Latest / Tiger Territory: A Detroit Tigers Podcast / September Is For Tigs To Earn Their Stripes

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September Is For Tigs To Earn Their Stripes · Tiger Territory: A Detroit Tigers Podcast

0:06
Speaker 1: And welcome into another episode of Tiger Territory, part of
0:09
Speaker 1: the Bout Territory Nowork Eights podcast.
0:12
Speaker 2: I'm Kierens.
0:12
Speaker 1: Sickley with me is always the man whose ideal version
0:15
Speaker 1: of Bark at the Park is when he brings brisket
0:18
Speaker 1: to the stadium.
0:20
Speaker 3: How you're doing Hey, you're doing good? I like that.
0:23
Speaker 3: I like that idea. This episode, I think it's almost
0:27
Speaker 3: time to bring back an old refrain. Are the Tigers good?
0:32
Speaker 3: I yes, they're good. They have the most wines in
0:34
Speaker 3: the American League. But over their last eighty games, I
0:36
Speaker 3: believe they are forty one and thirty nine. They are
0:39
Speaker 3: playing five hundred baseball almost. We've seen some ups and
0:43
Speaker 3: some downs. We talk about trying not to ride the
0:46
Speaker 3: roller coaster. Man, I feel like that's been hard as
0:49
Speaker 3: ever this season because last year there were like some
0:52
Speaker 3: big swings right. This year, with the exception of losing
0:55
Speaker 3: twelve of thirteen, it's been a little more even. But
0:58
Speaker 3: it's just every day. He sometimes, like recently especially, it's
1:02
Speaker 3: kind of hard to know what to make of this team.
1:05
Speaker 3: We focus so much on the pitching and it's like, well,
1:07
Speaker 3: Tommy Kinley throws a change up over the middle and
1:10
Speaker 3: he gets a groundball double play. Now it's like is
1:12
Speaker 3: Kinlee fixed? And then Ryan Helsley throws one hundred, but
1:16
Speaker 3: he can't get anybody out and carry Carpenter takes him
1:19
Speaker 3: deep to blow up in the game. This is a
1:21
Speaker 3: sport that will challenge you. It can be difficult to
1:25
Speaker 3: know what to make of things at times. It's it's
1:28
Speaker 3: strange to sit here and look and like, how is
1:30
Speaker 3: a team that leads the ale and wins? How does
1:33
Speaker 3: it have a pitching staff in such shambles? And then
1:36
Speaker 3: also like does it even matter? Maybe all that matters
1:40
Speaker 3: is that they get it right by October first, and
1:42
Speaker 3: maybe it's all gonna be fine. I don't know. I
1:45
Speaker 3: can talk myself into circles about some of this stuff.
1:50
Speaker 1: So number one, Uh, I feel sorry for anybody watching
1:55
Speaker 1: today's game. Recording this obviously Wednesday after the series finale
1:59
Speaker 1: against the New York Mets, a sixty two win for
2:01
Speaker 1: the Tigers.
2:02
Speaker 3: Uh.
2:02
Speaker 1: To salvage it a little bit, yes, But I feel
2:08
Speaker 1: sorry for anybody who was trying to kick a nicotine
2:11
Speaker 1: habit watching that game because it was it was it
2:15
Speaker 1: was a roller coaster.
2:17
Speaker 2: It was a lot of back and forth. It was
2:19
Speaker 2: a lot of like oh man, oh.
2:21
Speaker 1: Man, I mean just like even stuff that didn't even
2:23
Speaker 1: have anything to do with the with like actual play
2:25
Speaker 1: in the game, because then you have your facto closer
2:29
Speaker 1: like come out, not even warm ups on the mouth,
2:33
Speaker 1: like warm ups in the bullpen. So like there there's
2:35
Speaker 1: so so many things that happened, Like I'm just gonna
2:37
Speaker 1: rattle them off and then you can just kind of
2:39
Speaker 1: go in whatever direction you want.
2:41
Speaker 4: Uh.
2:41
Speaker 1: How about Wenzel Perez putting the charge in the two
2:44
Speaker 1: balls that resulted in double plays with Specter Torkolsen, one
2:48
Speaker 1: of them not as fault, the other one the result
2:50
Speaker 1: of you know, the base running aggression that we've talked about.
2:53
Speaker 1: How about Tyler Holton, uh, having the opportunity to maybe
2:58
Speaker 1: get a double play for sure, get one out and
3:00
Speaker 1: he pulls his glove hand down because you know the
3:03
Speaker 1: ball is going past him over the middle of the
3:05
Speaker 1: field and you know everybody's safe there. How about you
3:07
Speaker 1: know you mentioned Tommy Kinley. How about a Sodo versus
3:11
Speaker 1: Riley Green battle in which Riley Green ends up winning
3:15
Speaker 1: with a with a I mean you see the camera
3:17
Speaker 1: the ball moving and a wicked hop on Francisco Lindoor
3:22
Speaker 1: speaking of Riley Green, he runs into the net, saving
3:25
Speaker 1: his body as he always does. How about will Vest
3:27
Speaker 1: coming in the face Juan Soto and deciding the perfect
3:32
Speaker 1: first pitch is ninety five right down the middle and
3:34
Speaker 1: one soda, being like, yeah, it's cool, I'll get the
3:37
Speaker 1: next one, you know.
3:39
Speaker 2: Like it was just like so many you know.
3:42
Speaker 1: Back and forth, you know, not to mention the Carboner
3:43
Speaker 1: home run, like all this stuff, so much back and forth.
3:46
Speaker 1: Montero come in to close the you know, hinch close
3:48
Speaker 1: the game. I don't even know where to start. I
3:50
Speaker 1: don't even know where to start. It was fun, but
3:52
Speaker 1: I don't know where to start.
3:53
Speaker 5: What.
3:54
Speaker 3: Let's just talk about the pitching. This is what the
3:56
Speaker 3: focus is on. This is what I've been harping on.
3:59
Speaker 3: I think it's enough bad place right now and caveat
4:04
Speaker 3: Like I said, maybe it doesn't matter, Maybe they're gonna
4:07
Speaker 3: be just fine. But Chris Paddock was moved to the bullpen.
4:11
Speaker 3: He had been not very good. He made one appearance
4:14
Speaker 3: out of the bullpen. Now we found out later he
4:16
Speaker 3: was dealing with the death of a family member, so
4:19
Speaker 3: maybe his head just wasn't in a good spot. It
4:22
Speaker 3: looked even worse out of the bullpen. He gave up
4:23
Speaker 3: six eor and druns. It was bad. And so it's like, Okay,
4:26
Speaker 3: you have some off days coming up. The Tigers might
4:29
Speaker 3: be rolling with four starters for the foreseeable future. Ken
4:33
Speaker 3: Rosenthali just wrote a story that I think put in
4:35
Speaker 3: just perspective things we have been talking about things Ivy
4:39
Speaker 3: and said, like, who's their game two starter? They don't care,
4:41
Speaker 3: it doesn't matter. And the game we saw Wednesday was
4:46
Speaker 3: kind of a reflection of that. You just kind of
4:49
Speaker 3: got to get a starter who can get you through
4:50
Speaker 3: four or five, and Casey Maies did that. Casey Mees
4:53
Speaker 3: pitched his best game in a bit. Command was much
4:56
Speaker 3: better fast boat football. Velo was up a little bit,
4:59
Speaker 3: didn't miss a ton of bats, but definitely a step forward.
5:03
Speaker 2: Very efficient, Very efficient.
5:04
Speaker 3: Didn't mean he was going three times through the hinches,
5:08
Speaker 3: going to manage the playoffs, which I think is fine.
5:11
Speaker 3: I think the big caveat Dode the Tigers have a
5:14
Speaker 3: bullpen that can get you, that can carry four or
5:19
Speaker 3: five innings in a meaningful game. That seems like a
5:23
Speaker 3: little more of a question mark. Tyler Holtan has not
5:25
Speaker 3: been very good. Tommy Kinley, he's been better lately as
5:28
Speaker 3: he fixed. I'm not sure you know who impressed me.
5:33
Speaker 3: Rafael Montero. Yeah, we talk about being a tough watch.
5:38
Speaker 3: He's still walked a guy, but that fastball is getting
5:41
Speaker 3: a little more carry the splitter. Dan Dikerson broke it
5:44
Speaker 3: down on the radio. Basically, his fingers aren't spread as
5:46
Speaker 3: far apart. What that's gonna do. Take some of that
5:48
Speaker 3: depth off the splitter. It's almost moving too much where
5:52
Speaker 3: he couldn't command it. It's been a little more precise. Uh,
5:56
Speaker 3: he's actually looked kind of nice. He's thrown I think
5:58
Speaker 3: eight and two third consecutive scoreless and things. This guy
6:00
Speaker 3: still walks a lot of guys. But maybe they got
6:03
Speaker 3: it right. I think we've talked about the ration now
6:07
Speaker 3: behind their approach to the deadline. Love it or hate it,
6:10
Speaker 3: there was some reasoning for going with the quantity over quality.
6:15
Speaker 3: Showed up Ryan Helsley, guy, I really wanted man, he's
6:18
Speaker 3: been awful with the Mets. Would you still take him?
6:21
Speaker 3: You know, playoff series, Aaron Judge at the plate. Who
6:25
Speaker 3: do you want rolling out there? Ryan Helsley or Rafael Montero.
6:28
Speaker 3: I'd maybe lean Helsley, but I don't know. Right now,
6:31
Speaker 3: Montero has been the better pitcher, certainly at least getting
6:34
Speaker 3: better results. I think Montero deserved some flowers. He's clearly
6:39
Speaker 3: made some strides in his game. And so you see
6:43
Speaker 3: some good things happening with the staff, you see some
6:45
Speaker 3: bad things happening with this staff. It's certainly thin. There
6:48
Speaker 3: are a lot of question marks. But then it's like,
6:52
Speaker 3: maybe this is the design. We've talked about this just
6:55
Speaker 3: being a big tryout camp. Maybe if you can get
6:58
Speaker 3: a couple guys right, get a couple healthy, if they
7:01
Speaker 3: can sort it all out in the next twenty one games,
7:04
Speaker 3: maybe you feel fine about what you have going into
7:06
Speaker 3: the postseason. There's still a world where this is the
7:08
Speaker 3: team's achilles heel, where it bites them in a seven
7:11
Speaker 3: game series. But you can also see the signs of like, Okay, well,
7:16
Speaker 3: if this works and if this guy keeps pitching, well,
7:20
Speaker 3: I don't know.
7:21
Speaker 1: Yeah, Well, you know the expression you talked about, the
7:25
Speaker 1: old thing we used to say, I'll bring up another
7:28
Speaker 1: ajaism that he's always said. It's just has had a
7:31
Speaker 1: different flavor depending on where the Tigers are.
7:34
Speaker 2: It's we've earned the right. The Tigers have earned the right.
7:38
Speaker 1: To kind of figure this out with the cushion that
7:40
Speaker 1: they have with with the you know, being there in
7:43
Speaker 1: the top seeds. You know, you mentioned you know, some
7:47
Speaker 1: some pieces on the Athletic, one of which you wrote,
7:49
Speaker 1: the other one by your colleague n Rosenthal. I mean
7:51
Speaker 1: the epitome of this is if you go to the
7:53
Speaker 1: Tigers team page on the Athletic, you have the Rosenthal
7:57
Speaker 1: piece where it's like, you know, don't worry about the pitching,
7:59
Speaker 1: They're going to figure it out. You really should like
8:01
Speaker 1: be more, you know, Tigers' main focus should be like
8:04
Speaker 1: the strikeout rate and you know, the things offense and
8:06
Speaker 1: you know, blah blah blah, and then yours is just like,
8:08
Speaker 1: you know, everything that's going wrong with the pitching. It's
8:11
Speaker 1: like back to back and that's really what everybody's going through,
8:14
Speaker 1: the people that are talking about the Tigers, the people
8:15
Speaker 1: that root for the Tigers, trying to kind of rationale
8:19
Speaker 1: all of that stuff, and you know, to obviously hope,
8:23
Speaker 1: you know, Paddick and his family you know, are dealing
8:25
Speaker 1: with that in the best way they can.
8:27
Speaker 5: Uh.
8:27
Speaker 1: Specifically to the baseball piece of this, Uh, you know
8:32
Speaker 1: there was talk speculation about tipping. A j kind of
8:38
Speaker 1: danced around that a little bit. I don't know if
8:40
Speaker 1: that's because he just didn't want to bring attention to
8:42
Speaker 1: it or or what you know, there might have been
8:45
Speaker 1: a couple of more.
8:46
Speaker 3: Jas was a little weird about tipping, and anyone who
8:49
Speaker 3: knows his history you can probably guess why it's not
8:51
Speaker 3: a topic he loves. But I kind of agree, Like
8:54
Speaker 3: there's tipping and then there's just sitting on a change up,
8:56
Speaker 3: and I think maybe they were just more sitting on
8:59
Speaker 3: first back's change up doesn't meaning whon't tipping in it?
9:01
Speaker 3: But like, was he really executing pitch as well? He
9:04
Speaker 3: said he was. I don't think he was.
9:06
Speaker 1: Yeah, And and there's there's got there's pieces to this
9:09
Speaker 1: that we haven't even mentioned. There's pieces of this that
9:11
Speaker 1: we can't mention, and and we'll discuss that here in
9:15
Speaker 1: a second. Uh, we're gonna really examine like some talking points,
9:20
Speaker 1: some fallout of this of this chaos that we're witnessing
9:22
Speaker 1: that we saw last year and that you know, chances
9:24
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10:31
Speaker 1: All right, coming back here, you know the expression, to
10:35
Speaker 1: paraphrase Rick Pattino, so and so ain't walking through that door.
10:38
Speaker 1: The Tigers actually have a long list of that, you know,
10:41
Speaker 1: in their in their pitching department, and and there are
10:45
Speaker 1: a couple key pieces, more than a couple key pieces
10:48
Speaker 1: that were associated with that run last year that are
10:51
Speaker 1: just not here. They are not around. Uh, you haven't
10:56
Speaker 1: seen Jason Foley at all. You haven't seen Bobrisk, you know.
11:01
Speaker 1: And if you want to extend it to the starting element, no, Resulson.
11:04
Speaker 1: It looks like we're not, you know, any whole hope
11:07
Speaker 1: that people were holding out. Probably shouldn't hold any hope
11:09
Speaker 1: on that. And then Jackson job obviously too.
11:12
Speaker 2: So like.
11:15
Speaker 1: There's a there's two lanes you can go. Is this
11:18
Speaker 1: expected outcome or is this uh, and therefore you've prepared
11:23
Speaker 1: for it. Or is this, as we put the graphic
11:26
Speaker 1: here on our screen, like a cost that you have
11:30
Speaker 1: to adjust to afterward. You see what I'm saying? Like that,
11:32
Speaker 1: that's kind of like that. That's kind of where we're
11:35
Speaker 1: at right now. And I think depending on your persuasion,
11:38
Speaker 1: you can choose either one.
11:40
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean I think this kind of hit me Tuesday, right.
11:42
Speaker 3: They move Paddock to the pin and it's like, Okay,
11:45
Speaker 3: saw your Gibson long? He's gonna open another game for you?
11:49
Speaker 3: He didn't pitch well, is this guy the best you have?
11:51
Speaker 3: Who else you have?
11:52
Speaker 5: You have?
11:52
Speaker 3: Cater Montero, his his slider's not being getting with at
11:56
Speaker 3: the same rate. Down in Triple A. You look at
11:59
Speaker 3: the bullpen. They've been cycling in guys in and out.
12:02
Speaker 3: But do you feel good about any of them? Bailey
12:05
Speaker 3: Horn he's probably going on the paternity list soon. Who
12:08
Speaker 3: do you even? How are you suddenly down to Drew Summers?
12:12
Speaker 3: Is your only other lefty option? Brenton Herders hopefully going
12:15
Speaker 3: to make it back. Tigers kind of need him to
12:17
Speaker 3: make it back for the postseason. He's got lower back soreness.
12:21
Speaker 3: When the injured listened Toledo. But my question was how
12:24
Speaker 3: did they suddenly get so thin? Like, how did that happen?
12:30
Speaker 3: And I think it's interesting to look Keran. Here are
12:33
Speaker 3: the five pitchers relief pitchers the Tigers used the most
12:39
Speaker 3: after August first of last year, basically after they started
12:41
Speaker 3: I think this after August thirteenth of last year, after
12:44
Speaker 3: they started pitching chaos. Three of them basically don't exist.
12:48
Speaker 3: Jason Foley is not pitched bo brisk. He's barely pitching
12:51
Speaker 3: the majors this year. When he was and he wasn't
12:53
Speaker 3: years good. Now he has been shut down. Sean Gunter
12:57
Speaker 3: haven't seen much of them. They Tyler Holton, they use
13:00
Speaker 3: them a ton. Tyler Holton still been good, but he
13:05
Speaker 3: hasn't been the same guy. Used them a ton down
13:07
Speaker 3: the stretch and into the postseason. They rode these guys hard.
13:11
Speaker 3: Three of them have been hurt since August first of
13:15
Speaker 3: last year. No team has used its bullpen more than
13:19
Speaker 3: the Detroit Tigers. And we know their strategy, and they
13:23
Speaker 3: still had bulk relievers, and some of these relief innings
13:27
Speaker 3: as bulk relievers who kind of functioned more as starters.
13:31
Speaker 3: The point is They've ridden these guys really hard, and
13:35
Speaker 3: you can't help but wonder if it's leading to some
13:37
Speaker 3: of these guys breaking now, Pitchers get hurt. It's what
13:41
Speaker 3: happens in the modern game. So I don't want to
13:43
Speaker 3: dismiss that. But then you see Kyle Finnegan. It's not
13:47
Speaker 3: an arm, it's growing tightness. But he just threw fourteen
13:51
Speaker 3: and the third innings in August. That is the most
13:54
Speaker 3: innings Kyle Finnegan has ever thrown in a single month
13:57
Speaker 3: in his major league career, and he's gone four years
14:00
Speaker 3: with a lot of appearances without being on the il.
14:02
Speaker 3: Suddenly you're asking him to throw in some different roles,
14:06
Speaker 3: to throw with a higher frequency than he's used to,
14:09
Speaker 3: closing games for a team that hasn't been that good.
14:13
Speaker 1: Uh.
14:13
Speaker 3: Is it coincidence you know that the growing tightens up
14:16
Speaker 3: on him or is there some causation there. We may
14:19
Speaker 3: not fully know the answers to those questions, but I
14:23
Speaker 3: think it's beginning to be worth pointing out. Is are
14:26
Speaker 3: we seeing the downstream effect? Are we seeing the cost
14:30
Speaker 3: of the chaos that the Tigers, for the most part,
14:32
Speaker 3: have had a lot of success with. I think it's
14:35
Speaker 3: just a question worth raising, worth talking about a little bit.
14:40
Speaker 1: Yeah, and if you guys have watched on YouTube, you
14:42
Speaker 1: can see that graphic. But if you if you you
14:46
Speaker 1: look at the top ten teams on that list, I mean,
14:48
Speaker 1: just another example of us not not being able to
14:51
Speaker 1: like take point a and point b and have lots
14:56
Speaker 1: of conclusioncy. Okay, the Tigers have the best records since
15:00
Speaker 1: you know whatever date. Okay, they're number one. The Dodgers
15:03
Speaker 1: are defending World Series champions, they're number two. But then
15:06
Speaker 1: it's the White Sox. All right, it's Miami and then
15:09
Speaker 1: it's Milwaukee. You know like that, you know, then at
15:12
Speaker 1: your top four, I will see me top five Colorado Minnesota.
15:17
Speaker 1: For a lot of that stretch was a team trying
15:20
Speaker 1: to win, right you know, Texas a team trying to win.
15:23
Speaker 1: The Giants a team trying to win. So it's like, yeah,
15:27
Speaker 1: it's not like all the bad It's like the Tigers
15:29
Speaker 1: are with all the bad.
15:29
Speaker 2: Teams or are there with the kids?
15:31
Speaker 3: With this shows is there are multiple ways you can
15:33
Speaker 3: use your bullpen. You can use it very creatively, like
15:35
Speaker 3: the Tigers. You can use it a lot like the
15:38
Speaker 3: Dodgers because they have a good bullpen. Or you can
15:41
Speaker 3: just suck your starters can be terrible like the white
15:44
Speaker 3: Socks and to some degree the Marlins, and you just
15:46
Speaker 3: have to use your relievers a lot.
15:49
Speaker 1: Yes, And you know, to to go back to the
15:53
Speaker 1: kind of overall question that we're just kind of pondering here,
15:58
Speaker 1: is like if you believe the front office puts a
16:01
Speaker 1: lot of thought into the arms that they bring, in
16:04
Speaker 1: the way that they developed the sequencing, in the pitches
16:08
Speaker 1: that they emphasize to make guys as effective as they can,
16:11
Speaker 1: which you know, evidence shows that that is certainly the case.
16:15
Speaker 2: You would have to imagine that part of this calculus.
16:18
Speaker 1: Is that there's going to be some where where and
16:23
Speaker 1: tear and you're gonna have to replicate and or replace
16:27
Speaker 1: like that output a handful of times. I'm sure there's
16:30
Speaker 1: a formula that exists that says, like, we're probably gonna
16:33
Speaker 1: have to use this many you know pictures, we have
16:36
Speaker 1: to have this much available in the bucket to pull.
16:38
Speaker 2: Out, you know, that kind of thing.
16:39
Speaker 1: So you would have to believe that this is not
16:44
Speaker 1: taking the coaching staff in the front office by surprise,
16:49
Speaker 1: like like it would you know, like a casual fan.
16:52
Speaker 1: It's like, man, all these guys are hurt, you know
16:54
Speaker 1: what I mean, Like, and maybe that's maybe that's Jose
16:58
Speaker 1: or Keati. Maybe may be that's uh, maybe that's your boy,
17:03
Speaker 1: uh Seawall, Seawalt, Uh, maybe that's Alex. Lane's gonna have
17:09
Speaker 1: to have a moment here or two, you know, just
17:11
Speaker 1: to kind of get you by and you know a
17:13
Speaker 1: name where this is a miss by us right here,
17:17
Speaker 1: we haven't mentioned Troy Melton once, and you have to
17:19
Speaker 1: imagine he's going to be like one of the key
17:21
Speaker 1: cogs of this, you know, yeah, like AE factor and
17:27
Speaker 1: to the extent, like you know, it's gonna be a
17:29
Speaker 1: question that's going to exist the rest of the year.
17:31
Speaker 1: Is it better off as he is right now? Or
17:35
Speaker 1: like should they have tried to make him a star
17:37
Speaker 1: the whole time?
17:38
Speaker 3: Right? And that's that's also for all the crowd wanting
17:41
Speaker 3: to stretch him back out, like you're using him frequently,
17:44
Speaker 3: you're using them in a different role. You want to
17:47
Speaker 3: suddenly have him go back to throwing four or five innings,
17:49
Speaker 3: Like I worry how hard they're writing Troy Melton and
17:52
Speaker 3: now they're asking him to do different things. He's been great,
17:54
Speaker 3: he's been awesome, what's that gonna look like next spring?
17:58
Speaker 3: What's that gonna look like next year? This is young picture,
18:00
Speaker 3: like not a dude, you want to get hurt. And
18:04
Speaker 3: it's hard to have scientific data for any of this.
18:07
Speaker 3: But like the way they're using Melton almost scares me
18:11
Speaker 3: a little bit, even though I think it's the right thing.
18:13
Speaker 3: If he were a starter, he's gonna hit his endings limit.
18:15
Speaker 3: You're not gonna be able to use them at all.
18:18
Speaker 1: And that's and that's why, like, you know, to bring
18:20
Speaker 1: it back to today's game specifically, that's why like what
18:25
Speaker 1: we saw, I'm not gonna say it was a like,
18:28
Speaker 1: you know, something encouraging, but it is going to be
18:32
Speaker 1: needed that you're gonna have to rely on Kanelee to
18:35
Speaker 1: get you one point one, right, Like you're you're gonna
18:38
Speaker 1: have You're gonna have to support. You're gonna have to,
18:42
Speaker 1: you know, have a situation where it's like all right, dude, Raphael,
18:46
Speaker 1: Like you know, it's not the most high leverage, but
18:49
Speaker 1: it's not easy either, you know, like you're gonna have
18:51
Speaker 1: to go through the hard order here and get us
18:54
Speaker 1: and you know, and get us a win here. You're
18:56
Speaker 1: not gonna You're not even gonna get credit for a
18:57
Speaker 1: save even though you're putting in a manager you'll save situation.
19:01
Speaker 1: Uh So, like those kind of guys have to be
19:04
Speaker 1: able to perform. It's at least the rest of this
19:07
Speaker 1: month postseason, and everything's different the rest of this month.
19:09
Speaker 1: If you're gonna get the top two seed, or if
19:12
Speaker 1: you really care about the one seed, or if you
19:13
Speaker 1: just want to be in position where you have more options.
19:16
Speaker 1: You have to get comfortable with Kinley in these situations today.
19:22
Speaker 2: You have or he has to be comfortable.
19:23
Speaker 1: You have to get comfortable with Rafael Montero in these
19:26
Speaker 1: situations today, and damn it, you probably need to get
19:29
Speaker 1: cater Montero comfortable enough that you can use him in
19:33
Speaker 1: a situation the rest you know, the rest of the
19:35
Speaker 1: month and maybe spell you a little bit if you
19:37
Speaker 1: don't think he figures into your postseason plans. And you know,
19:41
Speaker 1: with all this speculation that we've done, I did want
19:43
Speaker 1: to again give credit to Casey Miz. You know you
19:46
Speaker 1: talked about it, but like another example of that my
19:49
Speaker 1: you know micro Macro, and that's the two stories on
19:52
Speaker 1: the on the athletic right now. Is that, Yeah, Casey Miz,
19:55
Speaker 1: what is he like thirteen and five and got a
19:58
Speaker 1: three eight five three eight seven.
20:01
Speaker 2: But do you guys worried about a number two starter?
20:04
Speaker 3: All right? Take out like put that in a vacuum,
20:07
Speaker 3: or give you you know those numbers in March, Just say, Casey,
20:10
Speaker 3: my is gonna have this ra Oh everyone would have
20:14
Speaker 3: taken that. You would have been feeling great about your
20:16
Speaker 3: pitching staff as long as you didn't reject Flarity's numbers,
20:19
Speaker 3: which are worse than we all would have thought. But
20:21
Speaker 3: you are, You're a miz or a flairity clicking away
20:24
Speaker 3: from like a lot of things being solved, a lot
20:27
Speaker 3: of things being solved, a lot And of course this
20:31
Speaker 3: is Casey Mice. He threw a what aj Hinch called
20:34
Speaker 3: like one of the more extended bullpins I've seen or
20:37
Speaker 3: something like that. He put in a lot of work
20:38
Speaker 3: between starts, is what he did. And I asked Casey, like,
20:41
Speaker 3: did something click in your bullpen? And the most Casey
20:44
Speaker 3: May's answer ever, He's like, no, I left my bullpen
20:47
Speaker 3: feeling really frustrated, like I normally do. And then he
20:50
Speaker 3: goes out and he has his best outing in several starts.
20:53
Speaker 1: So yeah, I mean five innings, five hits the one
20:57
Speaker 1: run you know, three k's, I mean it was and
21:00
Speaker 1: and again efficient low pitch count.
21:01
Speaker 2: What was he at sixty something?
21:03
Speaker 3: Sixty nine? Again, don't I don't think you're gonna see
21:07
Speaker 3: Casey Mice or Jack Flaherty or anyone not named Trek
21:10
Speaker 3: Scouble going three times around the order in the playoffs,
21:13
Speaker 3: no matter their pitch count. So whether that's right or wrong,
21:16
Speaker 3: we can debate. Get used to it.
21:19
Speaker 1: Yeah, and you know, another piece real quick while it
21:22
Speaker 1: popped in my head. You know, the Greg Risotto aspect
21:24
Speaker 1: of it. You know, there's you know, that was another
21:27
Speaker 1: guy just in general that was like, you know, available
21:29
Speaker 1: at the trade deadline. And you know we saw, you know,
21:34
Speaker 1: we see the downside of giving up assets for someone
21:37
Speaker 1: who was a little bit less controllable, you know, on
21:40
Speaker 1: the mound there, you know, he had the wild pitch
21:42
Speaker 1: and and he gave up you know, the left on
21:44
Speaker 1: left hit there to Riley Green. So and it's also
21:48
Speaker 1: not to you know, make excuses for this team. You
21:50
Speaker 1: dropped the series to a really good team, but not
21:52
Speaker 1: every team has a Lindor Soto Alonzo three punch.
21:59
Speaker 3: Stars, stars stars matter. It's college football, saying I don't know, maybe,
22:05
Speaker 3: But another thing pointing out here. We're sitting here watching
22:07
Speaker 3: the Tigers and just talking endlessly about their pitching. I
22:12
Speaker 3: think the Mets pitching is in worse shape, worse. It's bad.
22:17
Speaker 3: And they made the moves for the Hellsley the Soto
22:20
Speaker 3: and it hasn't worked out, and they're relying on Nolan
22:25
Speaker 3: McLean and another rookie basically to carry them. The Tigers
22:30
Speaker 3: are betting on a bunch of injured guys and fringy
22:33
Speaker 3: guys to carry them, and the Mets are betting on rookies.
22:36
Speaker 3: Which is better? I don't know. You have school, The
22:39
Speaker 3: Mets don't have a schoobl.
22:42
Speaker 2: The more you learn about this sport, the less you know.
22:46
Speaker 1: And we'll get to some non pitching topics here in
22:49
Speaker 1: a second, including a little bit more flowers for Jake
22:52
Speaker 1: Rodgers becoming a theme recently here.
22:54
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Speaker 2: Foul coming back here.
24:00
Speaker 1: You know, recently we've been getting some good reminders about
24:05
Speaker 1: like what an asset Jake Rogers can be on this team.
24:10
Speaker 1: And you know, defensively, we we know what he is,
24:13
Speaker 1: and what we were really looking for was a little
24:15
Speaker 1: bit of punch offensively, which he has a twenty home
24:18
Speaker 1: run season to his credit, so we know it's in
24:20
Speaker 1: forget that we know it's in there, we just hadn't
24:23
Speaker 1: seen it. And for the first time as a major leaguer,
24:26
Speaker 1: he was like getting very very very infrequent playing time
24:31
Speaker 1: and he had to I don't know if this is
24:33
Speaker 1: one of those things where he finally adjusted to it
24:35
Speaker 1: or what, but he is, you know, kind of hot
24:38
Speaker 1: right now. Eight for twenty three this season. With runners
24:41
Speaker 1: in scoring position, that's not nothing at the back of
24:43
Speaker 1: your lineup. And again, Dylan Dangler is having a great
24:48
Speaker 1: season where we were like comparing him to some old
24:50
Speaker 1: time great Tiger catcher seasons of late. But maybe there's
24:55
Speaker 1: a case to give, like, you know, especially September fresher
25:00
Speaker 1: as much as possible going into the postseason. I think
25:04
Speaker 1: there's a case to get Jake Rogers in there just
25:06
Speaker 1: a little bit more, give him a little bit more run.
25:09
Speaker 2: Is that fair?
25:10
Speaker 3: I don't know. Tingler's pretty good. He is trying to
25:14
Speaker 3: take him out of the lineup. But we talked a
25:17
Speaker 3: couple episodes ago about catchers and catchers who play a lot,
25:21
Speaker 3: and Kyle Rowley I don't think has a hit since then,
25:24
Speaker 3: and he's having an all time season from a catcher
25:27
Speaker 3: but he's playing more than anyone in the American League,
25:29
Speaker 3: and you do wonder like the guy's just wear down
25:31
Speaker 3: a little bit. And so I think it at the
25:35
Speaker 3: very least, it helps to have a competent back up.
25:37
Speaker 3: And even though Jake Rodgers offensive numbers aren't going to
25:40
Speaker 3: wow you, I think he certainly counts as a competent backup.
25:42
Speaker 3: And he's been swinging the bat better of late. It's
25:45
Speaker 3: been good in the situational hitting. I don't know if
25:49
Speaker 3: he should catch more. That's a hard wonderbody. Jay Hinch
25:52
Speaker 3: would say to that, I don't know.
25:55
Speaker 1: I mean again, it's it would be just a situation
25:59
Speaker 1: to get him a little bit more run because like
26:02
Speaker 1: you know, who knows in the postseason, like if there's
26:05
Speaker 1: a situation where he might have to come up in
26:07
Speaker 1: a bigger spot than than than you're accustomed to.
26:10
Speaker 2: And like and right now he's eight in your offense.
26:14
Speaker 2: Dingler is too, don't get me wrong.
26:17
Speaker 3: Too, and we've seen him both in the lineup at
26:19
Speaker 3: the same time.
26:21
Speaker 1: But it's just like he's played well enough. I think
26:24
Speaker 1: consideration is merited. It's really like it's really like my
26:27
Speaker 1: larger points say.
26:29
Speaker 3: It's probably unlikely. That'sigers have a bunch of off days
26:32
Speaker 3: coming on up, and really for the rest of the schedule,
26:34
Speaker 3: I'm not counting one more time for Jake fair enough?
26:37
Speaker 2: What about.
26:40
Speaker 1: What about one Hobby bias? Because I've this is something
26:45
Speaker 1: that I've kind of been seen a little bit because
26:48
Speaker 1: you would think with a no Parker Meadows situation, you
26:54
Speaker 1: can you need him in center field. Now Perez has
26:57
Speaker 1: proven he can he can play center two. But then
27:00
Speaker 1: you're rolling out McKinstry. Are you wearing out McKinstry and shortstop?
27:03
Speaker 1: You know, how much do you trust Trey Sweeney? Like
27:06
Speaker 1: the Hobby's defense almost seems like you ought to be
27:08
Speaker 1: in the lineup almost every day, but we're starting we've
27:10
Speaker 1: seen that not be the case. And and AJ spoke
27:14
Speaker 1: about this the other day, uh and kind of put
27:18
Speaker 1: it in really the only way AJ can. I'm not
27:21
Speaker 1: going to read this whole quote. You guys can see
27:23
Speaker 1: it on h on YouTube if you guys are watching
27:25
Speaker 1: on that. But basically, like you know, we'll Hobby has
27:29
Speaker 1: not had as high a quality at bats as he had,
27:33
Speaker 1: you know, towards the beginning of this season, and that's
27:35
Speaker 1: that's part of the consideration there too, and uh, and
27:39
Speaker 1: there are just certain pictures that AJ is not going
27:40
Speaker 1: to throw them out against.
27:41
Speaker 2: It's basically the gist of that.
27:44
Speaker 3: Yeah, it was kind of a very AJ Hinch quote
27:47
Speaker 3: and the like, there's kind of a lot going on here.
27:49
Speaker 3: When I asked him this, Hobby had only played three
27:51
Speaker 3: times in an eight game spell. AJ pointed out he
27:54
Speaker 3: had been battling an illness during mckinsas City series that
27:58
Speaker 3: at least partially factored in. But the playing time for
28:01
Speaker 3: Hobby has noticeably decreased. Tray Sweeney's been playing a lot,
28:05
Speaker 3: and I wouldn't say the production there has been much
28:07
Speaker 3: better than you would get from Hobby. Baya is at
28:09
Speaker 3: the plate. But when AJ was saying this live, I
28:13
Speaker 3: was like, damn, like he kind of buried Hobby. A
28:16
Speaker 3: little bit. Better at bats will equal better playing time, like,
28:19
Speaker 3: and AJ speak is like he hasn't been good. But
28:22
Speaker 3: then he goes on to say, hey, our roster is
28:24
Speaker 3: going to change, and it sounded like he was hinting
28:27
Speaker 3: that when we get Parker Meadows back, Sweeney's out of
28:30
Speaker 3: here and Hobby's gonna go back to playing a lot
28:33
Speaker 3: that I don't know for sure, if that's gonna happen.
28:35
Speaker 3: But that's how I interpret this. And then it's like, well,
28:41
Speaker 3: if that's the plan, then why is Tray Sweeney playing
28:44
Speaker 3: so much right now? Why not just play Hobby bias?
28:46
Speaker 3: I think it's worth pointing out. Look, Hobby's in a
28:48
Speaker 3: five for thirty six skid pretty much since his two
28:51
Speaker 3: homer game against the Red Sox. He has not been
28:53
Speaker 3: very good. All those metrics we went round and round
28:56
Speaker 3: one early in the season, eh, they have been proving correct.
29:01
Speaker 3: His performance has not sustained. It's just not been good.
29:04
Speaker 3: He's playing more like twenty twenty three twenty twenty four.
29:07
Speaker 3: Hobby Bayas lately needs a tough question for what you
29:10
Speaker 3: do next year, and even for what you do the
29:12
Speaker 3: remainder of this season. You're right here and that the
29:15
Speaker 3: defense at least has been pretty good, but the Hobby Bayas,
29:20
Speaker 3: who is a big part of your magical first half,
29:22
Speaker 3: has not been the same. And again, for as much
29:24
Speaker 3: as we talked about the pitching, since the trade deadline,
29:29
Speaker 3: you're twelfth in ops, you are eighth in the American
29:33
Speaker 3: League in run scored. You were second before the All
29:36
Speaker 3: Star break. So the offensive regression has kind of set
29:39
Speaker 3: in a little bit, I would say, almost more subtly.
29:43
Speaker 3: But the offense hasn't been as good. One big reason
29:46
Speaker 3: you're not getting the good version of hobby byas anymore.
29:51
Speaker 1: And I think there's there's a reasonable expectation that this
29:56
Speaker 1: was going to happen, as we talked about with those metrics,
29:58
Speaker 1: but you also would have thought that maybe you would
30:00
Speaker 1: get something. And it might sound like a broken record,
30:02
Speaker 1: but it's really part of it, like get something from
30:04
Speaker 1: Berly and get something from Meadows, and you obviously and
30:06
Speaker 1: you obviously have it, and then you throw in just
30:08
Speaker 1: like the variants of a of a carry.
30:10
Speaker 2: Carpenter.
30:11
Speaker 1: Now he had the big home run on one hundred
30:13
Speaker 1: mile an hour fastball today, but I was looking at
30:16
Speaker 1: his like splits by month, you know, August he had
30:20
Speaker 1: a seven to seventy one ohps, but that was with
30:22
Speaker 1: a two thirty nine average, obviously aided by having five
30:26
Speaker 1: home runs. He's, uh, he's a guy that you can't
30:30
Speaker 1: quite get like a reasonable line through with with his
30:35
Speaker 1: production either.
30:36
Speaker 2: And by the way, now we're kind of splitting hairs
30:39
Speaker 2: a little bit.
30:39
Speaker 1: But at the same time, if Carpenter's not hitting and
30:46
Speaker 1: you have to make decisions between Baias and Sweeney.
30:50
Speaker 2: Like all of a sudden, All of a sudden, the
30:52
Speaker 2: holes like start.
30:53
Speaker 1: That's how you end up getting like high strikeout rate,
30:57
Speaker 1: you know, compared to your peers, and you're running, you run,
31:01
Speaker 1: scoring goes down, like that's how it happens.
31:02
Speaker 3: You know what I mean? Is this like The Tigers
31:05
Speaker 3: and the Twilight Zone or something. This whole episode we've
31:08
Speaker 3: just been reading off numbers that tell us one thing,
31:10
Speaker 3: and then another set of numbers that tells something else.
31:12
Speaker 3: It feels like I'm in an Orwell novel or like
31:15
Speaker 3: Severance or something like that. Like I and I just
31:18
Speaker 3: don't know what to make of it.
31:19
Speaker 1: No, this is definitely a talk in an episode that
31:24
Speaker 1: two weeks from that will be like remember you're worried
31:26
Speaker 1: about X.
31:27
Speaker 3: Remember Remember I think you're right.
31:28
Speaker 1: Remember remember if Finnigan's like growing tightness like he's done
31:32
Speaker 1: fourteen ending since then, you know, just like you know
31:37
Speaker 1: something like that, You know, Herder comes back and all
31:39
Speaker 1: of a sudden, you're good on lefties, you know what
31:40
Speaker 1: I mean? Like yeah, like like as complicated as frustrate
31:45
Speaker 1: as it could be, I guess it is.
31:47
Speaker 3: That's where I'm met That's where I'm at what I've
31:49
Speaker 3: been saying for a month, like I'm viewing everything through
31:51
Speaker 3: the lens of can the Tigers win the World Series
31:53
Speaker 3: or can they get to the World Series thing? I'm
31:55
Speaker 3: done with that. I think just like, let's get to
31:58
Speaker 3: let's get to the playoffs, and let's play those games,
32:00
Speaker 3: because all this is just like kind of noise that
32:04
Speaker 3: isn't really gonna factor in like maybe we can clean
32:07
Speaker 3: something from it, maybe we can't. Uh, the lights are
32:10
Speaker 3: gonna be bright after one hundred and sixty two games
32:13
Speaker 3: of identifying trends and trying to come up with predictive stats,
32:17
Speaker 3: is gonna be like who executes right here? Let's playoff?
32:20
Speaker 3: Baseball suddenly becomes a little more like a football game.
32:22
Speaker 1: And then yeah, you know what, manager is going to
32:25
Speaker 1: try to go tip to tat with AJ on the matchups,
32:28
Speaker 1: and then you know, like, yeah, you have Chicago this weekend,
32:31
Speaker 1: you have you know the Yankees in Miami, you know
32:34
Speaker 1: next week Cleveland, Atlanta, Like it's you're gonna you're gonna
32:40
Speaker 1: be there opportunities to figure some things out. You're gonna
32:43
Speaker 1: be able to in theory, should be able to get
32:44
Speaker 1: some guys some run in some non leverage situations. I'd
32:47
Speaker 1: like to see some more j Hen nice to see
32:50
Speaker 1: him playing first base, uh yesterday. Don't want that to
32:53
Speaker 1: go unmentioned either, But you're gonna have to You gonna
32:59
Speaker 1: have to get some an through some data points, not
33:01
Speaker 1: not answers, data points. Now, that's that's that's the that's
33:04
Speaker 1: the actually the way to summarize this. We're not looking
33:06
Speaker 1: for answers, We're just looking for data points. So that's
33:07
Speaker 1: what the Tigers are doing.
33:09
Speaker 3: Yeah, I like, you know, we talked to Thustin Jackson
33:11
Speaker 3: like is it who you play or when you play them?
33:14
Speaker 3: And that's still a very relevant question. But I like
33:16
Speaker 3: seeing them play the New York Mets. The Mats we
33:18
Speaker 3: haven't been playing all that good baseball. But yeah, it's like, okay,
33:21
Speaker 3: how do you how's Drew Summers gonna fair against Jan Soto?
33:24
Speaker 3: And did Drew Summer's credit He actually made a nice pitch.
33:27
Speaker 3: It was an inside sinker Soto hit at one hundred
33:29
Speaker 3: miles an hour, but there's a chopper on the ground
33:31
Speaker 3: that got down the line. You never felt coold about
33:34
Speaker 3: that matchup though, And then Soto hit another ground ball
33:37
Speaker 3: the first Wednesday that wasn't hit quite as hard and
33:40
Speaker 3: wasn't right down the line it was now, So that's
33:43
Speaker 3: more baseball. But I liked I liked seeing these guys
33:46
Speaker 3: in situations against some star players, against what is likely
33:51
Speaker 3: a playoff team. We'll see that a couple more times.
33:54
Speaker 3: We'll see that against the Yankees. I do feel like
33:57
Speaker 3: it was just a little more that there was a
34:00
Speaker 3: little bit of a postseason ish element to this Mets series.
34:03
Speaker 1: I enjoyed it, obviously, you know, Tuesday was was not
34:07
Speaker 1: all that fun to watch, but like, just like Monday
34:10
Speaker 1: and Monday and Wednesday's games definitely had playoff feels, like
34:14
Speaker 1: the back and forth, the matchup thing we talked about,
34:16
Speaker 1: the lefty lefty combination that they ran out there, and
34:20
Speaker 1: and it felt like, all right, you got to see
34:24
Speaker 1: Summers in a situation that you just you're not gonna
34:26
Speaker 1: be able to replicate that in Toledo going on again
34:29
Speaker 1: sponsor in a key spot.
34:30
Speaker 2: You have to see Kinelee go more than you know,
34:33
Speaker 2: more than any and then you.
34:35
Speaker 1: Know, the whole team had to adjust to like, you know,
34:38
Speaker 1: how we going to figure out this Finnagan thing when
34:40
Speaker 1: he can't you know, come in the game like that's
34:42
Speaker 1: not nothing either. You know, sometimes crazy happens in the postseason.
34:46
Speaker 1: So looking forward to see more data points. That's it,
34:49
Speaker 1: Stata points.
34:50
Speaker 3: I'm done with that points. I don't care about data
34:52
Speaker 3: points whatever. We can hit the ball and they ain't.
34:57
Speaker 3: That's my strategy.
34:58
Speaker 1: There you go, maybe get the Baltimore shop going to
35:00
Speaker 1: all right, you can follow us on x probly knows,
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Speaker 1: Twitter at Cody Stavenhagen. I'm at Kieran Underscore, secte pot
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Speaker 1: page at Tiger Territory Underscore, YouTube, Instagram, Apple, Spotify, wherever
35:10
Speaker 1: gets your podcast.
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Speaker 2: You guys know what to do. We appreciate you all
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Speaker 2: of you.
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Speaker 1: Make sure to go to Tiger Territory dot com Tiger
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Speaker 1: Territory shop dot com to get all of your merch.
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Speaker 1: Like I said, we appreciate of you for hoy Saveanhagen.
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Speaker 1: I'm Kieran Steckley. Everybody, have great day.