I love interleague play. Apparently, the Tigers do too. After going 12-3 against the Dodgers, Giants, Padres and Cardinals Detroit has moved over .500 for the first time all year. More importantly, it seems like they’re starting to find their groove.
I don’t want to jump the gun. After all, only the Cardinals in that group are any good and they were a little banged up. But this team is starting to look a lot like they did in “06 with the late inning heroics and the role players coming through in the clutch. They’ve got a long way to go if they expect to make it to the post season, but they’ve gone from 12 games back to only 5 in the blink of an eye. I wouldn’t expect them to continue playing .800 baseball the rest of the way through, but 5 games back at the end of June is easy enough to overcome.
More importantly, if they are able to manage to get to the post season, I would hate to be the team playing them. Leyland can say what he wants about chemistry in baseball, but if you’re a fan, you’ve seen it before. The Tigers had chemistry in “06 and the Rockies and Indians had that Mojo going last year. Granted, they didn’t win it all, but they finished strong. And the Red Sox have had it ever since they came back on The Yankees in “04 down 3 games to nothing. They’ve got 2 championships to show for it in the last 4 years, so it does make a difference.
They may not score 1000 runs as many (myself included) expected, and they sure as hell ain’t the new Murderers Row (What the hell was I thinking), but they are starting to play really good baseball. They’re hitting well, and hitting timely. Before, they were scoring 19 runs in useless one sided games, then losing 4-1. Now they’re winning the close games.
The pitching staff will never be confused with the Braves from the 90’s, but the starting pitching has quietly gotten a helluva lot better in the last month. As bad as Rodney looked when he came back, he has begun to regain his control. Todd Jones, rollercoaster ride that he is, has only blown one save all year – and The Tigers came back and won the game anyway.
All of this leads me to one conclusion: There is a reason that Jim Leyland manages The Tigers, and I only write about it. Because he knows what he is doing, and most of us can only second guess it.
