Results tagged ‘ Detroit Tigers ’
Yankees’ Sloppy Defense has Been Their Undoing Thus Far
For the majority of the past four seasons the Yankees have had the luxury of putting a top notch defense on the field anchored by former Gold Glove award winners at almost every position. The fact remains that many of those players were a bit past their prime but for the most part the defense the Yankees have put on the field these past four years has been solid. They didn’t make many mistakes, they hit they cutoff man, and they generally played smart baseball.
Well, during the first five games of this young season, the 2013 Yankees have looked nothing like their predecessors. The infield defense has been sloppy, teams are going 1st-to-3rd on every outfield single, and I don’t think a single New York outfielder has hit a cutoff man to date. And I haven’t even touched the surface on the defense behind the plate, where both Francisco Cervelli and Chris Stewart appear to be overexposed in full-time duty. Let’s break down some of New York’s issues on defense:
Detroit May Want to Rethink Their Closer Strategy
All offseason long Detroit general manager Dave Dombrowski held firm that his team had no intention of signing a closer on the free agent market. Last year’s closer Jose Valverde wasn’t going to be walking through the door regardless of managers Jim Leyland’s pleas to sign the free agent. Instead the Tigers were going to have an open competition during the spring to see who would get the ball in the 9th inning with minor league flamethrower Bruce Rondon listed as the favorite. But Rondon struggled with walk issues and posted a 5.94 ERA in 13 spring training outings, earning him a ticket to Triple-A Toledo to work on his control. That left the Tigers with an unenviable situation staring them in the plate: a smorgasbord of middling relievers forming a closer-by-committee.
Spring Training Battles: Left Field in Detroit
Each year baseball fans everywhere mark a random day in mid-February down on their calendars as one of the best days of the year: the day pitchers and catchers report, aka, the unofficial start of the Major League season. For many players, particularly veterans and All-Stars, Spring Training offers a chance to reconnect with old teammates while meeting new ones and to work the body into shape for the long grind of 162 games. But for many other players, rookies, guys on the fringe, or the 40-year-old looking for one last shot at glory, the start of spring represents the start of the season. These players are fighting for their big league lives, the last spot on the roster, or maybe even a starting position.
The defending American League champion Detroit Tigers are well-primed to defend their hard-earned pennant. They resigned Anibal Sanchez, reloaded with Torii Hunter, and will regain Victor Martinez to cover up one of the team’s only trouble spots a year ago, DH. They also play in the easiest division in baseball, one that took just 88 wins to capture a year ago, and they return the best hitter (Miguel Cabrera) and the best pitcher (Justin Verlander) on the planet.
The Round Mound of Pound Gives the Giants a 1-0 Series Lead
There have been 625 games in the illustrious history of the World Series and just 4 men have ever hit 3 home runs in a game. The list of players to accomplish the feat is predictably littered with all-time great Hall of Fame type talent: Babe Ruth, perhaps the greatest player to ever don a pair of cleats, Reggie Jackson, otherwise known as Mr. October, and Albert Pujols, a player whose enshrinement into Cooperstown will occur precisely 5 years following his retirement. Well after last nights power display, now you can add one more name to that prestigious list: Pablo Sandoval, the Kung Fu Panda.
World Series Preview: Detroit Tigers vs. San Francisco Giants
Major League Baseball fans everywhere should be a bunch of happy campers today. We’ve been blessed by the Baseball Gods with a star-studded World Series match-up between the American League champion Detroit Tigers and the National League champion San Francisco Giants. There is MVP and Cy Young hardware all over the place in this series. We have the presumptive 2012 MVP winners in Miguel Cabrera and Buster Posey, seated to your left (although there are MVP arguments for other players, Mike Trout in particular). Over in that corner you have the 2011 AL MVP/Cy Young winner in Justin Verlander. Turn around and you can catch a glimpse of Barry Zito, the 2002 Cy Young winner. Just strolling in the door is Tim Lincecum, the winner of the 2008 and 2009 Cy Young awards in the National League. It’s ridiculous how many big names are in this series, and we haven’t even mentioned the perennial All-Star types like Prince Fielder and Matt Cain. Every single playoff series, except for the ALCS, has been remarkably balanced and has gone the distance this year, and with two evenly matched competitors set to take the diamond tonight, you can expect more evenly matched world-class baseball. Here’s some of what you should be keeping your eye on in the games to come.
Anatomy of a Comeback: How the San Francisco Giants Pulled it Off
With a dominate 9-0 victory yesterday against the St. Louis Cardinals, the San Francisco Giants became just the 6th team in baseball history to overcome a 3 games to 1 deficit in a League Championship Series. Matt Cain helped lead the way, throwing the 3rd consecutive shutdown start in a row for Giants. Marco Scutaro and Pablo Sandoval rapped a couple more hits a piece, and the baseball Gods smiled once again on the zany Hunter Pence, who’s gutty efforts have come to define San Francisco’s comeback mentality. When all the smoke had cleared and Matt Holliday’s infield pop up was sitting safely in the glove of NLCS MVP Marco Scutaro, the celebration was on in San Francisco. By edging out the Cardinals for National League supremacy, the Giants improbably clinched their 2nd World Series berth in 3 seasons, and they have given themselves a shot at another ring. I’ll look ahead to the World Series tomorrow but for now I want to analyze how San Francisco was able advance pass the Cardinals against the odds, and it all goes back to the mid-season pickup of a 36-year-old journeyman shortstop.
Can the Yankees Come Back, sans Jeter?
The American League Championship Series got off to a rousing start last night before, ultimately, ending on a sour note. Tigers closer Jose Valverde continued his season long battle with the save, giving up a pair of 2-run homers and a 4-0 lead to the Yankees in the bottom of the 9th. A couple innings later, the Tigers were able to parlay an atrocious display of defense by Nick Swisher and some timely hits into a pair of 12th inning runs to escape with a 1-0 series lead. The game was particularly disastrous for New York because not only did they hand over home-field advantage, captain Derek Jeter was also lost for the rest of the playoffs due to a broken ankle.
How Does Miguel Cabrera’s Triple Crown Season Stack Up?
Yesterday, Detroit Tigers’ 3rd baseman Miguel Cabrera became the 14th player in baseball history to pull off the Triple Crown, leading the American League in batting average (.330), home runs (44), and RBI (139). His other-worldly ability to square up a baseball on the sweet spot of the bat is uncanny in today’s game, and Cabrera’s power to all fields can only be matched by one or two other players in baseball . These unique skills have allowed the 29-year-old slugger to achieve a Triple Crown season, something that has become a part of American iconoclast, due both in part to its rarity and its difficulty. How difficult is hitting for the Triple Crown you might ask? Well there are now only 3 living players who have achieved the feat: Cabrera, Carl Yastrzemski (1967), and Frank Robinson, who achieved the treble in 1966 as a member of the Baltimore Orioles.
To put it simply, Miguel Cabrera has put up a season for the ages. But how does his fantastic 2012 season stack up against other famous Triple Crown-winning seasons? And does Cabrera have a shot to repeat his feat in the future, which would put the slugger in the same class as Ted Williams and Rogers Hornsby, the only players ever to accomplish the feat twice? Let’s take a look at the numbers.
Previewing a Wild Final Day in Baseball
Even though all 10 playoff spots have already been claimed this year, the last day of the season still has the potential for fireworks, particularly in the American League. There are plenty of important story lines floating around out there including: the American League West having a winner-take-all game out in Oakland, the AL East dogfight finally reaching a conclusion , and a Triple Crown coming into fruition, among other things. Let’s take a sneak peek at some of the more intriguing bits of news still left in the regular season.
Ranking the Bullpens of the Playoff Contenders
In 2011 we saw the St. Louis Cardinals use a powerful offense while leaning heavily on a revamped bullpen to roll all the way to a World Series title. Having a strong bullpen for the postseason has never been as important as it has during the past couple of seasons, and for good reason. Pitchers throw fewer innings per outing with each passing year, which means a larger part of the 9 inning burden falls on pitchers who throw no more than 70 innings a season normally. Many of these players will be called upon in situations with enormous ramifications, whether it be to match up with a slugger like Joey Votto or to get out of a bases loaded jam. Let’s take a look at which teams’ bullpens are best prepared to enter the war of attrition known as October baseball.
