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The Weekend Buzz while you eagerly anticipate that certain anthem that makes grown men cry following Monday's NCAA championship game:
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| The Tigers' early slump is enough to make manager Jim Leyland sick. (US Presswire) |
But, know what? This is why we watch baseball. It's why we remain glued to the game and hang on its every curveball. No, not to watch the Tigers lose every day. But because it never turns out like it says it should on paper. That's what keeps it so fascinating.
These Tigers are loaded, and the raging debate all spring was whether they would score 1,000 runs. Certainly, they were going to break their own club record of 957 runs scored in 1934.
Well, you don't have to look too far to finger the main reason why the Tigers are the only team in the majors yet to enter the win column. The team with the Murderers' Row lineup on Sunday enters this week ranked dead last in the American League -- and 28th of 30 major-league clubs -- with 15 measly runs scored.
A thousand runs scored? That's an average of 6.2. runs per game. So far, the toothless Tigers have scored more than three runs a game only twice in six outings.
Magglio Ordonez, Miguel Cabrera and Placido Polanco are off to frightful starts. Brandon Inge leads the club both in homers and RBI, and outfielder Clete Thomas has the highest batting average, and neither of them was supposed to play. But center fielder Curtis Granderson is out -- though he's expected back in about 10 days -- and Gary Sheffield and Cabrera have missed time.
Entering Sunday's game, the Tigers needed to go, oh, 35-0 to match the legendary 35-5 start by the 1984 Tabbies. Then they were drubbed by Chicago 13-2, fell to four games behind the first-place White Sox, and the Tigers can't even count to one, let alone 35.
There are other issues, to be sure. The Tigers' bullpen remains lacking with key pieces Joel Zumaya and Fernando Rodney on the disabled list (and Francisco Cruceta still unavailable because of visa problems).
One spin around the rotation only enhanced the questions following Justin Verlander (who wasn't so hot Sunday) -- particularly where Jeremy Bonderman (four runs and eight hits in 6 1/3 innings against Kansas City) and Dontrelle Willis (seven walks Saturday against the White Sox) are concerned. Manager Jim Leyland said this spring that he thinks Bonderman is a consistent change-up away from going from a good major-league pitcher to a great major-league pitcher. Still waiting.
But the pitching -- both starting and relief -- has been good enough to win at least two or three games. The overriding issue remains the one thing nobody dreamed would be a problem. Leyland terms the hitters "anxious." The fact that the Tigers rank eighth in the AL in on-base percentage and 14th in runs scored suggests they're pressing.
The fact that no team has ever started 0-6 and won a World Series -- and only two have started 0-6 and made the playoffs, the 1995 Cincinnati Reds and the 1974 Pittsburgh Pirates -- no doubt will lead to more anxiety. That, or even more nicotine for Leyland.
Nobody thinks the entire lineup is going to remain in a prolonged slump that will ruin the season. Of course, nobody ever dreamed the Tigers would lose their first six in a row, either.
