Clete Thomas

[jaxvid]

Don't look now but las Tigres Detroit have a white player in the line-up. Thomas was a surprise last man on the roster decision, who's played well in place of injured Granderson. He's a CF with some speed too. Leads the team in hitting at this early point. Will go to the bench when Granderson comes back but it's still nice to see a white face in the line-up.

And the Dontrelle Willis hype begins, Yahoo headline: Chicago White Sox rally after ending Dontrelle Willis' no-hit bid, beat Detroit Tigers 5-3

yes a "no-hit bid" which was five innings of poorly pitched ball. The only reason the Sox didn't have any hits was because he walked so many, then he finally got knocked out of the box by Jim Thome.

 

[Van_Slyke_CF]

When I saw the headline about Willis` start, I was thinking he must have thrown a gem. Then I clicked on it and saw his line: 5 innings with 3 earned runs and 7 walks. Who cares if you only give up 1 hit if you walk everyone and are primarily responsible for your team losing the game?

I noticed that Brandon Inge has been playing well with so many other darker Tigers hurt already in the young season. Now I know that Inge has been too inconsistent over the past couple of years, but was it a good idea to bring in Cabrera and give him $153 million over the next 8 years? It won`t be long before he can`t play third at all anymore, and then they will have to move him across the diamond to first, or use him as the DH.
And to be fair, I`m not just singling out a non-white player for some of the absurd long-term contracts in MLB. Look at Barry Zito or Mike Hampton, for example.

It sure is a shame that Gary Sheffield hurt his finger.

Jim Leyland has cast his lot with as dark a team as he could find. He`d better hope they start playing better, or it will be a very long season in Detroit.

 

[Don Wassall]

Clete Thomas is named after Clete Boyer, who was a great fielding 3B for the Yankees. I always liked that name, distinctiveand just sounds like a baseball player's name.

 

[Realgeorge]

How about them Tigers! 0 and 6 and dropping like a rock. Maybe they can improve on 2003's season of 119 losses.

And someone forgot to tell the Orioles that they suk. They are much whiter than last year ... and imagine that, they're playing more cohesively. Five and one. How bizarre!

I wish the Orioles' lunk-headed GM and arsehole owner would just admit that Brian Roberts is the best infielder in the game ... and give him a seven-year extension with mucho dollars.

 

[Bear-Arms]

I watched the entire series being a White Sox fan and thought Thomas looked great. He was one of the few players doing something for the Tigers. Funny how writers are pinning their slow start on the Granderson injury when Thomas has been getting on base. Granderson is an energy guy for sure. He gets a lot of extra base hits, which is not hard in that new ball park. There is just a ton of room in that outfield. Anyone with speed should be putting up big numbers there.

The Tigers remind of how the old White Sox teams were built. The teams were built around power guys like Maggs, Carlos Lee, and Frank Thomas. They had a shaky bullpen and just enough starting pitching. They weren't built around character guys like Rowand, Thome, and Swisher. Swisher by the way has been great for the Sox. Anyway watching the Tigers you can see they have no passion right now. Joe Morgan called Guillen a gold glover on the ESPN game Sunday then moments later committed a big error that cost them a bunch of runs. Guillen looked completely disinterested in winning.

I was a bit nervous Willis would throw a shutout that game on Saturday. I figured eventually he would get knocked out the game because of all the walks. That was actually the best game I ever seen Willis pitch.

The Tigers will heat up I'm sure because they have a lot of talent on that team. I could see them sweeping the next two series. I wouldn't count them out just yet.