How in the hell can i watch or listen to this game?
Watch: MLB Network – WPHL 17
Radio: WPHT – WXYT – XM 176

Starters:
Detroit Tigers: Fu Te Ni (0-0, 7.94 ERA, 5.2 IP)
Philadelphia Phillies: Roy Halladay (1-0, 0.91 ERA 14 K’s in 10 IP)

Also scheduled to pitch today for the Tigers:
Brad Thomas (0-0, 3.86), Eddie Bonine (1-0 5.68), Enrique Gonzalez 1-0 4.15), Ryan Perry (0-1 8.53).

This morning, according to Press Pass the Tigers optioned Alfredo Figaro to Toledo. Minor leaguers returned to the minor league camp were pitchers Cody Saterwhite and Andrew Oliver, plus catcher Mike Rabelo, SS Gustavo Nunez and outfielder Kory Casto.

With these moves, the Tigers have 39 players remaining on the spring roster.

Ramon Santiago’s 2 run triple opens the scoring for Detroit in bottom of the second inning off of Halladay. Diaz singles in another run in the next at bat.

Guilled missed a homer run by “just that much”. Halladay doesn’t look to have his normal stuff today. When I say normal stuff, he’s just merely good today.

Eight men come to the plate in that inning, three runs score, left two men on base.

Fu Te Ni comes back out for the third inning. He’s worked two solid innings thus far.

Guillen with his patented sliding catch for an out. When I say patented, I mean “He misplayed it again, but saved his arse by sliding and catching it”.

No hitter broken up by Halladay, who shows off his bunting skills, yo.

Just two hits given up by Fu Te Ni. Nice job.

Cabrera opens the bottom of the third with a double. His
first hit of the day. Inge lines out to Big Bad Howard. One down, man
on second. Detroit up 3-0.

Lively crowd in Lakeland.

Larish is hitting .385 for the spring. The ball is exploding off the bats
today. Or MLB.TV has the mics turned up. You decide. I’m going to take a
drink of my coke.

Product placement. Got to pay for this addiction some how.

Halladay looks weird in a Philly uniform. I’m just going to throw that
out there for public opinion. Larish hits one deep, but not deep
enough and that’s out number two.

Miggy moves on to third base. I’m calling it right now. He’s going
to steal home.

There’s an Opie and Anthony fan in the background, apparently, I can
hear the “Ramoooooon” – I get it buddy. WOW. Santiago grounds out to
the second baseman – Miggy stranded at home.

Eddie Bonine in for Fu Te Ni. That’s the funnest name to spell. That and Funkhauser.
I really enjoy that name as well. Bonine pops Victorino up for the
first out of the Top of the fourth.

Chase Utley hits a lazy fly ball that Guillen labors to catch. Maybe he didn’t labor,
but it’s a labor for me to watch him out there. Actually, it’s just
scary. So very, very scary.

Big Bad Howard slams a double, where the ball gets stuck underneath the padding
of the wall. It’s all for nothing though, Bonine uses his jedi powers for
good and keeps a the Phillies at bay by inducing a line drive out
to the Jackon in center.

Dlugach (not such a fun name to spell) doubles for the first hit of the bottom of the fourth inning. How do you say Dlugach? I’ve heard it pronounced several different ways.

Thomas pops out to end the inning – Rollins and Mayberry almost got to know each other a LOT better.

The umpire is very slow. Like he’s guessing if it’s a strike on the corner. Doesn’t he realize I have to pee? Or does he just not care? One down. With exception to Big Bad Howards double, Bonine has looked good.

Inge getting a lot of work this inning, with two ground balls his way so far this inning. Looks healthy.

Dlugach almost sends one over Miggy’s head, who comes up a little lame after words – but the inning is over with no damage done.

Halladay still in. What are they doing? Trying to ruin my ace’s fantasy season? Get Dubee on the phone.

NOW.

Graphic alert: Guillen is a lifetime .087 hitter against Halladay.

Cabrera up. Good. Victorino steals a base hit from Miguel. Nice diving play to catch a knuckling lazy fly ball. Inge follows it up with a double with two outs in what they believe will be Halladay’s last inning.

That’s what I thought, Dubee.

Man, a guy in the front row almost lost his pizza. Talk about a day gone wrong. Announcers a mocking Larish, calling him a statue.

They keep saying Larish’s dad is his hitting coach. Wonder how Lloyd feels about that. Will they fire his dad next? Stay tuned to These are the Days of The Detroit Tigers.

Larish grounds out to end the inning.

Wilken Ramirez in now for Detroit.

Ok, this sample of what the season will bring from Tigernotes.net is now concluded. I wanted to test some things on word press. We’ll be back for the regular season night games, doing what we just did.

See you then.

Love is in the air, babies. Gifts are being bought, dinners being ate and relationships being rekindled. The same could be said of baseball lovers. We’re on the brink of rekindling our obsessions with our favorite teams. We can look forward to no less that 162 dates  - but hopefully more.

At the end of this courting, we hope to see a ring. What to wear, what to wear in November.

Here are my valentine gifts for the Detroit Tigers:

Justin Verlander: 20 wins and 300 strikeouts, young man.
Rick Porcello: You don’t have to do anyone elses laundry, anymore, sophomore.
Scott Sizemore: Hey, Scott, Rick is looking for you. He’s got something for you.
Austin Jackson: Forgive the Granderson fans, they’ll come around.
Max Sherzer: I’m buying you contacts, because, buddy, your eyes freak me out a little.
Brandon Inge: Healthy legs and no Home Run Contest this season.
Magglio Ordonez: Your long hair back. But not like this.
Gerald Laird: A batting tee.
Carlos Guillen: A book, “How to pass time on the bench, while DH’ing”.
Joel Zumaya: Guitar Hero 2. Sorry, couldn’t resist.

And finally:

Ernie Harwell: There is nothing I can give you that would ever do you justice sir. You are my childhood, in a little box with one speaker and a clothes hangar for an antenna. You are the voice of God, the voice of reason, the voice of baseball.

Last season was a tale of two very different seasons for Detroit Tiger outfielder Magglio Ordonez. He started the season with his customary long black locks, but gone was the power that was a signature of the Venezuelan born Ordonez.

Through the first 57 games (and 242 plate appearances) Ordonez had just two home runs and twenty-two RBI with a .273 batting average. Compare that to just one year before, Maggs was sitting on nine home runs and thirty-seven RBI with a .322 batting average in his first 57 games (239 plate appearances).

The plate appearances are key. If Ordonez made it to the plate 1,080 times over the course of 2008 and 2009 seasons his contract would automatically vest. He ended the season with 1,141 plate appearances, for a pay day of 18 million dollars.

Even the most ardent fan was irate over the vesting of the contract. But lets examine what Magglio did in that second half:

In 76 games he hit .337 while driving in twenty-nine RBI with seven home runs. Basically a return to what he was doing in the first half of the previous season. Or before everyone was complaining about the vesting of the contract.

Why am I bringing this up? I’m bored, mainly. I’m really at a point where I’m tired of the coffee table GM’s worrying about Mike Illitchs money. Seriously, if Illitch didn’t want that contract to vest he would have made it known. And had he made it known, and it had vested, Dave Dombrowski would be out of a job right now – well, at least out of Detroit.

So say Magglio (who is our second best hitter, behind Miguel Cabrera) gets off to a HUGE start, driving in runs, etc. Do you still worry about vesting? Do you still worry about Mike Illitchs money?

Would you rather lose, then spend 18 million dollars of someone Else’s money?

“The rumors of my death have been greatly exaggerated”

- Mark Twain

It began last season when Magglio Ordonez reached the vaunted at bat that vested his contract for 2010. Detroit Tiger fans scratched their heads in mystery, some jumping the very bandwagon they called home after Magglio hit the famous HR to send Detroit to their first world series since 1984.

We’re going to have to cut a lot of dead weight now, they’d type angrily at various message boards found on the world wide web.

And then the fateful day of December 8th, 2009. Curtis Granderson and Edwin Jackson, two very important pieces to a second place team during the regular season were traded. Detroit got lefty reliever Phil Coke and outfield prospect Austin Jackson from the Yankees, plus touted young pitchers Max Scherzer and Daniel Schlereth from Arizona.

The fall out was fierce.

Granderson, 28, has a very loyal fan base with the Tigers. The fans, to say the least, were not happy with the deal.

But than it began; “They are cost cutting”, “Giving up on 2010 for a run in 2011″. And sure, in the epicenter of this hurricane was a lot of things that proved this theory correct. Why would Detroit send a beloved Tiger (this generations Willie Horton?) away WHILE also trading a guy that had just won 13 games for the organization.

But few looked at the arms Detroit stocked with this move – nor did they think about the possible future of highly touted Yankee prospect Jackson. And I understand why – broken hearted fans don’t see clearly right away.

But then something happened.
Something big.

The Tigers committed 80 million dollars to superstar-ace Justin Verlander over the next five years. How’s that for cost cutting? Verlander was coming off easily his best year, statistically. The move made a lot of people happy – but now their was the seed of doubt planted … why sign Verlander to this deal now?

Aren’t we supposed to be cutting cost?

And now reports are coming out that Detroit has officially made an offer to Johnny Damon. No one is sure if its 1 year, $7 million or 2 years $14 million. But the offer was authorized by Mike Illitch.

You know, the owner of the club.

So ask him, if this team is cutting costs.

And I hate to be critical of any one wearing the Tiger uniform … but if that’s the case … good.

His defense has been a liability for far too long. So much so that Manager Jim Leyland – who is a HUGE Carlos Guillen fan – would bench him in late innings for defensive purposes.

My breaking point with Guillen was after the one-game playoff with the Twins. Guillen was pulled for defensive purposes. Not happy about this, and siting that you don’t treat a former all-star like this, he publicly criticized Leyland.

Strike three Pudg…er, Guillen.

Is he capable of being a decent DH? Maybe, if he can stay healthy, which isn’t a given. In the six years he’s played in Detroit, Guillen has missed significant time on the DL four of those years. At 34-years old, I don’t see that trend coming to an end anytime soon.

So, if it means Guillen playing less – or even being traded – I’m all for the signing of Johnny Damon.

I won’t say I was a huge Thames supporter. He was a one dimensional player – but often times wasn’t given a chance to get into a rhythm.  He avereged 20 home runs over the last four seasons. He seemed to all but disappear in the second half of the 09 season.

I hope he catches on with the Yankees. He seems like a good guy.

—

The Tigers released their TV schedule this morning. 156 games are on the docket.  I updated the season schedule here. Email me if you see any mistakes.

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It was announced that the Royals have named Zack Grienke their opening day pitcher. So it should be Grienke vs. Justin Verlander to open the season. Let’s hope Grienke has some early season rust to contend with.

Over at Motown Sports, they are predicting what the Detroit Tigers are going to do this season. Great idea!  As you can see, I’m projecting/predicting Verlander to pick up right where he left off last year, while Rick Porcello stay right about where he was last year. Max Scherzer is going to be great at times, but will struggle by a lack of Tiger offense from time to time.

Jeremy Bonderman and Phil Coke are the wild cards in this scenario. We really don’t know what we are going to get this season with Bonderman, and we really don’t know if Coke will even make the rotation.  But, this is what I think will happen.

What say you, Tiger fans?

Anyways.

Lee Panas looks at what Johnny Damon would bring to the table, if the Tigers were to sign him. If your a numbers guy, then this column is for you. Lee dissects the weakness of the Tigers lineup. I still don’t think Damon will end up here, but the more I think of the alternatives – I’m becoming more interested in seeing him in the Old English D.

The Bleacher Report posted their idea of what the 2010 Detroit Tigers lineup will look like … interesting timing, you copy cats! Just kidding. Theirs not much in the way of news to report, and throwing out lineup ideas is always there on the table for anyone to play with.

In other news, Project Prospect released it’s Top 50 prospect list for the season. Just one Tiger (Alex Avila) made the list. Avila came in at #34.

Former Tiger outfielder Kirk Gibson (now bench coach with Arizona) had an autograph signing in Grand Rapids on Saturday. One Thousand fans showed up to see Gibby. Do the Pistons have that many show up for a game? I kid, I kid.

I’m going to decipher that for you all.

They don’t want Miguel visiting the pubs, drinking, and bringing his “Click-Clack” with him to the lovely state of Florida. Does anyone find this a bit rediculous? This is like hiring that nanny from ABC’s “SuperNanny”.

I understand that Miguel dropped the ball – big time. And at the WORST possible time to drop said ball. He’s said that he’s gotten help – that he’s taken the steps to make sure this won’t be a problem again.

So why the babysitter? I don’t see this as anything more than an eventual distraction. I’m not trying to be uncaring. Please don’t take that from this. If Miguel truly has a problem – like former first baseman Dmitri Young had – then he shouldn’t even be on the ball field.

Young lost his job with us under similar circumstances. He wasn’t really given a “second” chance per se. Once he dropped the ball, Jim Leyland lost confidence in him. They cut Young at a time when he was one of the better hitters on the team. I understand that he had the issues with diabetes.

He was still shown the door.

Now, i’m not proposing that the Tigers do the same to Cabrera. Opposite, really. If they feel he TRULY has a problem … then they need to address it without a babysitter. Without a nanny.

And if the problem isn’t really a problem at all? Put it in the past, and move on.