Prince Fielder, Delmon Young Lead The Tigers to a 7-3 Win

The Detroit Tigers beat the Boston Red Sox tonight 7-3.

First off, the umpiring picked up right where they left off today, blowing calls and ejecting coaches because they made the wrong call! Everyone goes to watch the umpiring show, right?

Moving on though, the Tigers found themselves down 2-0 early, but a Don Kelly single and Danny Worth double to begin the 3rd inning had runners on 2nd and 3rd with no outs and Quintin Berry at the plate; Berry hit a single to drive in Kelly, and Berry stole 2nd base to put runners back on 2nd and 3rd with no outs still for Brennan Boesch who hit a sacrifice fly and the score was tied 2-2. After Miguel Cabrera hit a fly ball that got Quintin Berry to 3rd base, Prince Fielder drove Berry in with a single and the Tigers took a 3-2 lead.

Alex Avila had to leave the game in the bottom of the 3rd inning after being cut open on his nose by a foul ball. Brian Britten reported that there were no signs of a concussion. He is day-to-day.

After The Red Sox tied the game up 3-3, the Tigers responded in the 5th inning. After a bunt single by Quintin Berry, he stole 2nd base and advanced to 3rd on a throwing error with 1 out and Miguel Cabrera at the plate. Cabrera ended up driving Berry in with a single and the Tigers took a 4-3 lead.

After struggling through the first 3 innings, Max Scherzer settled down and went 6 innings, giving up 3 runs on 7 hits, walking 2 and striking out 6 batters, and earned the win. After Scherzer walked the leadoff batter in the 7th inning, Phil Coke came in and pitched a scoreless inning.

In the 8th inning Delmon Young hit a solo home run to put the Tigers up 5-3; It's his 4th of the season.

Phil Coke got the first out of the 8th inning, and then Joaquin Benoit came in to finish off the 8th.

The Tigers added some insurance runs in the 9th inning. After Miguel Cabrera hit a single, he stole 2nd base and advanced to 3rd base on a throwing error. Prince Fielder drove him in with a triple. Delmon Young came up next and drove in Fielder with a single.

Jose Valverde came in to pitch the 9th inning and got the Tigers the win.

Casey Crosby makes his major league debut tommorrow as the Tigers open a 3 game home series against the Yankees and CC Sabathia (6-2 3.66 ERA).

Picture credit: usatoday.com
Follow us on Twitter: @FearTheShadow

Tigers Continue to Struggle in a 6-4 Loss

The Detroit Tigers lost to the Boston Red Sox tonight 6-4.

The Tigers got going in the 1st inning with singles by Danny Worth, Miguel Cabrera, and Prince Fielder to load the bases with 1 out. Delmon Young hit into a fielder's choice, but a run scored and the Tigers took a 1-0 lead.

Quintin Berry led off the 3rd inning with a triple and scored on a sacrifice fly by Danny Worth. Miguel Cabrera then hit a double, advanced to 3rd base on a wild pitch, and scored on a ground ball from Prince Fielder to make it 3-0.

Drew Smyly was cruising, but he gave up 2 2-run home runs in the 4th inning, with 2 outs.

In the 7th inning, Alex Avila hit a ball off the green monster and was called out at 2nd base, although instant replay clearly shows Avila was safe. Gerald Laird was up next and hit a double, so that call cost the Tigers a run. Great umpiring in this series!

Luckily, the Tigers had some luck from the Baseball gods, and after a pinch hit infield single by Andy Dirks, Miguel Cabrera hit a flyball that Adrian Gonzalez made a sliding play for, and had the ball in his lap, but couldn't hang onto it, so it was a RBI double for Cabrera to tie the game at 4.

Drew Smyly was done after 6 innings, giving up 4 runs on 8 hits, and striking out 4 batters.

Octavio Dotel came in for the 7th inning and got the first 2 outs of the inning, then Phil Coke came in to face Adrian Gonzalez, but gave up a run and the Tigers entered the 8th inning down 5-4.

The lead eventually became 6-4 and was too much for the Tigers to overcome tonight.

The Tigers finish up their 4 game road series with Boston tommorrow as Max Scherzer (4-3 5.67 ERA) takes on Josh Beckett (4-4 4.15 ERA).

Picture credit: freep.com
Follow us on Twitter: @FearTheShadow

Doug Fister Headed to the DL

According to Brian Britten the Tigers have placed starting pitcher Doug Fister on the DL with a left side strain. The move is retroactive to May 29th, and Casey Crosby will be called up from Triple-A Toledo to take his spot in the rotation.

Doug Fister was 0-3 this season in 6 starts this season with a 3.15 ERA, but had struggled in his last start against the Boston Red Sox, and going on the DL may mean he was pitching hurt.

Casey Crosby in Triple-A Toledo this season is 4-2 with a 4.26 ERA and 1.36 WHIP.

Picture credit: mlive.com
Follow us on Twitter: @FearTheShadow

Ryan Raburn Optioned to Triple-A Toledo

According to Brian Britten the Detroit Tigers have optioned Ryan Raburn to Triple-A Toledo. The team will make a corresponding move tommorrow.

Ryan Raburn has been called a '2nd half hitter' many times over his career, because of his splits before the all-star break which is .214/.273/.369 and after the all-star break Raburn hits .300/.351/.397. Quite the difference, however the 1st half of the 2012 season thus far has even been bad for the standards that Raburn is given in the first half.

This season Ryan Raburn has a hitting line of .146/.209/.211. Raburn has only 1 home run and 7 RBI in 123 at-bat's. Tigers fans can only hope that either Raburn gets into his 2nd half form, or he doesn't play if he still can't hit when he eventually comes back.

UPDATE: Danny Knobler reported that the Tigers have called up catcher Omir Santos from Triple-A Toledo to replace Ryan Raburn on the Tigers active roster. It can be assumed he will be sent back down to Toledo once Austin Jackson comes off of the DL.

Picture credit: mlive.com
Follow us on Twitter: @FearTheShadow

Justin Verlander Not Sharp in Tigers 6-3 Loss

The Detroit Tigers lost to the Boston Red Sox tonight 6-3.

Justin Verlander struggled a bit today, he allowed 4 runs after 4 innings, and the Tigers found themselves down 4-0 going into the 5th. Jhonny Peralta responded with a solo home run to make it 4-1; it's his 4th of the season.

Verlander gave up another run in the 5th, but Prince Fielder responded in the 6th inning with a solo home run that might still be traveling; it's his 8th of the season.

Justin Verlander did not pitch well today, going 6 innings, giving up 5 runs on 10 hits, walking 1 and striking out 7 batters. Going 6 innings made it 53 straight starts of 6 innings or more for Verlander, which is the longest since Steve Carlton had 69 straight from 1979 to 1982, according to Matthew B. Mowery.

The Tigers continued trying to get back into the game in the 7th inning after a double by Miguel Cabrera, Prince Fielder drove him in with a single to make it a 5-3 game.

The Red Sox would go on to make it a 6-3 game, and that was too much for the Tigers to overcome.

Drew Smyly (2-1 3.14 ERA) makes the start tommorrow for Detroit against Jon Lester (3-4 4.72 ERA).

Picture credit: espn.com
Follow us on Twitter: @FearTheShadow

What's Wrong With the Tigers Offense? - Andy Dirks

The 2nd part of "What's Wrong With the Tigers Offense" goes to Andy Dirks.

Dirks, like Austin Jackson, has been pretty good this season. His batting line is .318/.367/.512 in 125 ABs. Let's look into this a little deeper though.

First off, Dirks is in his 2nd season with the Tigers after putting up a line of .251/.296/.406 in his rookie season in which he had 219 ABs.

This season for Dirks, atleast in the month of May has been 2 different type of seasons, so to speak. From May 1st to May 10th, Dirks hit 14/28 (.500 average), and from May 11th to May 28th, Dirks hit 18/69 (.260 average). Just looking at that, you assume while both are small samples, that the 28 at-bat sample size is more of a fluke than the 69 at-bat sample, right?

Well, it's very hard to tell, because he only has 2 seasons in the major leagues that combine for a total of 112 games.

It's difficult to say what to expect from Dirks. Looking at fangraphs.com, his O-Swing% (percentage of pitches a batter swings at outside the strike zone) is up slightly 37.9% from 35.1% last season, the alarming stat is his Z-Swing% (percentage of pitches a batter swings at inside the strike zone) is down a lot from his rookie season which was at 77.6% whereas this season it's at 61.6%. What makes this odd is that while that may mean Dirks is being more patient, his walk percentage is only slightly up from 4.7% last year to 5.7% this season. To his credit though his strikeouts are down. He struck out 15.3% of the time last year and this season it's only 12.9%.

Dirks is in such an odd case here that it's just too hard for the average fan to know what they can expect from him the rest of the way. The best thing you can say is to be happy with what he's doing right now, but understand it may not keep up at this pace.

Up next in this series will be the #3 hitter, Miguel Cabrera.

Picture credit: yahoosports.com
Follow us on Twitter: @FearTheShadow

Doug Fister Struggles* in Tigers 7-4 Loss

The Detroit Tigers lost* to the Boston Red Sox today 7-4.

After Doug Fister gave up a run in the bottom of the 1st inning, Delmon Young hit a solo home run in the top of the 2nd inning; It's his 3rd home run of the season.

The Red Sox came back in the bottom of the inning to score 3 runs, thanks in part to bad umpiring. Doug Fister had thrown strike 3 and Mike Aviles swung at it and was a foul tip that Gerald Laird caught it (which can be seen on instant replay), however the umps called it otherwise and because of that, the Red Sox scored 3 runs in the inning, and the floodgates had opened instead of the inning ending.

3rd base coach Gene Lamont, and manager Jim Leyland both got ejected. I guess the umpires wanted to be the stars of the game today because the first Tigers at bat of the 3rd inning, Danny Worth was safe on a double, but the umpires blew another call and called him out, even though instant replay again showed he was safe.

The Tigers were down 5-1 going into the 5th inning, but Gerald Laird made it a 5-2 game with a solo home run; It's his 2nd of the season.

Doug Fister struggled a bit today going 5 innings, giving up 6 runs (should've been 3) on 11 hits, walking 1 and striking out 2 batters.

Luis Marte came in out of relief to make his season debut and pitched 3 innings, giving up 1 run and striking out 3 batters.

The Tigers make one last try in the 9th inning after a double by Prince Fielder, and then Jhonny Peralta hit a 2-run home run; It's his 3rd home run of the season. However, that's all they got, and thanks to the 3 runs the umpires gave the Red Sox, instead of it being a tie game, it was a loss.

Justin Verlander (5-2 2.15 ERA) takes the mound tommorrow for the Tigers against Daniel Bard (4-5 4.69 ERA).

Follow us on Twitter: @FearTheShadow