Lately I’ve been giving a lot of thought to who my all-time favorite Tigers are and who would make a tidy list.
Putting together my top 10 would be easy. Narrowing it to just five would be tough but I wanted to give it a shot.
What’s the criteria for this list?
I decided that this was my purely subjective list based on players I enjoyed watching play for the Tigers.
For example, Mark Fidrych doesn’t make the list simply because I never saw him play live — and I decided ESPN Classic and MLB Network reruns don’t count.
The legend of The Bird and his place in Tigers lore is secure for me.
Here’s my list* — not in order of favorite-ness, but in order of how they came to mind — which has been revised right up to the moment I clicked “Publish” on this post.
It took all of the second day in Cooperstown to make it through the balance of the Museum – and it did not disappoint. There’s so much I could write about but I think the photos I posted on TigersHistory.com tell the tale more vividly. Yet, one dimension in particular stands out and deserves a few words: the detail of the Museum.
Here I am in the exhibit recognizing the Tigers clubs from the 1980s. Though he’s not represented in the Hall of Fame, I was delighted to see my man Jack Morris in the Museum. Same for Alan Trammell, Lou Whitaker and the rest of the ’84 champs.
The Museum is rooted in the minutiae of baseball and the memories these otherwise mundane objects evoke. You’d expect to see artifacts from Hank Aaron’s chase for the Babe, Nolan Ryan’s seven no-hitters and Rickey Henderson’s stolen base exploits. But it’s the other stuff that held me rapt. For example:
The cornerstone from Ebbets Field
The wall panel from Tiger Stadium’s deepest reaches – the 440-foot mark
A deep-blue leather jacket from the Philadelphia Athletics
The rotating thingy that sat atop the centerfield scoreboard at old Comiskey Park
A scorebook from a Tigers/Indians game from the early 1970s
The shoes worn by Hall of Fame National League umpire Doug Harvey in his final game in 1992
And so much more. Of course, there was lot of Tigers miscellany, some curious of not outright dubious.
For example, in the Tigers locker, part of the Today’s Game exhibit, you’ll find the hat worn by Luis Pujols when he managed against the Royals’ Tony Pena in June 2002. It marked the first time managers from the Dominican Republic faced each other. The fact someone has that on their radar and thinks to make contact ahead of time with the Royals and Tigers is astounding and impressive.
Also in the Museum is the hat worn by Octavio Dotel on April 7 when he appeared in a game for his record-setting 13th different club.
In a way it’s cool that these items are in Cooperstown, but these two names representing the Tigers with Ty Cobb, Hank Greenberg, Charlie Gehringer, Hal Newhouser, Mickey Cochrane, George
Kell and Al Kaline? Kind of a joke, I thought. But the more I considered it, the more I appreciated that the seemingly minor and mostly forgotten stories of people like Pujols and Dotel shape the narrative and history of baseball.
I know that sounds cheesy, but it’s true.
As we departed for the grueling drive back to Detroit I wondered when I’d get back to Cooperstown. Chances are it won’t be soon.
Until that time, I’ll be keeping a more watchful eye on the historical aspects as they happen and cherish a trip of a lifetime with my Dad, brother and brothers in law.
On Oct. 6, 2006, Kenny Rogers began etching himself into the Tigers’ postseason lore with 7.2 innings of five-hit mastery of the Yankees at Comerica Park. (As if you’ve forgotten.)
He walked just two and struck out eight as the Tigers beat the Yankees 5-0 — and Rogers slew a personal postseason dragon — to take a two-games-to-one lead in the American League Division Series.
A look through the Tigers history book reveals that they’ve been quite busy on October 6 — when they make the postseason, that is. So, I thought we’d take a look and see if there’s some historical star alignment happening ahead of Game 163. Here’s a deeper look at how the Tigers have performed (or not) in the franchise’s postseason appearances from 1907 through 1987:
On 
dailyfungo.com 