A full baseball season can be broken into Nine 18-game segments. I have termed these 18-game segments as an “inning” of a season. In the past I have provided analysis of each “inning” at www.detroittigersweblog.com. For 2009, I am going to post the analysis on my own blog www.samhoff.com.

Let’s compare the first seven innings of 2009:

                                                                      Starters:         Bullpen:

       W-L  RS –RA     HR-SB-AVG/OBA/SLG    W-L- IP-  ERA     W-L-S-ERA

1st:  10-8  102-84     21-12-276/349/432    7-6-103.1-4.62    3-2-4-3.96

2nd:  10-8   99-86     20- 6-265/342/436    8-5-104.0-3.63    2-3-3-5.68

3rd:   9-9   67-65     14-13-252/317/370    9-8-114.1-3.23    0-1-5-4.23

4th:  12-6   85-84     29- 8-259/335/459    6-5- 97.2-4.98    6-1-6-4.08

5th:   7-11  70-76     23- 7-234/307/403    5-7-108.1-3.90    2-4-3-3.66

6th:  10-8   82-86     16- 7-268/338/412    6-6-113.2-4.75    4-2-5-3.44

7th:   9-9   74-85     25- 9-250/321/423    5-5-104.0-4.76    4-4-6-4.39

 

 

The seventh inning saw the Tigers finish 9-9. The Tigers started out the inning 1-4 after losing the first 3 games in Boston which included a controversial brawl and the Rick Porcello suspension. The Tigers went a respectable 8-5 after that while outscoring their opponents 54-46. The Tiger’s gained in the Central division race as the Twins (10-8) and the White Sox (7-10) had their own struggles. 

  

Starting Pitching: The Tigers starting pitching was pretty mediocre (4.75 era). Justin Verlander continues to roll up strikeouts (31 in 27.2 innings) and his 2-0 win against Boston on August 13 may be the turning point in the Tigers season. Galarraga was pretty effective in 2 starts then was strangely sent down to Toledo with elbow inflammation. Rick Porcello only pitched 12 innings thanks impart to his 2nd inning ejection at Boston. Washburn was very effective for a guy who gave up 7 HRs in 26 innings. After having no run support all year, Edwin Jackson got 2 wins despite pitching very ineffectively.

 

Name G IP W L S K ERA WHIP
Justin Verlander 4 27 2/3 2 2   31 3.90 1.19
A Galarraga 2 11 1/3 0 0   9 3.18 1.32
Rick Porcello 3 12    0 1   10 5.25 1.25
Jarrod Washburn 4 26    1 0   14 4.85 1.23
Edwin Jackson 4 22 1/3 2 1   14 5.24 1.84
Zach Miner 1 4 2/3 0 1   3 9.64 1.93

Bullpen: The bullpen continued to be effective. Eliminating Lambert and Dolsi’s 3 horrendous outings the bullpen posted a 2.78 ERA.  Fernando Rodney continues to pitch well as an unearned run lead to his only loss. Seay, Lyon, Ni, and Perry were all effective as middle relievers. Zach Miner took 33% of the Tiger’s loses in the 7th inning and seems to be best suited for low leverage situations.  

Name G IP W L S K ERA WHIP
F Rodney 7 8 1/3 0 1 6 7 1.08 0.96
Bobby Seay 8 7    2 0 0 6 2.57 1.14
Fu-Te Ni 4 6 2/3 0 0 0 2 4.05 0.90
Brandon Lyon 6 7    2 0 0 7 3.86 1.57
Ryan Perry 8 9    0 0 0 11 3.00 1.56
Zach Miner 5 7 1/3 0 2 0 3 2.45 1.23
Chris Lambert 2 6 2/3 0 1 0 4 14.85 2.70
Freddy Dolsi 1 1 1/3 0 0 0 1 6.75 4.50

 

Offense: The offense continues to perform below expectations. Thank God for Miguel Cabrera who like last year, really seems to be heating up in towards the end of the year. Magglio is showing signs of life as 6 extra base hits and Clete Thomas’ 20 strikeouts in 46 ABs seem to make it apparent that Maggs will get his 18m option (he needs 55 more ABs in the remaining 36 games). Guillen, Granderson, and Polanco all get passing offensive grades for the 7th inning. Ryan Raburn hit well, but is now officially categorized as a butcher at 3B as a 3-error effort against KC on August 16 brought his career fielding percentage to .811 at that position. Avila proved he is human, but you have to love the fact that he coaxed 5 walks in his 30 plate appearances. Ramon Santiago seems to be winning the year long shortstop battle with Everett as he has hit much better and has a slightly better range factor for the season. Brandon Inge is not hitting at all, but pretty much has to be kept in the lineup for his glove. Gerald Laird’s offense continues to disappoint despite his good defense. Thames has been relegated to playing only against lefty starters. The Tigers were rumored to have traded for Aubrey Huff, but it doesn’t seem that he has shown up yet!

Name G AB HR RBI SB BA OBP SLG
Miguel Cabrera 17 64 5 17 2 .422 .486 .750
Magglio Ordonez 14 41 1 4 0 .390 .490 .634
Carlos Guillen 16 52 4 11 0 .269 .367 .519
C Granderson 17 63 3 5 1 .222 .300 .444
Ryan Raburn 16 28 4 5 2 .357 .400 .821
Alex Avila 10 25 2 4 0 .240 .367 .560
Placido Polanco 18 74 0 4 1 .284 .303 .324
Ramon Santiago 13 31 1 2 0 .290 .353 .387
Marcus Thames 11 35 2 6 0 .200 .237 .400
Adam Everett 12 32 1 3 1 .219 .242 .375
Gerald Laird 11 36 0 1 1 .167 .250 .250
Brandon Inge 17 61 2 6 0 .131 .154 .230
Clete Thomas 16 46 0 3 1 .130 .216 .130
Aubrey Huff 8 24 0 1 0 .083 .154 .083

 

The 7th inning featured 4 games at Boston and a 6 game road trip to the west coast where the Tigers have traditionally struggled. A 9-9 record and increasing the lead in the central are positive signs. The next inning features 12 home games and only seven games against a team with a winning record (all vs. TB). The Tigers need to make hay in the 8th inning to build a cushion going into the last inning which will feature 13 games against Minnesota and Chicago. As pointed out in previous posts, history is not on their side. But with a relatively healthy team, and a favorable schedule, Leyland will have no excuses for not winning the central division.