17 posts tagged “detroit baseball”
Detroit lost arguably its most recognizable baseball icon yesterday when the body of Mark "The Bird" Fidrych was found beneath an overturned dump truck on his Massachusetts farm. He was 54.
There will never be another baseball character like Fidrych -- young, wide-eyed, talented, and, dare I say it, humbled. That last one gets lost on a lot of jocks these days, especially baseball players, where the nonsense of overpaying has attained levels characterized only as obscene. Editorial accounts have been remembering Fidrych since yesterday. I listened to part of a radio interview on my way into work with former Tigers pitcher Dave Rozema. Some highlights include:
- The often mandatory discussion of his quirky mound antics that endeared him to so many people because of, first, its curious nature, and, second, the fact that nobody else was doing it. He takes to the mound, gets down on hands and knees, and uses his hands to move the dirt around, arranging the earth in such a way where he eventually finds solace. He talks to himself between pitches, but it looks like he is having a one-way conversation with the ball in his hand. He is tall and gangly, and has this blond curly hair that looks like the other end of a mop. He is unique and humble and when a teammate makes a great catch to end the inning, Fidrych is out of the dugout, clapping and slapping hands with the guy before he even crosses the baseline to get back to the bench. He is asked about his enthusiam, to which he is said to have often replied, "It's either this or working at the gas station back home." Think you'll ever hear Manny Ramirez say "Well, it's either this or selling guns back home"?
- Rozema spun some solid tales. Chief among them was Fidrych's attempt to comprehend his star shooting right through the universe in 1976. The Tigers were not a very good team then. The country was in an energy crisis and Detroit had seen better days. Huh. Sound familiar? In comes this lanky goofball from the East Coast, a non-roster invitee, who manages to make the team and, in one season, rattle off a 19-9 record, with a 2.60 ERA and, ahem, 26 complete games. Twenty-six complete games in one season, with at least three of them having gone into extra innings. He shut out the Yankees in New York in 11 2/3 innings. Most pitchers don't have 26 complete games in a career, let alone a season. The Bird became legend, not just in Detroit, but nationally and globally. It got to the point where he couldn't leave his apartment because he would become mobbed. Still, you never heard the guy bitch about any of it. He signed autographs and went about taking to the mound, grooming it himself, and then blasting low heat with a ton of movement, freezing batters in time and space.
- He was evidently an avid cook. Rozema recounted stories during spring training, when, in the evening, most players would head out on the town to drink and chase pussy. They would pass his apartment, en masse, to see him grilling on a small hibachi, tossing some cold beers. "He liked his beer cold in a chilled mug," Rozema said this morning. "And he liked drinking them in his apartment." I can relate. I had apartments. And I liked drinking beers in them, either alone or with company. You can have yourself quite a time in an apartment with a six-pack.
I loved watching him talk to himself and groom the mound probably as much as I liked watching him pitch. As an 8-year-old, you don't understand the mechanics of the pitch, or the situation at the plate, or the nuances of the game. But you can understand this tall, oddball-looking clown on the mound, chattering it up with nobody and getting his hands dirty.
Last week, Tiger Hall-of-Famer George Kell passed away. Yesterday, it was the iconic weirdo, Fidrych. I worry about who might be next.
And I'm not talking about Parcheesi. Mrs. Chicken made it to her first Tiger game of the season, and with the way the team lit up Minnesota's pitching that night, she should get to the park more often. Typical Detroit baseball for this season, though: lose Friday night to the Twins; come back Saturday to destroy them, 19-3, a game featuring two, two-run homers from Ordonez; and then lose 6-1 the next day, thanks to that dickhead Francisco Cruceta giving up a grand slam to what essentially amounted to a soup can of a player. This is the same Cruceta who missed all of spring training and the first couple of weeks of the season because he was stuck in the Dominican Republic with visa problems.
Dude, you're a professional baseball player. You have an entire off-season, and really, parts of the season prior to work the phones and get the right paperwork hooked up for the next season's spring training. Yes, I know it's bureaucratic bullshit, the work visa process, but you have an agent, and I assume, that because you possess the motor skills to throw a baseball at the professional level, you probably know how to read and use a telephone. If you can't tend to the most urgent personal matter -- you know, the one that gets you into the country to make the $500,000 that is on your contract for this year -- then how in the fuck are we supposed to have any confidence in you as a player. That, and you helped lose Sunday's game, pretty much single-handedly. You're off to a fantastic start.
Still, it was a perfect night for baseball with temps around 65.
Sometimes you see all sorts of stupid shit walking to the park ...
... including these guys.
I shouldn't be so hard on them, though. They were nice enough to pose for the picture in the first place, didn't talk any smack and were generally very friendly. It's just so odd to see a group of people rocking the opponent's jersey. This entire area is so nuts for their Red Wings, that it is rare to see a jersey, especially those worn en masse, of another team. I'm sure they weren't smiling that way about four hours after I took this shot, considering that Detroit "did" the Penguins in that Game One.
Stopped at The Park for some pre-game beers. Dig the Motor City Brewing Works' custom taps ...
It's rare that I'll address specific comments in this here field, but I have to agree with Ray when he recently remarked "I am so glad the season is here." Yes, the baseball season is here. And I am glad, too. I am glad for myself, but I am especially so glad for fans of the game everywhere.
One feature I especially enjoy about of my Vox neighbors is that I get the glimpse I really want on what baseball fans in other cities think about their team and what's going on with their squad. I have a newfound respect for the White Sox and SF Giants because I now know some of their fans, and those people are knowledgeable and authentic. By association, and perhaps out of respect, I've even embraced a long-distance I-got-your-back type hatred for their rivalries as well. Simply put, I never disliked the Dodgers and Cubs before I started talking baseball with these guys.
The off-season is now "off," and I'm so happy for everyone who digs the game. I start missing baseball the morning after they stop playing it for the season. It's going to rain tomorrow. It could rain down car batteries all afternoon and I wouldn't give a fuck no way. That's right, I wrote it that way on purpose.
Again, less words more looky-looky.
At a flea market about three years ago, I found this 1984 Detroit Tigers yearbook. It appeared to be in excellent condition (not that I would know, but the pages were crisp and the saddle-stitch bind was not overtly compromised), so I bought the thing. The cover, by today's design standards, is funny.
The profiles inside are standard content for a club-produced publication, but, if you're like me, you find some to be cooler than others, based on players you especially dig. Some of my favorites from past Tiger teams include
The seller of this yearbook also threw in an unfolded 1984 Tigers schedule
Today is one of the only day of the year when I can say the following to myself and it means something:
They're playing baseball tomorrow.
It seems like 8 or 9 weeks ago when I looked at the calendar for March 31 and said to myself, "You have another 8 or 9 weeks to go." Now, the Home Opener is nearly here. I'm so excited I actually took yesterday off. I could hardly contain myself.
My biggest gripe with the Home Opener is that it is akin to New Year's Eve in that it's pretty much Amateur Night. Well, at least it used to be. Back when they absolutely blew, the club sold out the Home Opener with little challenge, but then you never saw about 70 percent of those people again until the weather bettered in the summer or the Yankees came to town. That, and other out-of-town attractions/freak shows like when Detroit played St. Louis in inter-league and McGwire essentially sold out the park by himself. That kind of shit.
Tickets are now becoming tricky to obtain. Preseason ticket sales have shot way up. The club has added 700-plus new seats. Most games will be packed, if not sold out. One interesting trend is the attendance in the two games following the Home Opener. Over the years, turnout for those contests were laughably low. The Wednesday and Thursday day games after the opener have, in recent years, hosted greater crowds. There are more people taking in Tigers home games than I can remember, and I've been going to games consistently for the last 14 years.
Seven years ago, I had one of the most unpleasant experiences in the right-field seats. A couple of guys from Chicago were sitting behind me and, as fans are sometimes wont to do, throughout the game we joined each others' conversations. One of the guys asked me, totally sincerely, "So, man, it's got to be tough when your team is just so bad like yours is, all the time." And the guy wasn't, you know, outwardly or intentionally trying to be a cock, but all I could really do is agree. Yeah, it is tough. It is incredibly tough when your team puts a shitty product on the field pretty much every game. So, the club galvanized the farm system, brought in the right guys (Pudge signing and then Ordonez started that glorious chain reaction of ballplayers actually wanting to come to Detroit), started to contend, and then made it to the World Series.
That brought the people out. You don't have to like that fair-weatheredness. For about a micron of a second, I did not, but brisk ticket sales are good for people doing business around the park. We know a tavern owner whose parents bought a building downtown one year before the '68 riots, when he was just a kid, and they've been in for the long haul. His business is doing well. We're happy for him. And I'm happy for the parking lot owners (even if they overcharge; fuck it, man's gotta make some money) and the other bars and restaurants who are thriving because of the elevated foot traffic. Good for them.
I now have a few from both sides. A half-empty ballpark with a shitty team is a boring place to be. I'll take the crowds and the jostling and the people who don't know a fielder's choice from fucking Sophie's Choice. I'll take the 43,700-something people and their inconveniences because a team can slide at any time. Guys get hurt, get traded, the locker room goes to pot, the wheels fall off the thing and before I know it, I'm listening to someone from Cleveland or New York ask me "Man, it must be tough when your team was really good but sucks again, huh?" Ah, fuck a bunch of that. I'm going to enjoy the congestion and, on Monday, the raging celebration-like atmosphere of the opener, a killer lineup and a season of promise.
Speaking of promises, City Chicken's lead-in to the 2007 Home Opener isn't all text and self-important prattling. No, we have images. I fancy myself a very entry-level Tiger memorabilia collector. And by entry level, I mean that I have six or eight things I've scored at flea markets or have had given to me. My former brother-in-law, a man often dealing in vintage goods, hooked me up with some old-timey Tiger schedules.
This first one, interestingly enough, appears to be missing a year. I assume it's around the early '60s.
He also gave to me a 1963 schedule.
Somewhere along the line, I picked this up
It is some type of postmark that, I think, looks pretty legit. I didn't live in Detroit in 1984, so I don't know if the post office did that or what.
I believe it is the cable network TBS that is showing, all week as it leads to season-openers nationwide (and even some internationally), baseball-themed movies every night. This part of my baseball geekdom gets properly scratched with shit like this. Last night, I watched part of "League Of Their Own," while last night was "Bull Durham." Three nights ago was that "Rookie" movie with Dennis Quaid. I swear, if it has a diamond and a dugout in it, I'll probably sit and watch at last a half an hour's worth.
Last month, I'd apparently been jonesing for the game so much that, after Kerry split for a rare Saturday work shift at noon, I actually found "Angels In The Outfield" on some random station. And yes, I sat and watched about 40 minutes of a young Joseph Gordon-Levitt trying to convince crusty manager Danny Glover that a band of angels, led by the whimsical Christopher Lloyd, were, indeed, in the outfield. It was horrible, trust me, but I sat, transfixed by the nuances of the game that, by late January, seemed pretty much foreign. An (arguably) interesting aside? Also in the movie, which was released in 1994, were considerably younger versions of Adrien Brody, Matthew McConaughey, and Dermot Mulroney, as well as an appearance by former Oakland A's slugger Carney Lansford.
What I'm digging now is all of the baseball coverage as spring training winds to a close. I welcomed back to my daily routine, the baseball page of the sports section. That alone is a true sign of things to come. And speaking of things to come, there are only four more days until the Tigers' home opener. Please, enjoy this take on the 2006 opener, from the earlier incarnate of City Chicken.
SI.com baseball writer Tom Verducci -- who, by the way, is one of the better national baseball scribes out there -- in his season preview, has made his World Series pick/prediction. With it, he has Detroit over Chicago, which is just great. Actually, I've been enjoying much of the preseason hype the Tigers are getting, especially with everyone painting them as the Yankees of the Midwest. This, however, is a falsehood. The Tigers are not the Yankees of the Midwest. If they were, they would be dressed in diapers, sucking on poop dildos and coming in spikes-high to second base in a meaningless exhibition game. Fuck New York. But, Detroit is taking a nice, hot shower in accolades galore without swinging so much at Pitch One. And that is cause for a Chicken to fret. I like what Verducci and other writers have had to say about the professional baseball team that plays its home games in Detroit. But Tom, I believe, is a little -- pardon the pun -- off base. Get it? Off base? And this is a thing about baseball? Goddamn that's funny.
Tom points to a triumvirate he believes will take Detroit over the Cubs in the Fall Classic, an accomplishment that would render Joe Buck all fetal positioned out and whimpering because Detroit will sully the Cubs' storyline to which every network suit will be masturbating this season. Verducci's three citations that Detroit is championship bound are Miguel Cabrera, manager James Leyland and owner Mike Ilitch. My closest speculation leads to this: those last two guys named don't actually play on the field, Holmes. Yes, Leyland can manage rather well, and DJ Pizza Pizza can bust wide with the clams to sign the big guns, but when it comes to throwing from the mound to first base in a World Series Game 5, that's, um, up to the players, Tommy Boy. The manager and the owner don't have shit to do with on-field execution. Getting to the World Series -- and winning it -- will take sacrifice and balls, in that order. And once there, it's really defense that wins the thing.
The home opener is 5 days away. In recognition, City Chicken will provide some scattershot and wholly inconsistent lead-in coverage, which will include some crudely constructed editorial product; some warmed-over, stale items from the past; and a barrage of imagery you will come to loathe and admire simultaneously.
This Tigers-Marlins trade has me absolutely giddy, but I am tempered with a wee bit of caution and concern. Aw, fuck it. I'm excited; ecstatic, really.
In a mammoth deal, Detroit shipped out two legit prospects and can't-miss future All-Stars in Cameron Maybin and Andrew Miller, along with the Mike Rabelo, Eulegio de la Cruz, Dallas Trahearn and some corpse named Burke Bradenhop. Detroit also threw in Rasheed Wallace, Tommy Hearns' son and a gently worn Steve Yzerman jockstrap to complete the deal.
In return, Detroit gets All-Stars Dontrelle Willis and Miguel Cabrera.
The caution in this deal is giving up the young talent. Maybin and Miller were deemed untouchable. Both sipped from the Big League cup last year, with Miller going 5-6, losing velocity later on and was sent back to AAA, which is what you expect from a kid only a year removed from college. In his second Major League start, Maybin took Roger Clemens deep, in the fucking' Bronx. And lest we forget, Detroit, in the Gary Sheffield deal the year prior, let go of Humberto Sanchez, Kevin Whelan, and Anthony Claggett. All three are pitchers and, at the time, Sanchez was considered the third of Detroit's top three young prospects, behind Maybin and Miller. In return, we got Sheffield, who exhibited his power-hitting prowess in 2007, but slowed down due to injury in the second half and is now having off-season shoulder surgery for the fourth time. He can crush, but he only half-crushed for us last year. Willis is also coming off his shittiest season at 10-15. But the guy is an innings monster and Detroit's starting five needed more of that last year than anything.
Willis and Cabrera, it has been reported, will be free agents after the 2009 season. As Tony pointed out, if Cabrera bolts, Detroit pretty much mortgaged their future for a two-season fling with the guy. Those, to me, appear to be the biggest cons.
The pro(s)? This batting lineup:
1. Curtis Granderson, CF-- .302 avg., .361 OBP, .553 SLG, 38 doubles, 23 triples, 26 stolen bases, 185 hits
2. Placido Polanco, 2B-- . 388 OBP, 200 hits, 36 doubles
3. Gary Sheffield, DH-- 25 home runs, .265 avg., .462 SLG (injury-shortened season)
4. Magglio Ordonez, RF--.363 avg., 54 doubles, 139 RBI, .595 SLG, .434 OBP
5. Miguel Cabrera, 3B-- .320 avg., .565 SLG, .401 OBP, 188 hits, 119 RBI, four All-Star appearances and 523 total runs before the age of 24.
6. Carlos Guillen, 1B-- .502 SLG, .296 avg., 167 hits
7. Edgar Renteria, SS-- .332 avg., 164 hits
8. Ivan Rodriguez, C-- .281, 96 ks
9. Jacque Jones, LF
Hitters 1-7 can get on base and most of them can clear the bases. The bottom of the order gets tricky. Pudge strikes out too much and rarely walks. This means he has no patience at the plate. He has to get over that shit. Also, Pudge went from being The Man on this team to being The Catcher. I hope his ego can handle it.
Detroit will also be paying $6 million per year to its former third-baseman, Brandon Inge. Everyone here hates his bat and loves his defense. When Detroit signed Pudge, everyone laughed that Inge was on his way out. Instead, he reinvented himself into the everyday third baseman. Depending on if Detroit keeps Jacque Jones, Inge may be a utility guy, or he may go back to being a backup catcher. Cabrera could platoon in left, but I doubt that's going to happen. But then again, what in the fuck do I know?
I do know that the Tigers now have what writers are calling a "powerhouse lineup." And they may have forgone future talent to do so. Of the six Detroit sent, really, Maybin and Miller are the real studs. Maybin has long drawn comparisons to Junior. And if he has a bat and defense like Griffey when he plays in the Bigs, then good for him. But I don't think Detroit was haste in moving those cats for Willis and Cabrera. I can't fucking wait for Opening Day.
I had the sublime pleasure of seeing live and in person the final two stages of the Tigers’ sweep over Boston this weekend. I will try to express here how great it was to sweep the Red Sox.
It was pretty fucking cool.
And, for me, it was cool for many reasons. First, I really think that team is overrated. No offense to Voxers down for their team, but I believe that. They have some mashers in Ortiz and Ramirez, and yes, their pitching is pretty sick. With Matsuzak---wait, I call him here on the Chicken “Dice-K,” because that’s the nickname for the guy, who, for the record, is an amazing pitcher with unrivaled control. And they have Beckett, Schilling and Wakefield, and when those guys are in a groove, they are better than any rotation out there, save for the following:
- An unrelenting Kenny Rogers;
- A Jeremy Bonderman who, despite his fucking insistence on giving up no more than 2 runs between the first inning and the top of the third, can just shut down a lineup card after for 7 innings;
- And Justin Verlander looking down at his stash of 10 wins and not thinking about anything else but the next start.
I didn’t put Nate and Andrew Miller in there because I don’t see them yet as the cherry of the lineup. They are getting it done in ways nobody could imagine, but they ain’t the core.
The Sweep means everything right now. Detroit rolls deep into the All-Star Break, fresh off, what, having won five (straight) of its last six and 14 of its last 19 games. It puts everyone else on notice. Imagine what happens at the end of August when Joel Zumaya comes out for this first outing.
But more importantly, this sweep signifies a much-deserved “who farted” look in the direction of the plentiful hype of the Red Sox. And this is my second point here about why beating a team like the Red Sox is so much more savory. Boston is one a few teams (the other being the Yankees, Giants, Dodgers) that has its own “culture” to it. They get the press and, more specifically in the media, they get “the slant,” They get the play-ups and the priority coverage. If you’re a Yankee fan in Boston, it gets noticed. Nobody cares if you’re into the fucking Padres, though.
When you take one of the most hyped players in the game, and reduce him like they did today to 6 runs in 5 innings, you’re saying so much, so many times.
Two straight days of ball, a sweep of the major’s best team (although that designation is now challenged by Detroit), and a shut-up to three rows of Red Sox Nation assholes in front of me today, has been some pivotal, season-altering shit. Yeah, the second half of this season is looking really good.
I'm still reeling from last night's game. It's becoming decidedly surreal to understand what we were a part of last night. The first Tiger no-no since 1984 and the first one at Comerica Park. First, last year, and now last night. And last night was some random game, too. I had pooled some of the fellas together about a month ago and suggested we hit a game together. About two weeks ago, I started looking at the schedule and actually picked TONIGHT''S game to go, but a couple of the guys are hockey players and Wednesday night is no good, so I backed up to last night's game, did some e-mail planning with them, got the tickets and met up last night.
Our seats were really bad, and got worse when three of Dearborn's finest douchebags sat in front of us. If it wasn't bad enough, it worsened when they all stood up and did the same dance to some fucking lame rap song playing before Sheffield's at-bat. Three of us relocated, out of sun, down into the lower bowl, about 30 rows off the field. The others followed and it wasn't until about sixth inning when I realized Verlander had all zeroes up there. He seemed to get stronger as the game went on, as those eighth- and ninth-inning strikeouts (102 mph in the ninth inning? Are you kidding me?) will verify. Still, nobody in our row mentioned anything involving the words "no" and/or "hitter." Sacrilege. My only regret? Last night was one of the first and only I did not take my camera to the game. Dave did, and hopefully we will have some of those images soon.
I've been to a lot of games, but that was the best one. Ever. I can't believe I got to see a no-hitter last night. I'm on about five hours of sleep and I don't even care. It's like I got a magic ticket.
I was at a game once with somebody, it might have been Kerry or even our friend Pete, and I remarked that until an opponent gets that first hit off a Tiger pitcher, I always say to myself "Well, he's got a no-hitter going." Granted, he might give up a double to the second guy up (to which they said, "Well, you must be disappointed a lot"), but it's always been on my mind, the possibility of a no-no actually happening. And that's part of its beautiful charm. You can buy a Stanley Cup or Super Bowl ticket and know you're going to be part of a championship atmosphere. Buy a random Tuesday night baseball ticket and, while odds are slim, you might have a chance at being a part of something historic.
Justin Verlander: Rookie of The Year 2006; no-hitter in 2007; 20-game winner and World Series MVP 2008?
Corbett and I successfully negotiated our third straight (and my eighth overall) Tiger Home Opener. Especially wonderful about the day was the raising of the American League pennant. Good luck, by the way, getting another one in '07. The division is absolutely sick. Detroit, Chicago, Minnesota and Cleveland. Of those four, YOU go ahead and try to predict who is going to finish fourth among those four. Those are four really good fucking teams, and they, along with every other opponent, is going to be gunning for Detroit. Expect a lot of brushbacks and shitty calls by the umps. Last year, Detroit got very lucky with a lack of injuries, save for Polanco's blown-out shoulder. But premeditated excuses aside, baseball is arguably one of the toughest sports to repeat successful seasons, via championships or simply making the playoffs. Ask a Red Sox or White Sox fan about that. It's brutal. Detroit has the tools, but I guess it will be up to a.) Leyland to motivate those guys to play to win, and b.) those guys actually playing to win. And by playing to win, I mean shit like advancing a runner from first to third with two outs in the seventh before actually scoring the run. It also means cutting back on messy, extraneous strikeouts (Granderson, Inge; you hearing me?) and errors (Guillen, and the entire pitching staff; you hearing me?).
Whatever happens, I still look forward to another fun season at the ballpark. We have our season tickets, just like we always did. I'm still considering having a T-shirt printed that reads "I had season tickets when they sucked," just to let the amateurs and fair-weathered fucks to know what's up. But I especially look forward to that first warm and breezy Friday night game, where you're comfortable in shorts and T-shirts at 9 at night, and it's just now getting dark. Hells yes.
We hit a couple of bars early and then into the park for the festivities. Third baseman Brandon Inge and long-time (50-plus years) front office employee Audrey Zielinski unfurled a replica of the banner,
I'm not buying the optimism right now. It's going to be a long season.
