OT: Tigers/Yankees/Alex Avila

Submitted by QuarterbackU on

 

Tigers are tied with the Yankees right now, 3-3 in the 8th, Alex Avila has two opposite field solo HRs off Bartolo Colon.  

As I was one of the hasty idiots on this site who wanted him out of the lineup during the first few games of the season, I feel the need to come clean and admit, I was dead wrong.  Guy's having a nice start to the season, and I'm glad I misjudged him!

tricks574

May 2nd, 2011 at 9:49 PM ^

Sizemore getting the call up today, not sure who goes down. Dirks also probably getting called up. Id say Jackson goes down and maybe worth.

tricks574

May 2nd, 2011 at 10:55 PM ^

Worth and rhymes. They are both just black holes of average with decent speed and D. Hopefully they can put guillen somewhere far away from the team, if sizemore is up he needs to start almost every day. He's too good to lose potential AB at a crucial period in his development as a major league hitter.

I assume dirks is just playing the hot hand and trying to get jackson some pressure free time to work out the kinks in his swing. Also think Dirks is who replaced zumaya on the 40 man roster

BOX House

May 2nd, 2011 at 10:19 PM ^

... this is getting old very quick.

Is it too pessimistic to say the season is slipping away already? after 2 straight sweeps and with the yankees in town, we can't afford  this type of thing.

WolvinLA2

May 3rd, 2011 at 12:01 AM ^

They will be contenders in the division.  I predict second to that team in Wisconsin.  We should be ahead of the Bears and the Vikings don't have a QB.  Oh wait - they were able to snag Blaine Gabb- er, I mean Andy Dalt- er, I mean Ryan Malle- er, I mean Colin Kaeper- er, I mean Nick Sheri- er, who did they pick?  That's right - Christian MFing Ponder with the 12th overall pick. 

Michigan4Life

May 3rd, 2011 at 11:02 AM ^

for NFC North title.  They beat the Packers with a 3rd string QB starting for them(yes Rodgers got knocked out but the Lions held the Packers scoreless in 1st half with Rodgers at QB).  The Lions were close in several games that a break or two could've had them finish off with a winning record.  The Lions finally learned how to close out games as evidenced with 4 games winning streak to end the season.

 

The future is bright for the Detroit Lions and they're a team to be reckoned for the next decade.  No more punch line jokes, no more disrespect and no more expecting to lose a game every Sunday!

hail2mich

May 2nd, 2011 at 10:46 PM ^

This is embarrassing. So many changes need to be made, yet Leyland stubbornly refuses to do one damn thing. He needs to go along with others, but it won't happen until the end of the season. Stick a fork in Magglio (tough to say because of his great past seasons, but it's the reality). Inge is absolutely worthless now. Jackson needs to go to Toledo to regroup, just to name a few. They have brought up Sizemore, but that won't be nearly enough.

Dombroski has made way too many bad decisions these past few years. The Inge extension, Willis extension, keeping Guillen way too long, not resigning Polanco (this one is the worst in my opinion), Sheffield, the list just goes on and on and on. The guy has proven he can build a team out of nothing (Marlins and Tigers), but he cannot keep it going. He needs to go.

I feel good about the core of this team for the future, but there is no way they can win if they continue to play these specific guys. It's pathetic that Leyland comes out with the same lineup everyday, even though the top three hitters aren't hitting over .200. It's May Jim, track record mean very little now. So frustrating...

JamieH

May 2nd, 2011 at 11:10 PM ^

I still can't belive Dombrowski let  Polanco walk away instead of offering him arbitration.  We've had a gaping hole at 2B ever since, and Polanco is batting .385 and playing gold-glove defense.

And to think, he would have cost lessto keep than the Tigers are paying that piece of junk Benoit.  Who do you think would be helping them more this year?

MadtownMaize

May 2nd, 2011 at 11:14 PM ^

Polanco has had a most bizarro career. Everywhere he has been his team has treated him like he wasn't good enough, and yet all he has ever done is produce. The Cardinals and the Phillies (during his first stint there) would never give him an everyday job (kind of like Santiago now).

   

Sommy

May 3rd, 2011 at 12:24 AM ^

I don't mean to be that guy, but I'm going to be that guy.

The Tigers have been pretty awful the past few games, but I'm glad to see that Avila has been coming around.  I've been saying since two seasons ago that I do believe he has a solid bat, and no, he wasn't only drafted because of his father in the front office.  He has solid plate discipline, and while he has often had problems swinging through pitches, I generally trust him at the plate.  I feel like he wasn't getting enough time behind Laird, and I'm glad to see that he is now the everyday guy.

edventure008

May 3rd, 2011 at 2:47 AM ^

To me, it seems like the Tigers are lacking a true leader amongst the players since Sean Casey and Polanco were there.  It is good to see Inge trying to step up but the lack of production of the field kind of hurts his credibility and makes him look like a cheerleader. 



The starting pitching is awful.  The pitchers do not get all that far into the game.  Verlander should be able to do a little bit more as a number 1 in regards to quality pitches and pitch count.  The two only quality games were against Baltimore and Texas were he averaged 114 pitches in 8 innings (2-1, W vs Chi sox, W vs Balt, L vs Tex)  Four other games, he reaches on average 118 pitches in 6 innings (0-4).



From the little research that I've done regarding pitch count and the win/loss of Josh Beckett, Roy Halliday, Cole Hamels, Josh Johnson, Bruce Chen, and Felix Hernandez, when you reach about 110 pitches for 6 innings, their teams were most likely to lose.

Cromulent

May 3rd, 2011 at 10:14 AM ^

Avila's poor plays late in the game. Darn near throws a ball into left field on the throw to third, and allows a ball from Papa Grande to get by him. I'll give him a bit of a pass on the E; if you keep throwing heaters 4 feet out of the strike zone eventually the catcher is going to muff one. But still.

I'd like to find a clip of the Peralta-Granderson contretemps to cut up and show to my 8-year old boy. So many mistakes wrapped up into one nice object lesson for young players.

Baseball is a couple of big, unteachable skills and a steamer trunk of small and very teachable skills. And that play was a good illustration. Granderson has good speed down to 2nd, but starts his slide too late and unforgivably turns over because he wants to see if throw is wild and he can get up for another base. Two brutal mistakes.

Peralta uses fine natural instincts to grab Avila's less than stellar throw - see a theme there, Alex? - and has the presence of mind to make Granderson pay for his thieving ways.

But then he uses poor technique in applying the tag. Granderson has to come back. You don't go extend yourself away from the bag to tag Curtis, unless you also block the base with your body. If you can't block you must let Curtis tag himself out by keeping the glove hand close to the bag. Often the ump will give you the benefit of the doubt on bang bang plays if you use good technique.

But Peralta reaches, allowing Granderson to evade the initial reach and get a hand back on 2nd. The tag happens, but well away from the base. The two actions - Grandy's hand on the bag and Peralta's tag - happened so close in time but spatially far apart its unclear to me which came first. But the ump had his eyes on Peralta's tag and bailed Jhonny out. Good fielders don't make plays like that difficult for the ump.

Cromulent

May 3rd, 2011 at 12:47 PM ^

... I'd like an explanation as to why the tone of my original comment earned a flamebait tag. I'm assuming it was the tone anyway. If I should have started another thread that would be helpful too.

Cromulent

May 3rd, 2011 at 1:05 PM ^

I can do it all day. Married guys often develop the skill of self-debasement as a survival tactic.

You can tag this as trolling & redundant and still give a reply. I don't mind; I'm trying to learn here.

OMG Shirtless

May 3rd, 2011 at 1:48 PM ^

I would be flagging them if I had the ability because you've posted almost 10 different times whining about it.  Fortunately for you, I'm still in the penalty box for another few weeks.  

Let it go.  It's probably just one slackjaw and now that people know that it bothers you they will continue to do it. (Think elementary school playground)