May Day!?!

Guillen is hoping for a better June.

For my 2007 Tigers Replay, the Detroit Tigers knew entering the month of May things would get a bit interesting and definitely more challenging.

As you know, we were rolling entering the Metrodome ("Metrodome Blues") with a 11-3 stretch, and then Minnesota swept us in a three-game series, and then we had to head to Boston. The eventual World Champions of 2007 took three of four at Fenway. We would bounce back a bit by taking our first inter-league series of the year against the St. Louis Cardinals, 2-1 at home & we would also host the Angels, in which we took two of three from them as well.

Then it was our first series against our division foe, the eventual A.L. Champion Cleveland Indians at Comerica Park. Justin Verlander pitches his 2nd shutout of the season, as we defeat the Tribe, 7-0 for the opener; but then followed that with 8-2 & 11-8 losses. During the 8-2 loss, Jeremy Bonderman suffered his first loss of the season, at the hands of C.C. Sabathia, as Bonderman is 5-1.

We would travel down to Tropicana Field in Tampa, which we won the first game 9-4, and then followed that victory with a 12-inning 3-2 victory. With a chance of a sweep, I loved my chances with Verlander on the mound (coming off of his shutout), instead fielding mistakes by the Tigers and untimely walks by Verlander made it a short night for him with 4 ER's (7 runs) allowed in four innings. The Devil Rays' James Shields would shutout the Tigers, allowing only two hits.

Now we have to go back up north to face the Indians in Cleveland for a big, early four-game series. The opener was a rematch between C.C. Sabathia & Jeremy Bonderman -- and boy, did they deliver? Bonderman would go nine innings of one run allowed, while striking out seven; while C.C. struck out six through ten innings, allowing only a run himself. The game would go through 15 innings! Until Casey Blake hit a walk-off three-run HR as Jacobs Field went nuts.

The Tigers finish the month, with a record of 30-23; going a even .500 with a 14-14 record in the month of May, trailing first-place the Cleveland Indians by 2.5 games. Tigers will continue the rest of the four-game series starting in June.

The Tigers' bats cooled off dramatically in the month of May, dropping from a team average of .301 in April, while batting .267 in May. The Tigers had five starters batting over .300 by end of April, only Magglio Ordonez batted over .300 in the month of May with an amazing .417 mark. He is currently batting .389 with 17 HR's & 46 RBI (An OPS of 1.191)! Carlos Guillen had a rough May, batting only .147, while driving in only 10 runs (he also hit into 6 DP's).

The pitching remained the same with a 4.37 ERA as their starting pitching did better, while the Tigers' bullpen kept going south. Chad Durbin finished the month with a 6-1 record, despite a 4.66 ERA, while Jeremy Bonderman has been the most consistent starting pitcher with a 5-1 record & 3.74 ERA.

No telling where the Tigers will be by the end of June, but hopefully it will go better than May.

Autumn Days of Years Past

     Anybody that follows my blog knows that I breath, eat, bleed baseball, and for anyone who bleeds baseball they also bleed for their teams, especially when their teams go to the playoffs. I am a fan of both the Detroit Tigers and Atlanta Braves, if I was to absolutely choose one, I would have to definitely lean towards my home state Tigers. I still love the Braves, but the love is different, I loved the 90's Braves in which had all the great pitching led by Greg Maddux, Tom Glavine and John Smoltz.

     The great thing about Baseball is that it comes to an end in my favorite time of year, in the month of October. I love the autumn, and so does my wife. We enjoy Autumn in the same way as others enjoy summer vacation. We love all the leaves changing, the cooler, more comfortable temps & we both love Halloween. Another reason I love autumn, is that my Birthday falls on October 28th.

      It was the time of year, as a kid where we enjoy October Baseball, while the NFL is just getting underway, we get a few little games of baseball done outside before it got too cold, and we would also play football. There was always something beautiful about the smell of burning leaves, and that crisp breeze -- getting out of school and hanging with your friends, then when it got dark (which came early), it was dinner & time to do the homework. But there was something always magical for that time of year.

     My first memories of October playoffs, of course was the 1984 World Series. In those days, my dad was have the TV on, and there was Al Kaline & George Kell doing the television work. If we won the Tiger's head burst through the logo and roared, when they lost he meowed like a kitten and had a thermometer in his mouth & a bag sitting on top of hit. Sometimes it roared while biting on a bat, and sometimes in special circumstances like playing the Blue Jays, there would be Blue bird feathers floating around, yep... the Tiger had a snack. It was pretty cool to know that my dad graduated high school with Kirk Gibson of the 84' Tigers, one of my elementary classmates' mothers happened to be a cousin to another Michigan native in Dave Rozema. I will have to talk more of my dad knowing Gibby in the near future, but for now back to baseball memories.

     Though the 84' season was something to cherish, the first real post-season in which I absolutely fell in love with the game and have been hooked since, was the epic 1986 World Series. It had everything, many colorful characters (and nicknames.. Oil Can, Mookie), many young studs (Strawberry, Clemens, Gooden) and just so much drama -- Hello Game 6! I remember watching that inning unfold thinking.. you can't write this stuff, not to mention the brilliance of Vin Scully. From then on, I was hooked, I would go in my backyard, at times all by myself reenacting actual plays, or making up scenarios of me growing up to be some up-and-coming baseball hero, with me voicing over the plays in my Scully or Bob Costas voice. Sometimes I would have the theme of "This Week in Baseball" on repeat, bouncing around in the background of my head while throwing the ball up to myself.

     1987 would cement my love for baseball with the Tigers' wonderful run to catch the Blue Jays. I remember we had to go to my Aunt's and on the way back we listened to Ernie Harwell breaking down one of the games where we gained another game on them, and my getting excited. Talking about the young guys who helped our vets doing the impossible, a division that looked like the Jays. My dad talking about the brilliance of us acquiring Doyle Alexander. Alexander will go down as one of the most intriguing trade acquisitions in MLB history for both good and bad reasons -- the good, he set an impressive 9-0 record with a 1.53 ERA in 11 starts; the bad? He was acquired from the Atlanta Braves, in exchange we would send Detroit-Native John Smoltz in the deal. We were 3 1/2 games out by the end of the day on Sept 26th, losing three straight to the Blue Jays, the Jays have now won 11 of their last 13 as well.

     But tomorrow is another day, and on that day we won a 13 inning game against the Jays to pull within 2 1/2. The next series we split 2-2 with the Orioles, while the Jays got swept by the Brewers in three games -- the Jays were 1 1/2 up and with Detroits 4th-game victory over Baltimore, Tigers pulled within a game now. The schedule had the Jays coming to Detroit for the last three remaining games of the season, Tigers edged the Jays in a night game with 4-3 victory (Alexander getting win #9 & a save to Henneman), we were tied in first, with two games remaining. I remember the excitement at school, and the talk on the playground, even the teachers were thrilled. The next game we would win in extras (12 innings) 3-2, with the win going to Henneman, the loss to Musselman. The last game of the season, the teachers brought the TV into the classroom, Larry Herndon hit a solo HR, the only run in the game. Frank Tanana pitched a complete-game shutout & it was off to the playoffs, I would remember the heartache that would follow when we lost to Minnesota. The "under-dog" Minnesota Twins won the A.L. West with only 85 wins-- their 85 wins would be the lowest total of regular season wins for a World Championship (the 2006 St. Louis Cardinals would break that record with 83 wins). The lowest total for a World Series contender belongs to the 1973 New York Mets, if you were all wondering. Another note on the Twins, they back-pedaled into the playoffs losing five straight & according to Baseball Reference.com, their Pythagorean Record was that of a 79-83 team. I do remember the heartache of 1987, but I also remember the thrill of catching Toronto that season, and thinking how we came so close.

     Little did I know at the time it would be another 19 years until my Tigers ever return to the post-season & another five years until a division title (24 years between division titles) -- So in some ways I can relate to the Pittsburgh Pirates' fans. The 2013 Tigers team would make it three-straight division titles for the first time in their entire (long) franchise history.

Mariano Rivera's Journey (An Excerpt from SI)

Just to put Mariano Rivera's accomplishments into perspective, here is a nice piece by no other than Sports Illustrated's Tom Verducci.

"The son of a Panamanian fisherman became baseball royalty, though it was a hegemony hard-earned, not given. Rivera signed with the Yankees in 1990 at age 20 for just $3,000 and promptly made the first airplane trip of his life to report to spring training in Tampa. He injured his elbow in '92 and had ligament-repair surgery. He was left unprotected by the Yankees in the expansion draft later that year but went undrafted by the Rockies and the Marlins, nearly was traded to the Tigers in '95 for lefthander David Wells and in '96 to the Mariners for shortstop Felix Fermin, and washed out as a major league starting pitcher with a 5.94 ERA in 10 chances in '95. Only then and in the bullpen, especially in October, did Rivera make his indelible mark."

Metrodome Blues

The Up's & Down's of Todd Jones.

The 2007 Detroit Tigers started the month of May exactly where they left off in April (winning 5 of 6); entering Game #32 (May 9th) the Tigers were 21-10, winning 10 of their last 12 games. After the Tigers won the first game against Seattle, they split the next two, as the Tigers headed to Minnesota with a 22-11 record.

I was thinking I had to be at least three games ahead of the actual season pace, turns out I was only a game ahead of pace for the most part (up to as many as 2 games ahead).

at MINNESOTA
Game #34 - Durbin (4-0) vs. Jo.Santana
Game #35- K.Rogers (0-3) vs. S.Baker
Game #36- Maroth (1-0) vs. Bonser

Originally with Justin Verlander being my ace, his turn in the rotation was due for a start on Game #36, but since the Twins had Boof Bonser pitching that game, I pushed Verlander's start back a game, so I can have my best four pitchers (including Verlander to kick off the series) in Boston for it's tough four-game series. Mike Maroth will get his 2nd start of the season for Detroit.

I beat Johan Santana a few weeks back at home, but now we face him in the Metrodome.

The Tigers at one point had a 3-1 lead, until Jason Kubel (batting 7th) hit a two-run HR, that's the thing about Rod Gardenhire's Twins then, they were tough, great fundamental team & had guys like Jason Kubel with HR power in the 7th spot!

The Twins' batting order:
1. Luis Castillo - 2B
2. Jason Bartlett -SS
3. Joe Mauer - C
4. Micheal Cuddyer - RF
5. Justin Morneau -1B
6. Torii Hunter - CF
7. Jason Kubel -DH
8. Jason Tyner - LF
9. Nick Punto - 3B

The team is usually a solid fielding one in APBA (43 pts), they have an ace in Santana (his last season with Minnesota), a closer in Joe Nathan. They would later trade 2B-Luis Castillo to the New York Mets, which didn't help the Mets from eventually choking the division lead to the Phillies.

The Twins would add 5 more runs with their 7th & 8th innings, as my bullpen (which was much-better of late, at least before Minnesota) reverts to it's problems. The final score would be 9-4, handing Chad Durbin his first loss (4-1).

In the 2nd game of the series, I started Ryan Raburn in left -- trying to get some batting average in there, Craig Monroe & Marcus Thames are my regular left-fielders. Monroe was over-achieving in batting average for quite awhile, but is now starting to come back down to Earth, as his average is now down to .247 (in real-life he batted .212 & would be traded to the Cubs in the 2nd half). Thames batted .242 in 2007, but has been lousy for me through 40 at-bats (.125 batting average)! The move for Raburn to start seemed to pay off as he hit his 2nd HR of the season with a three-run blast off of Scott Baker. The Twins of course, would fight back with a two-run HR by Justin Morneau, the Twins would score another run in the fourth to tie it up 3-3. It would stand this way until the Twins load up the bases & score the winning run on a grounder hit by Joe Mauer to Brandon Inge -- as Nick Punto the winning run scores, walk-off.

So I'm trying to avoid my first sweep of the season, entering the 3rd & final game of the series, I have Mike Maroth against Bonser. Maroth won his only start of the season (4 ER in 6 IP)on the last day in April against the Baltimore Orioles -- Maroth has pitched 6 relief innings allowing only a run this season as well. Maroth is an APBA D-R and would actually go deep into the game, not allowing a single run for the first seven innings, advancing his APBA Grade to an A-R entering the 8th. Maroth would allow a run in the bottom of the 8th, but still had a 4-1 lead -- thanks to Brandon Inge's three-run HR in the second inning.
Todd Jones entered the game with 9 saves, but would blow the save, the Twins would tie the game, force extras, in which Jason Bartlett (who came off the bench for Casilla) would hit a two-out triple & score the winning run off Luis Castillo's walk-off single. Grrrrrr...

So now it's off the Beantown, to face the eventual World Champions, coming off a deflating sweep & a bullpen that just doesn't have any answers -- Oh joy! Did I mention I am now a game behind pace of the actual season, and also have Cleveland at the end of the month.

The real-life Tigers started to hit a snag at this point as well, and would lose their first five meetings against the eventual A.L. Central Champion Cleveland Indians. Everything has mirrored actual life up to this point, hopefully we can reverse fate against Boston & Cleveland.

One thing is for sure, we have our work cut out for us.

Successful April for Tigers

For Sheff, there wasn't much to smile about at the beginning.

I started exactly a week ago, and have already finished the month of April with the 2007 Detroit Tigers ahead of pace record-wise; we finished the opening month 16-9 (in real-life they were 14-11), no to mention the two games I feel we totally blown as well, meaning we could have been 18-7 at the end of the month... but no crying over spilled milk -- like Tom Hanks says "There is no crying in Baseball!"

The cool news, I still have tonight on my two-day break to get half of May done! Pretty awesome, since I wasn't going to start until October 1st to kick this one-month break from the Crazy 48's. I even played three games of that league as well. So 28 games in a week, and I usually can bust up to 16-20 games overnight, only played 6 last night. So I feel like I'm on a roll... while still being able to do my wonderful husband duties as well.

The Tigers splits look good with 8 wins at home & on the road, and have won 3 of their 4 extra-innings games -- they lost 5 of 7 extra-innings games in real-life for the opening month.

The Opening Day Lineup was like this:
1. Curtis Granderson -CF
2. Placido Polanco -2B
3. Magglio Ordonez - RF
4. Gary Sheffield - DH
5. Carlos Guillen - SS
6. Sean Casey -1B
7. Ivan Rodriguez - C
8. Marcus Thames - LF
9. Brandon Inge - 3B

Sean Casey & Ivan Rodriguez every-other game was flip-flopping their slots, I have stuck with Pudge in the 6th spot (his natural spot that season) since coming back from his 5-game stint on the disabled list. Magglio Ordonez has always been an idea #3 slot batter for me, especially with that 2007 APBA Card of his, he consistently hits for his .363 batting average & also showed that in my Heritage League, being a force, batting 3rd for the Bay Area Athletics. In real-life, Jim Leyland had Gary Sheffield batting 3rd (who batted .260 that season), I never liked hitting a low-average guy in the 3rd slot, so Mags has hit in the 3rd slot all season for me. Craig Monroe has played the majority at LF.

SHIFTING SHEFF
Gary Sheffield, the newly acquired Detroit Tiger in 2007 was struggling for me through 15 games, batting only .156 (10-for-64) with a HR & 6 RBI -- it turns out in real-life (and I do remember this) he struggled as well, batting an even-lower .125!

For two games, I shifted him & Ordonez to their normal slots... and Sheff did better, but I didn't like putting Ordonez out of the desired #3 slot. While looking over the stats after 15 games, I did notice Carlos Guillen was batting in the .320's and was doing well.

Starting Game #17, I moved Sheffield to the fifth slot, and had Carlos Guillen batting cleanup, which is interesting because Leyland has used Guillen plenty of times in the cleanup spot as well. Since Game #15, Gary Sheffield has been on a tear, batting .471 (16-for-34), 3 HR's & 16 RBI in the 10-game span, his average moved up to .265, and now leads the team with 22 RBI.

LINEUP CLICKING
Curtis Granderson hitting .400 for most of the month has cooled off (4-for-17), having his batting average drop to .373, while Magglo Ordonez is 2nd on the team (.360). Ivan Rodriguez (.337), Placido Polanco (.333) & Carlos Guillen (.330) all follow; that's five regular starters over .330! Granderson leads the team with 6 long-balls & an extraordinary 29 runs (on pace for 188 runs), while Polanco has been benefiting by hitting in Granderson for 20 RBI -- that is almost one-third of his real-life RBI total of 67.

A MAN THEY CALL GRUDZ
I mentioned above that we had two games escape us, one of them was a game we led 7-2 after three innings (7-3 after 7 innings), in which Mark Grudzielanek sparked a four-run 8th on the Tigers. That series he killed us, batting .429 (6-for-14) with 2 HR, 3 2B's & 6 RBI! The other game may not look like much on paper, but the tone of the game was ours, we were up 2-0 in the ninth, and only allowed three hits to the White Sox (two of them by Pierzynski) when A.J. Pierzynski with two men on base smacked a three-run HR in the ninth. Bobby Jenks would come in to close the door.

KEEPING IT REAL
Just like in most cases with APBA and with Replays, it's very difficult to try to exactly duplicate things. I try to be respectful in trying to play it out as real as possible, by trying to respect the innings-pitched & at-bats counts -- but you can only do so much. All my relievers are well on their way to going over their innings and appearances, hitters in APBA usually have their offensive power a bit inflated (Albert Belle has 16 HR's in 23 games for my Crazy 48's already), which means lineups go further, more at-bats, games go longer (more extra-inning fun), which means in the long run you are not going to succeed in trying to keep the relievers in the neighborhood of their actual maxed innings. I try to keep it real by mixing it up, and keep them all around each other, and not have one guy go two-to-three innings every time he goes out there. Bobby Seay is my best relief grade at A-XZ, but I stay true and make Todd Jones my closer at a flat Grade C.

I once read a APBA fan's 1968 Tigers replay in which Al Kaline hit something like 40 HR's! Say What?! To me, that's not trying to be true to the Replay; in real-life Kaline only had 10 HR & 53 RBI in 327 at-bats, he was an injury rating J-3 for APBA. Sure I can say, hey I'm making Seay my closer, but to me that wouldn't feel right, because that would be a decision made on hindsight of the actual result -- I would be more behind a guy who was doing a 2006 Tigers Season Replay, in which the guy made Joel Zumaya the closer, because in a lot of ways, he was the closer-in-waiting -- it's unfortunate how the rest of his career has turned out, last I checked the Twins had him in the farm system somewhere.

I try to do the same with the bench, sure there is a part of me that would love to play Ryan Raburn a bit more, or Omar Infante, but to keep it real they will be bench guys for me in 2007.