Garret Craig

Celebration

More coming…

I could have titled this article a lot of other things; “Angel Hernandez” seems like a very plain title. Other titles I had selected may have been very clever and comical, but they would also have been very rude, so I decided against them this time (I’m feeling nice right now).

You may ask, at this point, what can you do but laugh when watching a Tigers game?  Why even write about the Tigers anymore? But I, like Jim Leyland, can’t prevent myself from finding something to complain about night after amusing night, and I feel obligated to make my point known.

I could talk about many things on the night of another horrifyingly disappointing loss for the Detroit Tigers, and I am by no means excusing Fernando Rodney for his terrible pitching in the 9th inning of tonight’s game or blaming the home plate umpire for the outcome of the game, but really, Mr. Hernandez, could you be any more arrogant?

Seriously. Do you really have to be so right that you can’t even ask the first base umpire for help when 3 different people think you might be wrong? Not to mention the rulebook says you don’t have a choice.

Rule 9.02(c) in the MLB Official Rulebook states; “Appeals on a half swing may be made only on the call of ball and when asked to appeal, the home plate umpire must refer to a base umpire for his judgment on the half swing.” Also, “Field umpires must be alerted to the request from the plate umpire and quickly respond.”

But you probably already knew that.

Miguel Cabrera has hit .291 this season, and only .292 over the past 7 days, but the Tigers are sure making him look good right now. Cabrera has batted in 9 runs in the last 3 games, about 53% of the Tigers total run production, and has earned them a 1-2 record in that span. But a .333 win percentage is not going to win very many ball games, especially the way the Tigers have played in their last 2 games.

On Tuesday night the madness started early, when the names Marcus Thames and Gary Sheffield were posted on the lineup card, and it transferred to the field early in the first inning. With one out and runners on first and second, Chris Lambert leaves a fastball right down the middle, but he get’s lucky; The batter pops the ball up to shallow right field. Placido Polanco circles under it for what seems like hours, but lets it tip off his glove, and everybody advances.

Polanco and the Tigers failed to play fundamental baseball again in the bottom half of the frame, as a ground out and a pop-out, both to third, fail to advance a man on second base with no outs. Miguel Cabrera picks up Polanco and Ordonez with a two-out RBI single. Then, with two outs, Gary Sheffield pops up with a 2-0 count to end the inning.

Good news came for the Tigers in the top of the second, when Edgar Renteria charged a ground ball! But we had to shield our eyes again in the next inning as Torri Hunter stole second base with 2 outs in the 3rd. This wasn’t just any steal… The Tigers were paying so little attention to what was going on, Hunter was probably half-way to second before the pitch was even thrown. Not to mention Placido Polanco couldn’t even beat him to the bag. It looked like defensive indifference, really.

I feel like I’m going to have to repeat myself alot here… That’s really how bad this is. Gary Sheffield fails to move another runner on second over with less than two outs; Ground ball to 3rd. Top of the 4th, one out, man on second, and Brandon Inge drops a pitch that hit him right in the glove, and lets the runner move to 3rd with one out. Brandon is one of the last players I want to be accusing of sloppy play, but it seems like it’s becoming a team trend now.

Off to the bottom half of the 4th now, nobody out, Renteria on first. Brandon Inge lines a ball to the right fielder, who throws it back in to first base. The ball hits the first baseman and trickles away about 5 ft. Edgar Renteria tries to advance and is easily thrown out. Now I understand taking a chance, making an effort, but sometimes it’s just plain stupidity, and that seems like the case here. Threat over.

The climax of bullheadedness starts in the top of the 5th, two men out, and a man on second. An error by Ryan Raburn on a ground ball to third moves the runner up and keeps the inning alive, and brings up Brandon Wood. Wood hits a ground ball back to the pitcher; Gary Glover kicks it away toward the 3rd base side, and every body’s safe. While the Tigers pick their noses and decide what to screw up on the next play, Mike Napoli moves over to 3rd with nobody covering.

Skipping through some more horrible play, I thought I should include something good in this article; Brandon Inge lays down a successful sacrifice bunt! That makes him 1/3 in bunt attempts all night!

Back to the bad… I believe most of the above falls on the manager, Mr. Jim Leyland. He has had poor decision-making all year. My expectations aren’t high for the next 2 games, but I’ll try to keep the complaining down for a few days.

The Motor City Kitties are making a run at last place in the division, and nobody seems to care. Is it honestly 7-1 in the 2nd inning when Justin Verlander, your “staff ace”, started the game? Oh, wait, make that 8 to 1.

2 errors, in 1 2/3 innings? And that doesn’t include Magglio Ordonez watching a line drive fall 2 feet in front of him without making anything remotely related to an effort, or Placido Polanco watching his ground ball roll down the 3rd base line from the batters box as he was thrown out by 90 feet, or Miguel Cabrera dropping a foul pop-out.

The Tigers were supposed to have the day off today. They’ll get a day off anyways! They’re only here to watch the Yankees trot around the bases!

And the crowd goes wild! Gary Sheffield leads off the bottom half of the 2nd inning with another team-trademarked SOLO HOME RUN. Hey look! They stranded the bases loaded with one out! Surprise!

I don’t know what else to say, other than you should at least TRY when there is 40,000+ in attendance on a Monday afternoon for a sub-.500 baseball team.

I’ll get you some interesting stats later this week…