The Tigers outhit the Angels 11-10 and lost. The night before, they outhit the Angels 9-4 and lost. This is a troubling pattern that started on April 11th when the Tigers had 18 hits but also left 19 RISP in a game they barely won 9-8 against Cleveland.
Detroit currently has the sixth highest batting average in MLB at .275 and the 2nd best in American League (behind Kansas City of all teams). They have the league leader in RBI in Cabrera who is hitting .364, our rookie leadoff hitter Jackson is hitting .328 and Magglio is starting strong at .316 (Side Note: Ex-Tigers Ivan Rodriguez and Placido Polanco are currently in the Top 10 in hitting). The Tigers also draw walks at an outstanding pace, trailing only the mighty Yankee lineup in on-base percentage. In spite of our ability to get on base, we are 21st in MLB in total RBI. In other words, we are not clutch and inept at manufacturing runs.
This falls on the coach. If your lineup can outhit the other lineup consistently, the manager needs to find a way to outscore the other team. As strong as our average is, we are not a powerful lineup and finish bottom half in power numbers. This predicates a manager who can set productive lineups and understands how to manufacture runs. They don't keep stats on this but I'm going on record as saying the Tigers lead the league in men stranded at 2nd base with no outs. In particular, Leland does very little to energize the bottom of our order with hit and run, bunts or steals. It is also alarming to see us start slow so often. Four of our wins came from Tigers beating up on weak bullpens and too many Top 3 pitchers shut us down. The Tigers need to come ready to play and jump on pitchers early before they have their best stuff just like opposing teams do to us.
It's not all on Leland (though I will put last year's collapse squarely on his ineptitude). Our pitching staff is 25th in opposing batting average and needs to improve, particularly Verlander and Ricky who have yet to overwhelm anybody. I think they will come around but it's worth noting that Minnesota is 22nd in opposing batting average and falls lower than Tigers in most batting statistics except RBI. I've long said that I would trade Cabrera and Verlander for Twins coach Ron Gardenhire and believe we would win more games the very next season.
That won't happen so I am forced to hope that our pitching reverts to form in a hurry, lest we spend the entire season watching from behind the vile Twins again.
The team has scored only 24 ER's against 69 innings pitched by opposing starters.
ReplyDeletePorcello could be running into the wall that JV did in his second year.