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Current myths (compared to reality) about the Tigers
Where are the Tigers going to find a spot for Magglio Ordonez: Easy. Right field. Hitting third. Ordonez is a lifetime .310 hitter with 162-game averages of 26 home runs and 110 RBI. Casper Wells has a lifetime minor league batting average of .250 without exceptional power. He is hitting .239. There are those who feel like Andy Dirks is this big find for the Tigers. He is hitting .226. Combined they are hitting .233 with five home runs and 16 RBI in 133 at bats this season.
Any reasonable facsimile of Ordonez should be a marked improvement. He should be completely healthy by now. Only question remaining is whether he has hit the wall at age 37.
The Minnesota Twins are done: No, they are not. I have no idea how under the circumstances, although Michael Cuddyer has been extremely hot lately, but the Twins have won nine of their last 11 games. They are nine games out of first place. I know it sounds like a lot, but this is a team that rallied to beat the Tigers while seven games down with just 26 games remaining in 2009. And Joe Mauer is due back in the lineup later this week.
The White Sox aren't much of a threat because they need a closer: The White Sox are very ominous from the standpoint they have basically played awful baseball, but are just 3 1-2 games out of first place and only two games below .500. Yes, it's true, they are a save opportunity about to be blown right now. But they will trade for a closer. The White Sox are always very aggressive near the trade deadline. This season will be no exception.
Replay of my livestream chat today. We addressed the Tigers in the first segment:
Any reasonable facsimile of Ordonez should be a marked improvement. He should be completely healthy by now. Only question remaining is whether he has hit the wall at age 37.
The Minnesota Twins are done: No, they are not. I have no idea how under the circumstances, although Michael Cuddyer has been extremely hot lately, but the Twins have won nine of their last 11 games. They are nine games out of first place. I know it sounds like a lot, but this is a team that rallied to beat the Tigers while seven games down with just 26 games remaining in 2009. And Joe Mauer is due back in the lineup later this week.
The White Sox aren't much of a threat because they need a closer: The White Sox are very ominous from the standpoint they have basically played awful baseball, but are just 3 1-2 games out of first place and only two games below .500. Yes, it's true, they are a save opportunity about to be blown right now. But they will trade for a closer. The White Sox are always very aggressive near the trade deadline. This season will be no exception.
Replay of my livestream chat today. We addressed the Tigers in the first segment:
Labels: Magglio Ordonez
posted by Pat Caputo at
9:24 AM
8 Comments:
Statistically the Twins are done.
If they win at a 0.600 pace the rest of the way, they win 84 games.
And only two teams, Boston and the Phillies, who both are a lot better than Minny, are now at that pace.
But you're right, teams in our division can not back into this pennant race. A team still needs 87 or more wins to do that. What's new.
Anonymous,
They were "done" in 2006 and 2009, too. Much later. And still won.
Caputo
Perhaps Book,
But I personally would like to move on to the spin off of this 2006 core into The Next Generation ... God love Ordonez - Guillen - Inge - but that core not only made the world series in 2006 - they came in last place in the AL Central in 2008. I personally don't think this version of Maggs -that moving Ordonez back into the lineup in a every day role will not get us to 90 games any faster. Ordonez also has his defensive downside too.
But I was very wrong about Avila - maybe I'm not giving Maggs the credit you think he deserves. It would be nice to be wrong AVILA style twice in a season!
I'm sticking with my original prediction 1. Chicago 2. Minnesota 3. Tigers - those two teams have better position players than we do. That will make the difference in the second half.
Pat, La, La, La .... I can't hear you?! My hands are over my ears.
I agree with number 2 and 3, although I still like our chances because of our rotation.
Number 1 is still up in the air. The "has Magglio hit the wall" question is a big one. And also he's going to be a major step down defensively because he's worse than Boesch in RF, and Boesch is a lot worse than Dirks in LF. So he doesn't need to just be better than Dirks offensively, but significantly better to make up for that.
key questions regarding Ordonez are how often Leyland should rest him and whether Boesch is the better #3 hitter at this point.
Leyland will put the proven vet in the 3 hole, but a pretty strong argument could be made for keeping Boesch there...he's hit .307 and slugged .551 with all 8 HRs out of that slot...numbers that we were hoping to get from Magglio at this point in the season...go figure.
The search for production out of the #2 slot in the lineup continues. Perhaps Boesch could do the job even though he's not the prototypic contact guy. They just don't seem to have an answer within the organization for that question. Maybe the fix will come at the trade deadline.
Anonymous,
The Twins are never done. Too many times they have rallied to win the division.
Caputo
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