Bats work, runners don’t
posted in 2007 season, KC Royals |Royals 6, Tigers 3
I already discussed a key disagreement with Jim Leyland’s management here.
So here’s what happened. The Tigers had 16 hits. Four were doubles. Rather than translating into the winning six runs, that translated into the losing three. Let’s look further.
The 9-1-2-4 batters had a combined 12 hits. You’d think that would HAVE TO translate into more than three runs. But Timo Perez left on five runners from the No. 3 spot. Carlos Guillen, Pudge and Sean Casey all abandoned four runners from the 5-7 spots. No timely hitting. No runs. No win.
Nate Robertson gave up six runs. Three of those came on a two-out double with the base loaded. That basically spelled the beginning of the end. He gave up a home run the following inning and that was that.
The Indians won. The Mariners lost, at least. This is most certainly a frustrating start to the easy portion of the schedule.
If you’re looking for a bright spots on a day the Tigers fell 3-1/2 games out of first place, Placido Polanco had a three-hit day, as did Ramon Santiago. And Magglio Ordonez had a four-hit day, helping him keep the lead in batting average. And Jason Grilli did a nice job in the bullpen, going nearly four scoreless innings in relief of Robertson.
Bunt Singles:
- Curtis Granderson is featured in USA Today …er… today. Besides touching on the baseball aspect of Grandy’s career, the article also touches on a lot of the points that I think make him so popular among Tigers (and other baseball) fans.
Nate wasn’t impressive but it seemed like a smaller strike zone last night He wasn’t getting any of the borderline stikes on the corners.
Nate just doesn’t have strikeout pitch right now. Can someone please get a clutch hit? Timo, Casey, Inge??? Someone??