Sunday: Tigers at Mariners

I believe White Ash is the species used for baseball bats. Scientific name is Fraxinus americana. It's been the choice of bat makers historically because of some unique qualities which make it superior to other hardwoods. It's properties include a nice straight grain, is strong, resilient, and is less dense, and therefore lighter per volume than hard maple, oak, hickory, locust, and beech. Walnut would be too light and maybe brittle I would imagine. Plus ash has always been a common tree growing throughout much of North America. Hence swinging an ash bat would be easier than swinging a hard maple bat but with similar results. I haven't followed the recent switch to maple bats story but I'm guessing it's because of the decreased availability of white ash. White ash trees are being attacked by a number of rusts, fungi, cankers, and many borers, including the Emerald Ash Borer( an invasive beetle). You can observe the decline of this great tree while just driving around the countryside. I have ash trees growing on my property and have observed them dying off over the years. They do however regenerate quickly from seed and are pretty fast growers for a hardwood tree. But they seem to get stressed easily and are then prone to disease.
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So without really knowing a thing about this maple bat experiment I'm going to guess that since maple bats would be heavier, to reduce some of that weight to keep the weight in line with ash bats, bat manufacturers are making the handles thinner, and thus making them prone to shattering when inside pitches bear down on the bat handle. Plus maple wood, although denser, may not be inherently as resilient as ash. Any other thoughts?.... Other than, Marty, that's way more information than we really care about...........Go Tigers.

Remember as kids, leaving a bat out in the rain, or maybe finding a bat that some other kid left out? Those suckers would get so waterlogged they'd double in weight, and it seemed they'd never ever return to their former lightness. They became the always shunned and dreaded "backup bat", when your good one broke.

OK Dan, leave us alone then, and go "ride like the wind" in your Pacific Northwest playground. I'm not jealous..........riiiight:) Why didn't you ride to Seattle for a game?

I`,ve heard that the grain of ash is more fibrous,so it usually cracks and stays in 1 piece where maple shatters and breaks completely apart. I heard Jim Price say that,other than that I know very little.....Nate got thru the first with 14 pitches.Decent start,Keep it up Nate...Congrats to Carlos,what happened to Polly

Guess Dans into that smoking lightning and heavy metal thunder...You``ll be sorry if Nate tosses a no-no

That is true Bruce.

Well you won't see Renteria make that play on Poly's hit. That's just another example of what we've been discussing about defense. Now another play on Carlos' hard hit. This is getting old..........sheesh

Aflac question....... always pick the wacky answer.....it's a gimme..... Obviously we can't make that 5, 6, 3 play the Mariners just made.

Chi won...Minn won.....Cleveland lost....KC lost......Yeah Marty,we certainly cant match Seattles defense....3more hits robbed in 3 innings,I guess we`re built to hit,wish we would do a little more of it.

Maggs wont make the play Ichiro just made in right either

Yeah not even close Bruce.

wow srike em out, throw em out...we cant get a break

I think our tired "stars" are just waiting for the 3 day vacation :) ...
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Pudge looks refreshed after his day off ..
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Do you guys think that our players lack confidence, now that they are back playing the AL ? They assume they will lose ?

I think teams are pitching Thames and Sheff to either walk them or strike them out. With Marcus, why take a chance giving him anything good? If he walks, he's not a great baserunner, and he will aggressively swing at balls outside the strike zone. With Sheff everything is outside where he reaches and chops the ball into the IF. Occasionally throw him one inside and he rips nice line drives harmlessly foul.

Thats a deep one from Rayburn...

Way to hit Ryan. Now why couldn't you do that yesterday with the bases full?

This guy with two last names should be toast by now.

This maple bat experiment is failing unless the data they are trying to collect is how many players and fans can you disfigure and mame in a complete mlb season.

Nate is very efficient today. He sure gets a lot of fly ball outs. Just keep them in the park Nate and we have a chance. The guy with two last names is pitching on thin ice. Scratch that..........he's done.

Yeah the inside medium speed fastball is an automatic foul ball HR strike to Shef.Seen that a few times...Nice whack by Ryan.....Bhavin, Boy that is the 183 million dollar question, I think a lot of the guys think they can do anything with the bats to compensate for the fundamentals,and unwittingly are trying to reinvent the Bronx Bombers.As much as JL tries to convince us how much he likes baseball players over athletes,the fact remains that most of are players are strictly offensive threats,and truly are not smart baseball players.I remember my great grandfather telling me how Ty Cobb used to hear all the players rave about hitting home runs,and it would be the wave of the future.being vociferous, he let them all know he thought that what they were saying was hogwash.Some players began to say he was jealous cuz he couldnt hit any.So Cobb went out the next day and hit 4 HR`s in the game.Afterwards,he said that aint baseball,Hit and run,stealing bases,playing defense(pretty much small ball talk) was the way to break down the opposing team.He finished the year with 6 or 7 HR`s,but got 4 in one game,and then said it was the most boring game he ever played.Sure wish he could talk with JL.

I have a hard time chewing gum and walking at the same time. I see Pudge can skip back away from a pitch bearing into his feet and swing at the same time. Some guys are just more coordinated.

Is there a smart reason why JL would pinch hit for Rayburn today. In his 2 AB's he has a walk and a HR.
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Can we trade JL before the trade deadline .. for Joe Torre or someone :)

Marty,I`ve heard he has heckuva chipshot

Another frustrating long scoreless inning. Nate has been on the bench for some time. Sure hope he can still hold them.

I think it was Dan who said we could get a bag of balls for him if we threw in a prospect.

Might as well take pudge out of the game .. he is 3 for 3
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I have never understood the JL encouragement idea. He routinely replaces or sits people who hit.
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It's like if you hit, you will be on the bench, and if you are in a slump like sheff, we will start you everyday.

Nate answered that concern. Has he been reading our comments?

Bruce, how bout a Maple Bat ? At least, it will have a true stroke till it lasts :)

Yeah Behavin, The moral of the story is don't hit game tying home runs if you want remain in the game.

Well,so much for making the pitcher work. 7 pitches to get thru the 7th.....Bhavin, The players are partial to those maple bats and arent likely to give one up that cheaply,probally take Porcello and JL for one of those babys

Nates at 70 pitches thru 7 and only 3 hits.But we`ve only scored 4 runs up to this point in the entire series

Well then Bruce .. balls it is :)

That kind of umpiring is brutal. Nice job of keeping your cool Marcus.

Bhavin,Are we getting em,or giving em....another E in the infielde, O boy,here we go again

Bhavin,I`ll throw in my inlaid pewter Detroit Tiger keychain,with the bag of balls if someone will take him before the all-star game

Wonder what happened to Holimon playing some short this series?Must be an oblique

Beck,

Just an aside from the game...

I read your piece yesterday on traveling woes... Any baseball fan, writer, or player from Detroit who whines about travel and how hard they have it needs a reality check! As far as travel shedules go, the Tigers couldn't be more lucky. If you doubt that, step into the shoes of say.... the Mariners, and you'll see. Those guys put on more miles than any other team in baseball. And they've handed it to the Tigers pretty good this weekend.

So, quit the whining about travel, suck it up, wipe the collective noses, and play ball. It ain't at all bad. As Leyland says, just go with it and don't talk about it. It's not a story.

Great job Nate. OK lets get about 3 runs and let Nate pitch in the 10th.

If you wanna use this site, you will have to be a little more respectful, karl.

Fine performance for Nate.Be a shame to lose this one.Come on boys.Plate a couple

Fine performance for Nate.Be a shame to lose this one.Come on boys.Plate a couple

That's a joke, right, Marty? I mean about pitching Nate.

I don't think he is joking ... cuz with a 3 run lead and With his pitch count, Nate can go for a 10 inning win

In JL's opinion, it doesn't make sense to PH Thames .. he is a slow runner in scoring position in a 1 run game .. but he is 0for 5 .. so we need him to stay in the game :)

I meat PR for Thames ...

wow 101 mph,he can throw it thru the barn.hope he doesnt put one of those in the dirt and kill poor Pudge

I like to kid, but no, I was being serious Steve. I have to say I had lost track of Nate's pitch count. (it was at 100) But he looked strong in the 9th, seemed to be in the zone, and frankly I had more confidence in him today than the pen.

11 hits in 12 innings for both teams combined in the AL.what are the odds

Zum did a great job. He seems to be reaching a level of maturity. Maybe the two injuries he's had to deal with in the last year have taught him he is a mere mortal after all. Still, he's hitting 101 today. He's getting stronger.

Marty,Just amazing that he came back with that kind of power,and he is getting stronger.thats scary....Well with our luck being the way it has been for us,maybe the 13th inning is our lucky one.come on boys.PLATE ONE

I've been watching the game from the start, but I'm starting to get bored.
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--Rich

Hard to win a game when your 2,3, and 4 hitters go zilch for 16. Just atrocious.

--Ed--

Sorry, I meant 3,4, and 5 hitters.

Just checked the box and Pudge is up to .291. Come on Freddy Hold em 1 more, watch Ichiro,he runs

Nice throw Pudge,big clutch throw,beautiful

So far we have 5 guys who are 0 for 5 or 0 for 6, I bet that would be a record for # of guys greater than 0 for 5 in a game.
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.500 would be a lot better than 2 games under, can we order a run please.

If we win this one Pudge should get a honorary save for throwing out Ichiro.Only his 3rd of year.Think he has about 35 steals............Another robbed hit by Seattle infielders.That is some D they run out there

Clete should have caught that ball.They ruled it a double,but sure should have caught that one

The Mariners are going to pitch their catcher against us.We better score or we will never live down the ridicule.

Come on Marcus make him pay...way to go TigersGet a deep one off this boy for insurance

How about that and Holy Cow...We Won!!.......I guess that sends a message to the rest of the league,Our guys might not be hitting so well,But....You better not throw your catcher at us.What a bizzarre game.

Well boys and girls, hope you were watching, that's what's going to be on the test. Dan, hope your ride was as long as this game was..........and a tad more interesting.

Is there any such thing as a demoralizing win? I know there are some of you out there that are ecstatic that we won, and don't get me wrong, at this point I'll take a win any way we can get it. But this game is a perfect example of what I was trying to say in an earlier post-- that even when we win I can't get overly optimistic about them. I mean it was another poor offensive showing against another sub .500 pitcher. Early this season when we had games like this, Leyland would say "you gotta tip your hat to that guy, he pitched an outstanding game". Well, I think by now we know that it isn't the pitching that is so good, it is the fact that this team isn't the offensive juggernaut it was supposed to be. I understand it's a long season and everyone has games in which they simply don't hit. But what is it now, eleven shutouts we've had? And numerous outings that Dan describes as "the coma zone". I don't propose to have the answer for this problem. I do know that we can't stand pat and hope to just start hitting--that approach just isn't working. Something needs to be done to wake up this team or we can kiss this season goodbye.

--Ed--