Anytime a high caliber team like the Mets roll into town, it’s hard to expect anything. Fortunately, the Tigers got some more great hitting in the final two games to walk away with a series win against one of the best teams in the National League.
Today’s game saw the most offense and once again, it was Gary Sheffield providing some of the fireworks. He finished the game four for five with his seventeenth homerun, two RBIs and two runs. Omar Infante, Ivan Rodriguez and Placido Polanco all scored three runs while five Tigers had at least three hits in the beatdown. Brandon Inge hit homerun number ten and he drove in a career high five RBIs in a fantastic day at the plate.
One downer was that Carlos Guillen left the game with a hamstring injury. Guillen has been nursing what seems like a variety of injuries all year and you almost hope he doesn’t get scooped up for the All Star game. I’m not sure how much those three days matters, but Guillen needs a break.
Andrew Miller improved to 2-0 although it was more because of all the offense then it was a great start. He gave up four runs on five hits three walks with five strikeouts in 5 1/3 innings. Like his last major league start, his phenomonal 3/1 groundball to flyball ratio didn’t carry over and he gave up six ground ball outs to five fly ball outs.
The Indians lost today so the Tigers sit just a game and a half back in the Central and while I hate to talk about it already, they’re a game and a half ahead of the surprising Mariners for the Wild Card. The Tigers have the night off tomorrow and then it’s three against the first place Brewers. It wasn’t that long ago (it just feels like it) that the Brewers were one of the Tigers division rivals. Now they only play them every few years in interleague play.