Hawaii .Five-oh-seven
posted in 2008 season |Much has gone on in the Detroit Baseball world these past few days. Most recently, Hawaiin Dane Sardinha had his first major league hit, RBI and triple all at once to help the Tigers sweep the Rockies and improve to their winning percentage to .507 for the year.
Sardinha? Tigers above .500? Man. Best to go in order of occurrence.
Sardinha actually got the call up earlier in the week and played his first game against St. Louis, Thursday, after Brandon Inge went on the disabled list with a hurt oblique. Some players come up with great excuses for how they hurt themselves, but Inge’s offering take the cake: a pillow did it. Ian has more if you haven’t already caught up on the story.
The Tigers won easy Friday behind the eight inning, one-run, five-hit performance of Eddie Bonine in just his third major league game. Joel Zumaya pitched a scoreless ninth.
Saturday, Magglio Ordonez left the game with … a hurt oblique. This affliction is getting out of hand. Gary Sheffield already went on the DL with the problem this year. FSN showed pregame footage that showed Maggs looked to be feeling a bit sore even before the game. Anyway, he left in the third inning. Detroit led by a comfortable margin until Todd Jones took the mound. Jones has been perfect far too long to let that continue! So he allowed four runs and blew the save. Freddy Dolsi helped out for the final out. Jones looked like he gave away a chance at .500. But his teammates weren’t going to accept that. Placido Polanco got on base with a hit and Ryan Raburn with a walk, then Miguel Cabrera knocked a liner to right field that sent them both home for the win .500 at last. Oh, and earlier, Raburn hit a grand slam.
And Saturday, Maggs goes on the disabled list. Matt Joyce got the call to come back to Detroit. Maybe we can call him Matts to keep the nickname thing steady. Kenny Rogers throws a quality game, Dolsi proves invaluable yet again to bridge the gap with scoreless innings. And oh, the Hawaiin hit a two-out triple with two runners on in the bottom of the sixth to provide the go-ahead run.
So that’s your recap. A “scrub,” a minor league battery recently called up from Toledo, a reliever who started his season in High-A ball and some All-Stars teamed up to sweep the Rockies. Pretty fun weekend for the Detroiters.
All good things….but who’s scared silly of the Twins? I am — especially at that awful ballpark that belongs in the Death Star.
Also — Willis gave up three BB in 2.0 innings. Also gave up a hit and an earned run. Not a good beginning when you’re pitching to the best that the Florida State League has to offer.
I can almost say that the Tigers are for real. The test comes this week. AL Central Battles. If we can play this good against the AL and the Central in particular, then we are for real. I don’t mean we have to win every game, but that the team plays with this much heart and composure. And I believe they will. Playoffs are still a long ways off. I’m just enjoying it day by day. Yes, we always play the NL well (all of the AL plays them well, in fact). But, the truth is that if our team from earlier played the NL, results would have been different. Our line-up is once again looking fearsome, and maybe the best is yet to come, although these past few weeks, past month even, will be hard to beat.
BTW, I didn’t boo Jonesy last night like all of Comerica did. That pissed me off. The guy has been perfect, although in an unorthodox way, and they let him have it. Hopefully, they will apologize to him, all at once. He deserves it.
Anyway, this period before the all-star break will be one of the most pivotal points of our season. Hopefully, the hearts of the Tiger’s hopeful, scars freshly healing, will continue to beat in time to the rhythm of the Tiger’s surge towards greatness.
At the point, the Twins scare everyone, Flying J. It’s not just you.
Yes, I saw Dontrelle gave up 3 walks in two innings. Hopefully there was some improvement in the mechanics, despite the results. If he can get back on track it’s a great late season addition.
Kaos, I agree. One day, Todd Jones is out there, clowning around to entertain fans during a rain delay. The (almost) next day, he has his first real screwup of the season and the fans rip him. But I have a feeling the kind of fan who stuck out the rain delay probably wasn’t booing.
Like I’ve been saying, first Detroit gets to .500, then we start to watch the standings. They’re definitely in the race now and they’re a lot close to the team that went 17-4 than the one that went 24-36.