Tigers On Top

Not quite as gleeful as yesterday.

Today we lost Danny and Jeannette to Santa Barbara, so they were replaced by Yazan’s little brother Gabby as well as my buddy Hugo, who has attended at least one Tiger Pride game every year since the tradition began, something no one else outside of my family can claim. Other than that, the crew from yesterday were back and ready to go.

Tigers fans in general did not turn out in the same huge unbelievable numbers as yesterday, possibly because many A’s fans were enticed by the free A’s poker set giveaway. No Jonesy sightings during BP, but I did see John Lowe and Vance Wilson. John Lowe, in case you didn’t know, is the Tigers beat writer for the Detroit Free Press. He is also a huge mentor for kids at the Michigan Daily–he read practically every men’s gymnastics story I wrote last year. He’s the kind of guy who can make you feel like you’re the best writer in the world. He was pretty busy today what with the trade deadline stuff (even though the Tygs didn’t do anything) but he still chatted a bit–well, more like yelling back and forth since I was above the dugout. Vance Wilson I found when I mistook Little Nate for Jonesy (his back was to me, they’ve both recently gotten haircuts, and Nate was hugging someone in the stands–typical Jonesy behavior). So I scampered over and discovered the someone was Vance Wilson! Very exciting. He was there with his little boy, and it sounded like he was heading to Detroit to catch some games there. Well, not literally catch, of course. It was pretty weird seeing him in civvies on my side of the fence, I’ve gotta say.

Tonight was quite migratory–bleachers to bullpen and finally back to Nick, where we belong. The game began with Jack Cust showing exactly why the A’s use him mostly as a DH, flubbing a ball in left and allowing Curtis to get all the way to third on the error. The Tygs took a 3-0 lead on some nice timely hitting, and then it all went to shit. A sloppy game all around. Errors all over the place. What was Carlos THINKING, triple clutching like that?! That keyed the whole ugly A’s rally.

Our migrations tonight unfortunately did not take us near a lot of other Tigers fans, and thus I had to listen and stew furiously as the A’s fans chanted exceedingly witty things such as, “Detroit sucks!” (And Oakland is such a shining example of a thriving city?) or “Hey Jones, at least you won’t have the chance to blow the save tonight!” Made me remember why I spent the first fifteen years of my life hating the A’s with a fiery vengeance (now I root for them when they aren’t playing the Tygs).

I couldn’t believe how long Leyland left McBride in. Actually I was trying to send ESP signals not to put him in at all. But I guess my boy Jason Grilli (still got a soft spot for him) didn’t do too much better. It just seemed like no one could throw strikes tonight, not consistently anyways. So much for the grand pitchers duel. Tonight was more of a slop fest.

Thankfully, the Indians lost so they didn’t gain on us. Tomorrow it’ll be Dallas Braden against Little Nate. If Nate’s on his game, as we all know, no one can beat him. However Braden has been doing quite well of late–the last game I saw him pitch, he was pretty brilliant and just lost because the A’s didn’t score for him. Kid can’t curve a cap brim to save his life … but that is a rant for another day. Gotta take the series tomorrow, not just cause it’s bloody CRUCIAL, but the Mom is coming. And if the Tigers don’t win, I’m not gonna hear the end of it.