tigers and Jim Leyland. Something that Gary Thorne mentioned in the ninth inning stood out for me was how the Tigers have a 40 and 23 record against the Central division this season Ñ imagine if they were closer to .500 against the White Sox.

Why run Todd Jones out there with a six-run lead? Martinez or Thorne said that it was because Jones hadn’t pitched since Monday and Leyland probably wanted him to get into the flow of the series from the get-go. I’ll buy that.

Anyway, a full evening of work awaits. Already it, and the weekend, are off to a good start.

That’s the Tigers record since Placido Polanco got hurt in Boston.

Desperate times call for desperate measures. I’ll leave it to you to decide if these are desperate times for the Tigers, but how does this strike you as a desperate measure: when Ramon Santiago‘s in the lineup why not use the DH for him and let the pitcher hit?

Santiago with a clutch hit. Still…

If the middle infield corps thins anymore, we may have to put infield coach Rafael Belliard in the lineup. Don’t laugh.

I’ve decided: Let Neifi go in the offseason and keep Infante.

It’s good to see Chris Shelton in the lineup again.

New pitcher + Craig Monroe = first-pitch flyout with two men on.

Talk about a drought: Santiago hasn’t hit a homer since Aug. 1, 2003

Final thought: The Tigers appear to be stumbling to the finish line, that much we know. But, last year’s White Sox team didn’t exactly sprint to the postseason either. In fact, I thought they’d be fatigued from fighting off Cleveland and lose to the Red Sox in the first round. Instead, the merely won it all. I’ll take that from the Tigers over the next six weeks.

The Tigers could ill-afford another tough-luck loss particularly when you see performances as strong as Nate Robertson‘s in game one and Wil Ledezma‘s in the nightcap.

This gives the Tigers some confidence going into tomorrow’s finale. Still, the madness that is too many first-pitch cuts has got to stop.

If the scores from the Twins and White Sox games hold, the Tigers could be up six heading into play on Thursday.

Huge.