There are two ways of looking at Rick Porcello’s performance for the Tigers Sunday night.
One is he fell behind in the first inning, to a large degree because of his own doing. He didn’t have good command of the ball in the opening inning, and didn’t get over to cover first base in time on a potential first-to-short-to-pitcher covering first double play ball.
It wasn’t good, but he has pitched better in his last two outings than his pitching lines indicate. The Mariners didn’t hit the ball hard off him initially in his previous start vs. Seattle, but had three bloopers just fall in. His outing Sunday started with an infield single that was essentially just a tapper. Then the home runs came in both outings.
A lot of veteran pitchers would have been done after that first inning Sunday, especially in a pennant race on national television. Porcello, although he is just 20, didn’t come unglued, pitching into the sixth inning.
His two-seam fastball is a really effective pitch. You can see a little bit of Brandon Webb in Porcello. If he keeps that two-seamer, with its sinking action, in the low 90s like that, he is going to be very effective.
People are probably panning Porcello and thinking he isn’t all that good, nor is going to be all that good in the future. I think Sunday’s outing is why he not only has a bright future, but will perform reasonably well the remainder of the season - despite his youth.

Random Thoughts

- My best educated guess is that if the Tigers are sending out signals they need a backup catcher, they feel Carlos Guillen’s return is enough to cure their offensive woes. If that is, indeed, their line of thinking, I think it’s wrong. They need another left-handed bat and bullpen help to give themselves the optimum chance of securing the American League Central title.

- I wasn’t surprised by the news this is the last Buick Open, but disappointed nonetheless. Michigan is one of the great states for golf in this nation. It’s stunning, really, how many truly outstanding courses there are in this state. It’s one of our treasures. From that standpoint, and the sheer size of this state, it makes no sense whatsoever we will no longer have a regular stop on the PGA Tour. Hopefully it is just a temporary thing.