So it’s been a week without an update. I apologize for that. Between the Tigers stinking up the joint, the start of prep football season, working nights labor day weekend and working the morning shift (which, as I work for an afternoon paper, means starting around 4:30 a.m.) this week and trying to remember my name by noon… It’s a nightmare of a swing. Well, it’s no excuse for not updating more frequently. It just is what it is.

A few issues to comment on:

• Kenny Rogers’ struggles

It’s sad to see he’s lost it. And it’s obvious, he has lost it. He knows it. You know when a player is that age, and has had that long a career, it can just escape just like that. Kind of like Todd Jones. Of course, Jones had an injury. (Does Kenny?) But same concept. Both aging pitchers fell off the table.

Unfortunately, fan perception was not totally balanced there. I am as guilty as the next guy, admittedly, for not giving Jones the credit he deserved. But I was happy to see Rogers given proper thanks for all he did for Detroit — and let’s face it, the man was incredible in 2006, both as a mentor and pitcher, and after his performance in the playoffs I will forever think of him as a Tiger even if most remember him as a Ranger. I don’t know if that will turn out to be his last start in Detroit. Maybe not. But in case it was, I’m just so thankful we had his pouncing kitten defense antics to watch for three years.

I imagine he’d want to be closer to his family if he retired from pitching, maybe step away from baseball for a bit. I don’t know. But I hope there’s always a position with the organization in the coaching ranks if he ever wanted one.

• Todd Jones

Bonus comment: I hope Todd Jones can get a chance to step out of the dugout to a standing ovation before the season ends. Put in a pass-or-fail position where his failures were scorned and his passings were forgotten, Jones was probably the most underrated Tiger this decade.

• Miguel Cabrera

Awesome. Totally awesome. I know. That is neither a particularly analytical comment nor a surprise to anyone who has watched the Tigers the past two-three months. But holy crap. He has been… awesome. Think if he did it for a whole year. Or heck, 80% of the year. He’s going to bring home AL MVP honors while wearing the Olde English D. That trade was 100% a winner.

• Off topic, but I’m rooting for the Brewers

Funny how Brewers fans came out of the closet … kinda like Tigers hats suddenly reappeared on heads in 2004 and jerseys were in droves in 2006. But I know too many to see their baseball hopes crushed by a September swoon. So think positive thoughts for Beertown, hey!

• Vance Wilson indebted to the Tigers

Kind of like with Troy Percival a few years back, acting as a scout when he could not pitch. It’s nice to see the Tigers continue to be a classy organization, and to hear players like Wilson feel loyal to the club because of it.

• This shocks me

600 fans saw the Marlins play? HUH! Can’t they move to Grand Rapids or something? I don’t care if it’s Grand Rapids, Minn. How the heck does a major league club only get 600 in attendance?

• The callups and whatnot

I haven’t actually been able to watch a complete Tigers game yet since they occured. So I have no real opinions. I’m glad Clay Rapada is back. I thought he should have been around for a lot more of the season. He deserves a real look for next year. I think it’s nice to see Mike Hessmen is up and getting regular playing time. I have a hunch he’s just a AAAA player, but hey, he’s living the dream, cheer him on. I’m curious to see how Dusty Ryan will do, because I guess Dane Sardinha just isn’t the answer as a backup catcher.

• Brandon Inge as catcher

I was talking to Ian, the voice behind Bless You Boys, on IM during the game yesterday. We were discussing how we thought Inge’s defense at catcher wasn’t the greatest and wondering if he’d improve during the offseason, knowing he is in all likelyhood “the man” for next season. And then he pulls off just a great double play, his second of the game. So you know what? I think he’ll be just find. I feel a bit uneasy, maybe, but he’s going to be just fine. I just hope he finds his bat. A full year behind the plate just has “mendoza line” written all over it. No wonder he prefers third base. . .

A few thoughts as the baseball season enters the final turn and the postseason chase becomes real:

• Pudge Rodriguez asked to be traded, NY Daily News’ Bill Madden reports. (Via Daily Fungo)
• Now, we put the pieces together and things start to make sense. Now we have a clearer picture why Dave Dombrowski decided to call Brian Cashman and say, “Hey, want our catcher?” In light of the theoretical — trading Pudge for some prospect from the Florida organization — becoming the necessary — he wants to leave, and he has a history of becoming a headache in the clubhouse — I’d say bringing back Kyle Farnsworth was probably a pretty good move. The Yankees weren’t going to give up anything too much to get him, and the Tigers weren’t going to get any of their A-level pitching prospects, of course.
• Now do I like the trade, in a vaccuum? Ever-so-just barely. Do I like the trade based on what we know now? Sure. I’m not thrilled. But I’m happy to accept it as a necessity. Thanking him for all he did for the Tigers and moving him was the right move.
• Personally, Pudge has taken a bit of favorability hit with me for asking to be traded, though not much of one because I still credit him for making Dombrowski’s job of bringing in free agents that much easier by agreeing to be a Tiger.
• Pudge probably should have thanked Jim Leyland for playing him less, if you look at his monthly totals. The more days off he was given, the better he seemed to bat. He may not realize this, but he’s an aging catcher who needs a few more days off. Nothing wrong with that. Did he think it hurt his free agent value? I don’t know why. He was putting up pretty decent numbers — .857 and .875 OPS numbers in the previous two months, as opposed to the .705 and .637 he did while catching nearly daily the first two months. Leyland absolutely made the right decision to rest him more, and the numbers prove it.
• My feelings on the trade deadline, I touched on in the comments section, but let me restate them here:  More or less, now that we know no further moves were made, I guess I’m mildly disappointed. Not much mind you. I would have liked to get a player for Pudge that would contribute past the final two months of 2008, but if it wasn’t to be, it wasn’t to be. No use lingering on that topic.
• As for moving the players who annoy us with their lack of contributions? I knew no team was dumb enough to trade for Edgar Renteria or Gary Sheffield at this point. WE don’t want them, so why would anyone else?  No big deal there.
• If Farnsworth comes out looking like the guy who has pitched for the past month or two for the Yankees, I’m sure my mood will shift towards the positive.
• Plus I’m intrigued to see Inge as the “daily” catcher because that’s definitely a piece of information the Tigers needed to find out before the offseason.
• Eddie at Tiger Thoughts is in a curious mood about catcher Paul Lo Duca, who was recently released.
• And if you were curious my non-Tiger trade thoughts?  I think Boston at best treaded water with their trade. Though they may be glad to get Manny Ramirez out of town, I feel like I’d rather have him than Jason Bay.
• Are the Angels the favorite to win the American League now? No. How can I say that after the trade?  I think the Angels’ move for Mark Teixeira obviously makes them better, though Casey Kotchman was no slouch. So it’s not like they upgraded a weak position with a superstar. And ultimately, I think what we find out is these big-name trades often don’t turn out like you expect them to.
• But my gut says Boston is still the favorite to win the A.L., despite the head-to-head results of the two teams in question.
• By the way, while looking at numbers at Baseball Prospectus, I found the Tigers have the best defensive efficiency in the A.L. Central. Who’d have expected that? It’s 7th in the league and 12th in the majors.
• Pitching is obviously still the sore point for the Tigers.
• Dontrelle Willis allowed one run on five hits in 5+ innings for Lakeland last night. He walked 3 of 21 batters. I think we’ll see him back in the Tigers uniform by Labor Day.
• Just for giggles, let me update my (awful) playoff predictions:  AL:  Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, New York (wild card); NL:  Philly, Cubs, Dodgers, Mets (wildcard).   AL pennant: Red Sox. NL pennant: Cubs. WS champ: Cubs.

Edit: Uhm, yeah, vacation just started and I already don’t know what day it is.

Some notes of important pitchers pitching in unimportant places.

• The Tigers announced Zach Miner will be returning from Triple-A Toledo to start in Monday’s game. So it appears he’s the important “fifth starter.”  He struck out 15 and walked two in his time there. Starting the previous two games, he struck out 12 and walked two. The problem, if you want some downside, if he only pitched 4 and 4-1/3 innings in the starts.
• In High-A, Dontrelle Willis pitched. That’s not all that eventful in and of itself. But this line is:  3IP, 0 BB, 4 H, 1 R.  ZERO WALKS IN THREE INNINGS!!

Does Freep.com insist on putting the same stories on its RSS feed for multiple days in an effort to get removed from my RSS reader? Because that’s where it’s leading.

• Jason Beck reports Edgar Renteria’s hamstring is still bothering him. It probably isn’t bothering Tigers fans too much, though.
• I hate the Twins.
• It was nice to see Sheffield come back to life last night. But a few things came to mind as Sheff homered once and had a second long ball caught over the fence in a defensive gem. 1) We’ve seen this before, after he came off the DL. 2) Does he need the extra rest, IE less playing time, to be consistently good? 3) Did ballpark dimensions affect things at all?
• My answers were:  1) Yes. 2) Yes? 3) Probably not given Oriole Park/Camden isn’t that much smaller to left.
• Fernando Rodney is on the trading block, the Freep reports. They didn’t have much to say. I’ll add that I doubt he fetches much. He’s basically going to fill the same role for any other team as he does for the Tigers: Some potential but not much more. No one’s going to give any useful pieces for him, I’m guessing. So the Tigers may as well just keep him around and decrease the pressure situations for awhile longer. He has some value. Just not in a one-run game.

Some Tigers thoughts as you enjoy the middle day of a three-day weekend:

• So the Tigers are 2-3 since returning to American League action. In my comments section, FJ wanted a time machine to go back, stop the Edgar Renteria trade and keep Jair Jurrjens a Tiger. I’m wondering if, long as he’s got that fancy Delorean, if FJ can’t get Bud Selig to move the Tigers to the NL rather than the Brewers…
• However, they have faced some pretty good pitching since returning to the A.L. And as the saying goes, good pitching beats good hitting.  It’s not a real good excuse, of course, because, you know, good teams should get some wins even against good pitching.
• Here are the ERAs (and ERA+ comparisons to average) of the starters Detroit has lost to:   Scott Baker, 3.65 ERA, 1.07 ERA+; Nick Blackburn, 3.78 ERA, 104 ERA+; Erik Bedard, 3.67 ERA, 107 ERA+. The average ERA of a starter in the A.L. is 4.24.
• Kenny Rogers must be wondering why his team hates him. In 18 starts by Rogers, the Tigers have scored 0 or 1 run five times. And twice they’ve only scored two runs.
• Of course, he’s not alone in his suffering. Justin Verlander’s run support is just a hair more than 4 runs per nine innings, ranking him near the bottom among starting pitchers in the A.L. (53rd of 65 starters with 60+ innings according to espn.com. I chose 60 innings to make sure it was among “regular” starters). Rogers gets 4.76 runs per nine while he’s on the mound.
• For the record, in 9 of 18 starts by Verlander, the Tigers scored two or fewer runs. Ouch! Makes it hard to win.
• What’s a more hair-raising experience? Driving the “pace car” near the crowds on those narrow winding roads in the Tour de France trying to stay ahead of the lead riders? Or being one of the riders?
• Thus far in his 25-plate-appearances major league career, Michael Hollimon’s slugging (.565) is more than twice his on-base percentage (.280). Interesting.
• The closest “regular” Tiger, depending on your definition of regular,  to that total is Marcus Thames, with a .610 slugging and .333 OBP.  Of eligible Tigers, the leaders for that are Miguel Cabrera at .115 difference and Magglio Ordonez at .114.
• The Tigers’ OBP is .340 this year. The 2-3-4 slots are .362, .333 and  .373, respectively.
• Just for comparison, for the 2007 season,  it was .345 with the 2-3-4 batters going .367, .365. and .421. That might explain a few things about why Mr. Rogers and Mr. Verlander don’t have as much run support!
• Returning to FJ’s point, knowing what we know NOW, I don’t think you make the Renteria trade. Still, I’m not sure. It’s not nearly as cut-and-dried as people seem to think it is, given the decision was not made in a vaccuum.
• At the time, the trade was a good idea. Remember, the Tigers knew Carlos Guillen was playing worse and worse at shortstop and wanted to protect him from injury for the length of his contract. They needed a quality SS. There was no dreams of getting Miguel Cabrera and Dontrelle Willis at the time, so it made sense to get a SS with some batting prowess and Jurrjens, while a nice young prospect, wasn’t a front-line starter either.
• Further food for thought: the National League is clearly the much weaker league. So Jurrjens likely wouldn’t be as successful in Detroit.
• And further: Who realistically is playing shortstop right now if that trade never occurs? And, while we can’t call this season a success, are the Tigers as successful as they were right now with that person as shortstop?
• So, I don’t know. I wish the Tigers have Jurrjens, certainly, but the issue is deeper than the first glance of Jurrjens > Renteria.
• Finally today, I think Detroit takes the next two games from the Mariners.
• Go A’s!! And please, Cleveland, would you win a game or two this weekend before breaking up the band?

Some news and notes:

• The Tigers’ short-season-A team, the Oneonta Tigers, seem to be up for sale. The team has a contract with Detroit through 2010. Interestingly, with a population of 13,000, Oneonta is one of the smallest towns affiliated with a major league club. I think someone in Marquette needs to buy it. Although that might be a bit of a commute for the New York-Penn league.
• Miguel Cabrera may end up on the disabled list, Lynn Henning reports. We’ll learn more today.
• La Velle E. Neal III, who appears to have the most complicated name in the A.L. Central beat writers’ circle, wrote in the Star Tribune that Jason Kubel will sit tonight while Craig Monroe gets the start. Kubel can’t hit Nate Robertson.
• Neal also reports Glen Perkins apologized for throwing the bal near Guillen’s head.
• There was lot to second-guess, a StarTrib blog reports.
• The Indians are alone in LAST?!! That’s kinda weird.
• Marcus Thames has the highest OPS for a Tiger with 100 at-bats or more. (He was 148) and a .961 OPS. He is just ahead of Magglio Ordonez (.866) and Curtis Granderson (.849).
• Robertson has allowed hte most hits and most ER in the Tigers’ rotation. That fact remained so even when you only look at the month of June though his ERA of 3.77 was much improved.
• The Tigers reportedly are one of the teams most interested in Freddy Garcia. I’m not sure I’m as interested as some. I know he won a decent number of games for several years. But even before injuring his shoulder, his ERA+ for his previous three seasons, from 2006 to 2004, was 105, 116 and 122.  That’s kind of going in the wrong direction.
• Jeremy Bonderman had a successful surgery to remove a rib. He’s now officially done for the season. But the surgery went well, fortunately.

• Ken Rosenthal thinks Dontrelle Willis is too fat to pitch.
• ESPN.com’s Buster Olney thinks Miguel Cabrera is too fat to hit. (hat-tip Spotstarters)
• Considering everyone commented how fit Cabrera was when he arrived at camp, one of two things is going on.
• 1) He’s got really! bad metabolism and eats like a horse to gain all that weight back that fast after signing his gigantic contract.
• 2) The excesses of his contract and the absences of his bat have left analysts who predicted a monster year grasping for forks and falling back on their favorite analysis: HE FAT!
• Jim Leyland doesn’t think it’s an issue.
• Honestly, I agree. He does look like he put a few pounds back, possibly related to his quad injury flaring up early in the year and maybe because he enjoys food too much. I wouldn’t doubt it has affected his game some, but he plays fine defense at first and is hitting better now.
• Think you can reboot the Tigers by trading away everyone? Think again, MLB Trade Rumors says.
• They look at some players and conclude: After this exercise I can see what Heyman meant. The Tigers’ veterans don’t have much trade value.
• Sadly that’s probably true. I think they could find a taker for a couple players but it wouldn’t get them too much in return, as far as prospects goes. Maybe if Edgar Renteria heats back up or Magglio Ordonez is really on the table. But in any case, the Tigers may have to make some moves, to free up the roster and future cash a bit.
• Who’s Eddie Bonine, besides “Detroit’s pitcher Saturday“? While I am usually one to answer that sort of question myself, my analysis would pale in comparison to Take 75 North’s Matt Wallace, who has actually seen Bonine pitch in person.
• Fernando Rodney may be one more game in Toledo away from returning to Detroit.
• Joel Zumaya struggled a bit however, despite hitting 100 mph on the radar gun a few times. But the Tigers shouldn’t be in a rush so that’s no big deal. Hopefully. He had two walks, a single, a double, a throwing error and allowed two runs in 1+ innings. Mlive’s article states he could be in San Diego with the Tigers a week from Friday, so there’s another appearance or two to be made, first.
• Gary Sheffield is resuming baseball operations, or something. I want to see him really prove he can hit before he clogs up the lineup. But a healthy Sheff would be a positive, in light of the other returning injured players. Detroit could give us an entertaining summer and maybe (stress maybe) start to claw their way back into a meaningful September.

• Carlos Guillen’s strained hamstring kept him out of the lineup today, Jason Beck reports.
• Dontrelle Willis was scheduled to have an MRI this morning but appeared in good spirits in the dugout, as shown on FSN Detroit.
• The Tigers rate last on the Baseball Prospectus hit list. Seeing as they started so poorly and it uses objective numbers for ranking, that sounds about right. No place but up to go!
• Former Tigers prospect Burke Badenhop debuted for the Marlins, striking out one in an inning of work.  Badenhop went to Florida in the deal that brought Willis and Cabrera. (hat-tip Fangraphs)
• Florida is turning into Motown South. Mike Rabelo homered yesterday, Andrew Miller is pitching today, 1998 Tiger Luis Gonzalez is there, as is 2003 Tiger Cody Ross. Eventually Cameron Maybin will make it up, too.
• Some stats, from ESPN.com unless otherwise noted.
• The Tigers are third in the A.L. in walks.
• And they’re at 100% in stolen bases at 8-for-8.
• They’re also worst in the MLB with 18 double plays grounded into.
• It may seem like the Tigers are grounding in an abnormally high number of at-bats, but they’re actually right in the middle of the A.L. (Hardball Times stats)
• The Tigers have a 5.20 ERA, second worst in the A.L. only ahead of the White Sox. The Marlins are the only N.L. team worse.
• Brandon Inge is the team leader with nine RBIs. That’s by far the most. 7 are runners driven in. The 3-4-5 hitters of Sheffield, Ordonez and Cabrera have driven in four baserunners.
• If you read Tom Gage’s story about Joel Zumaya’s recovery and wondered what internet photos he was referring to at the end of the story, these are your answer.

• How sad is it that when I saw the headline “Tigers flame throwers: Will Bautista join them?” for a Free Press profile about the Tigers reliever, I first thought of Ian’s post about Jason Grilli — especially the photo — Friday.

Joe Sheehan wrote at Baseball Prospectus the Tigers’ slow start to the season tells us nothing today we didn’t know about the team last Sunday (subscription required). While Tigers fans may not believe it, April losses don’t matter nearly as much as we think right now. Nor do October’s, other than the fact you take a few months off and someone else gets a parade.

Four games are meaningless. They’re a rounding error, a blip, five days to be forgotten just in time for the next cry of “Play Ball.” … In baseball, the very best teams are perfectly capable of taking a trip through their rotation without winning a game. (Sheehan)

• Some ugly stats:

Magglio Ordonez, .238 avg, .238 obp, .333 slg
Miguel Cabrera, .143, .294, .357
Edgar Renteria, .227, .261, .227
Gary Sheffield, .143, .500, .143
Jeremy Bonderman’s 5.68 ERA is better than Justin Verlander’s 6 and Nate Robertson’s 9.

• Think those guys will keep those poor starts (Sheffield’s OBP notwithstanding) up? No way.

• Good stats:

Brandon Inge, .375, .474, .875
Clete Thomas, .500, .500, .571

• Stats from Fangraphs.
• Yeah, they’re not going to keep that up, either, but it’s more important the first four guys hit than the last two guys don’t.
• So you can see, my working premise here is, it can’t get much worse than this. The bullpen may continue to blow some games, but every aspect of the team has crapped out all at once. They are playing exactly like a team that lost five straight games. But talent is talent, and things will even out.
• Fortunately the Indians have lost three in a row and the Yanks have started slow out the gate too. Eventually, all three teams are going to be winning regularly. But for Tigers fans, the “0″ and blown-up games is obviously getting hard to watch.
• The Red Sox designated reliever Kyle Snyder, who had a good 2006 but otherwise hasn’t done much. He had a Tiger-like appearance Saturday. (MLB Trade Rumors).
• I’m not saying Detroit should go after him, but maybe I’m saying they should think about DFA-ing an underperformer …
• Tigers on ESPN’s Sunday Night Baseball tonight. Great time to get that first win!

We got 10 inches of snow in Marquette and 26 inches of snow in Negaunee on April 1. I only wish that were an April Fools joke. Otherwise, while no fan of the off-day-after-opening-day, I did see a pair of baseball games tonight, including the A’s, so it wasn’t too bad. So here’s a few links I read tonight.

• The Tigers’ payroll is the second highest in baseball at nearly $139M when you include bonuses and all the other junk. It lags way behind the Yankees but is ever-so-slightly above the Mets. Never thought I’d be writing this paragraph in my lifetime. (Hat-tip Danny Knobler)
•  Jim Leyland will drop the puck at the Wings’ game Thursday. (Behind the Jersey)
• The Tigers and Tim Byrdak are looking for an agreement that would put him back in Toledo. I imagine he’d end up back in Detroit eventually. (Freep)
• D-Town Baseball has the probable pitching matchups for the next week.
• Ian interviewed awesome Kansas City Star columnist (and blogger) Joe Posnanski. Great interview, and if you’re not reading Pos’ blog, you should be. (Bless You Boys)
• Matt at Take 75 North tries to piece together the farm system rosters for the Tigers. (Take 75 North)

Some links to notice:

• I did a round table with Royally Speaking about my expectations for the A.L. Central.
• Ian has some nice new digs at Bless You Boys. I’m going to have to tidy up my blog a bit to keep up with the SportsNation powerhouse!
• But in all seriousness, he did a fun interview with Kansas City Star blogger Sam Mellinger, who also did an interview at BYB.
• Bilfer has 15 things he’d like to see this season.
• A fellow Spartan at The View From The Light Tower is not worried about Dontrelle Willis’ crappy spring.
• GO GREEN!
• Today is the rare occasion you can root against “the Tigers.”
• Just in case Jim Leyland surprises us, Lee profiled RHP Casey Fien at Tiger Tales.