Oh, What Could Have Been

I will always firmly believe that had the Tigers played the Mets in the World Series last year instead of the Cardinals, I would be writing about the World Champion Detroit Tigers right now. It could have been a match made in pitcher's heaven- your typical good pitching always beats good hitting type of series. The Mets had approximately one solid starting pitcher, Tom Glavine, and no one coming out of the bullpen that would strike fear into Tigers fans' hearts. Although, they do have Endy Chavez, who has the best first name in baseball.

But here I am, eight months later fantasizing about what might have been.

The Mets come to town for the first time in three years tonight, bringing with them a four game losing streak. They're pretty much tearing up the NL East again this year, up 3.5 games over Atlanta. They send Jorge Sosa, the New York equivalent of Chad Durbin, to the mound tonight with his 5-1 record.

It really snuck up on me that Durbs is 5-1 so far this year. It seems as if it were just yesterday that I would have rather seen him anywhere else but on the mound in a Tigers' uniform. But, he's been getting the job done, so he's okay with me.

What's huge is the way the line-up is starting to come around. After giving up six runs in the first inning of the Texas series, the Tigs outscored the Rangers 24-5 over the next 26 innings. Gary Sheffield is on fire. Curtis Granderson is on fire. Magglio Ordonez is consistent. Sean Casey is on fire (it's nice to see it too, he's batting around .340 during this recent hot streak). Placido Polanco is on fire. Pudge Rodriguez is on fire.

As bad as the road trip started out, the Tigers ended up .500 for the ten game swing through Tampa, Cleveland, and Arlington. They've run off four of their last five and have scored 9 or more runs in all of those wins. Basically, the way the Tigs are hitting, all a starter needs to do is show up and keep the opposition under five runs and he'll probably get out with a win.

It'll be nice to get back down to Comerica Park tonight after being away for a couple weeks. More blabbering after the game.