Archive for Detroit Tigers

It goes without saying that David Ortiz and Justin Verlander are among the most dominant players of their era. The Red Sox slugger has a career .284/.379/.545 slash line and 391 home runs; the Tigers right-hander has MVP and Cy Young Award trophies on his mantel. Their accomplishments have made them household names to baseball fans throughout the country.

Ortiz and Verlander recently sat down — in separate interviews — to answer the same set of questions about how they approach their respective crafts.

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Is hitting/pitching an art or a science?

David Ortiz: “Hitting is an art. It’s also hard. There are so many things against you. First of all, mentally you have to be 120% positive. You can’t feel like the guy pitching is too great — you can’t overrate him. If I’m facing a guy like Verlander, I tell myself that I’m going to take my chances. A lot of guys think, ‘Oh man, I’m facing Verlander.’ He’s the best pitcher in the game — he’s at least in the top three — but he still has to throw the ball over the plate.”

Justin Verlander: “Pitching is more of an art. There are so many different ways to get the job done. There are so many different pitches and so many different things. When an artist wants to paint a painting, they have all those things in their head that they want to portray on a canvas. It’s the same thing when I’m pitching. I have all these thoughts going through my head about how I want to pitch: which pitch I want to throw here, and why do I want to throw it?”

Can a hitter cover all 17 inches of the plate?

David Ortiz: “If you go up there trying to cover both sides of the plate, you have no chance. Read the rest of this entry »

Max Scherzer is having a Jekyll-and-Hyde-type season. The Detroit Tigers right-hander has the highest strikeout rate (12.0) of any American League starter, but he also has the highest BABIP (.394) and has a 5.67 ERA. According to a major-league scout who has seen him multiple times this season, the numbers aren’t misleading: “He has either been striking guys out or giving up hard-hit balls.”

Scherzer is stat-savvy enough to know that his BABIP should regress to the mean, but he also isn’t in denial about the hard-hit balls. He addressed the subject, as well as the increased velocity of his slider and his changeup, prior to Wednesday’s game at Fenway Park.

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Scherzer on his high BABIP: “My stuff, right now, is where I want it to be. I’m able to attack the zone with my fastball, and [throw] my slider and changeup in the zone and out of the zone. That’s how I’m generating swings and misses. But throughout my outings, I’m constantly making a few mistakes and I’m getting punished for it. You can’t put a number on that. It’s how my outings have been going and I have to minimize those mistakes.

“I’m aware of the luck in [BABIP], but at the same time, you can’t directly influence it. Read the rest of this entry »

One of the best hitters of his generation will officially call it a career this weekend. Magglio Ordonez wasn’t your prototypical slugger — he hit 294 home runs in 15 big-league seasons — but he was a paragon of productivity. A six-time all-star, the former Tigers and White Sox outfielder will retire with a slash line of .309/.369/.502 — and more runs created than numerous hall-of-famers. The 38-year-old Venezuelan won the American League batting title in 2007, when he hit .363.

Ordonez talked about his long-and-prolific career during the 2011 season.

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David Laurila: How would you assess your career?

Magglio Ordonez: I played this game and I respected this game. I’ve been on a championship team and I’ve been on losing teams. It has been a really nice ride, from the first day that I played in the big leagues to the last day.

DL: What are you most proud of having accomplished?

MO: Probably just being ready to play every day. I played the game hard and showed my teammates that I’m not better than them. I consider myself really humble, very low-profile. I don’t like to be in the spotlight. I come here, get dressed and prepare myself to play baseball. After the game, I go home. I don’t like to talk about my accomplishments. I let other people do that for me.

DL: How do Detroit and Chicago compare as places to play?

MO: Chicago obviously was the first team I played for — they gave me a chance to be in the big leagues — but the best memories I have of my career are with the Tigers. Read the rest of this entry »

If the Detroit Tigers are to live up to expectations and capture the American League Central, they’ll need to get solid starting pitching from more than Justin Verlander and Max Scherzer. The hard-throwing duo leads the club in wins — as they did last season — but they can‘t carry the entire load. Doug Fister, Rick Porcello and Drew Smyly need to consistently put their names in the Win column as well.

Jeff Jones, the Tigers pitching coach, gave scouting reports on the complementary threesome prior to Monday’s game at Fenway Park.

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Jones on Doug Fister: “Doug is really a complete pitcher. He has a lot of different pitches that he can throw for strikes. He changes speeds, he has a lot of movement on his fastball, and he has an outstanding changeup. He can also cut the ball. I’ve always felt that anybody who can make the ball move both ways has an advantage, and he can do that. He throws a two-seamer one way and a cutter the other. Doug also has a very good curveball that he can get some strikeouts with. We’ve gotten him to use it a little bit more. I thought he didn’t use it enough when he first got here.

“Doug uses reports, but he also has a very good ability to read swings and see what hitters are trying to do. Read the rest of this entry »

Andy Hawkins is the only pitcher in San Diego Padres history to earn a World Series win. It came in 1984 when the then-24-year-old right-hander threw five-and-one-third scoreless innings in Game 2, in relief of Ed Whitson. Dominating a powerhouse Detroit Tigers lineup, Hawkins allowed only one base runner as the Padres rallied for a 5-3 win at Jack Murphy Stadium.

Hawkins finished his career with a record of 84-91, his best season coming in 1985 when he went 18-8 with a 3.15 ERA. Currently the bullpen coach for the Texas Rangers, he reminisced about his World Series win during a visit to Fenway Park earlier this month.

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Andy Hawkins on October 10, 1984: “It was Game 2. I came in with two out in the first inning and we were in a tough situation. We were down [3-0] and they had runners on. My approach was to throw strikes, get somebody out immediately, and try to pick up the pieces from there. Fortunately, that happened. From there, I got a little stronger as the game progressed.

“It was mainly about controlling my emotions. This was the World Series and I was very uptight and very nervous. It was a battle of keeping myself under control, because I was pitching with an immense amount of adrenaline. Read the rest of this entry »

You probably haven’t heard of him, but Brian “Pete” Peterson is an invaluable member of the Detroit Tigers organization. Working within the realm of sports psychology, and alongside Dr. George Carlo, the 58-year-old Peterson is heading into his 10th season as the team’s Performance Enhancement Instructor. It isn’t a unique role — a handful of other teams employ someone in a similar capacity — but thanks to his background and experience, few, if any, are better at helping players gain a mental edge.

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David Laurila: How would you define your role with the Tigers organization?

Brian Peterson: My title is Performance Enhancement Instructor and my job is to help all of the players, in the entire organization, be clear of mind while they’re going about their business. That’s probably the easiest way to describe it.

DL: How did you get involved in professional baseball?

BP: I was a minor league pitcher for four years. My first year was 1976, in the Northwest League. I came out of the University of Oregon and was with one of the very first independent teams.

Later, and before coming to Detroit, I worked for the Florida Marlins. I was a pitching coach for six years — five in the Midwest League and one in the Eastern League — and then I was with them for three years in my current role. When the Marlins were sold, I was one of about 25 or 30 minor-league personnel who was let go. In September of 2002, Dave Dombrowski hired me. Prior to that, the Tigers didn’t have anyone in my position.

DL: How may teams currently employ Performance Enhancement Instructors, or Sports Psychologists? Read the rest of this entry »

Drew Smyly will come to camp as a non-roster invitee, with an outside shot of making the Tigers starting rotation out of spring training. It’s more likely that the 22-year-old southpaw will begin the season in Triple-A Toledo, but even if he does, he’s clearly on the fast track to the big leagues.

Drafted in the second round in 2010, Smyly started his professional career last season, and he did so with a bang. Splitting the year between high-A Lakeland [14 starts] and Double-A Erie [7 starts] he went a combined 11-6, 2.07, logging K/9 rates of 8.6 and 10.4 in his respective stops. Following the regular season, he threw 17 scoreless innings for Team USA.

Smyly talked about his path to pro ball, and how he gets hitters out, late in the 2011 season.

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Read the rest of this entry »

The Detroit Tigers made a move that will help them today and in the future, acquiring starting pitcher Doug Fister from the Seattle Mariners. The Tigers will also receive reliever David Pauley, and will send Casper Wells, Charlie Furbush, Francisco Martinez and a PTBNL to Seattle.

With Justin Verlander, Max Scherzer and Rick Porcello already in place, the Tigers headed into the trade deadline looking for a back-end starter. Fister, owner of a 3.33 ERA, will slide in nicely behind Detroit’s other arms. While Fister’s ERA is certainly a result of Safeco Field and the Mariners’ defense, he is by no means a product of a great situation. Fister’s xFIP currently sits below 4.00, as does his SIERA. While his league-average numbers are all well and good, Fister’s value comes from his contract situation. The 27-year old won’t be arbitration eligible until 2013, giving the Tigers another year or two of very cheap production.

Read the rest of this entry »

When the Tigers acquired Austin Jackson from the Yankees prior to the 2010 season, they did more than simply replace the popular Curtis Granderson in center field. They brought to Motown one of the few players who can match Granderson’s charisma. The 24-year-old Jackson isn’t a star — at least not yet — but he possesses an enviable mix of thoughtfulness and amiability. He can be serious, he can be fun-loving, he can even be baseball’s black Bugs Bunny.

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David Laurila: Why do you play baseball?

Austin Jackson: I play baseball, basically, because I’ve always played baseball. I had an older brother that played and I think that’s a big part of why I started playing. Growing up, I mostly played it for fun; it was something I enjoyed as a kid. I started getting a little more serious when I was in high school, because I realized I actually had a chance to make a profession out of this.

I had another sport and kind of swam my decision of whether to enter pro baseball or go to college and play both basketball and baseball. That was a tough decision coming out of high school — as an 18-year-old — to choose to make a little money and do something you love, or go to college and see which way that takes you.

DL: Does being African American impact that type of decision?

Read the rest of this entry »

It is common knowledge that starting pitchers take the mound every five games, but what happens between starts isn’t as widely know. A lot of work goes into those days between starts, and it typically happens within the parameters of a set routine. The routine itself can differ from pitcher to pitcher, but for almost everyone, it includes a bullpen session. Tigers right-hander Max Scherzer, and his pitching coach, Rick Knapp, talked about their respective approaches to getting ready for day five.

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David Laurila: Max, what do you do on the day after a start?

Max Scherzer: For me, the next day is one of the hardest-working days to get my body right. I’ll do a total body lift, lifting every major area. I’ll exercise my legs, back, chest, arms — kind of the whole nine yards. Then I’ll go out and run for awhile, trying to get as tired as I can. Throwing is very minimal. I just kind of loosen up, getting the arm moving to get ready for my pen the next day.

DL: Rick, what do you expect from a pitcher in his bullpen session?

Read the rest of this entry »