10/1/2025 1:08 PM Tigers @ Guardians AL Wild Card Game 2

[Sports_Freak]

7 minutes ago, gehringer_2 said:

My only question would be whether someone was paying attention to what he doing in the off-season last year that no-one thought to push back on the extreme swing path. It was pretty predictable that was going to lead to holes that pitchers would exploit. 

Any competent hitting coach could see he's swinging from the ankles and he can't shorten his swing when he gets to 2 strikes. Sometimes a player just needs to put the ball in play to put pressure on the defense to make plays. Greenes attitude of just shrugging off 200+ strikeouts rubs many fans the wrong way. Maybe even Hinch has seen enough?

[4hzglory]

5 minutes ago, Sports_Freak said:

Tuesday; Gaddis 19 pitches. Smith 19 pitches.  Wednesday; Gaddis 20 pitches. Smith 31 pitches.

I would be a bit surprised if either are used tomorrow.

 

Me too.  And while I know they had to win this game, you would think a 5 run lead in the 9th would have been reason to make sure you could have Smith available tomorrow - unless of course he wasn't going to be anyway after warming up.

 

At least Vest and Finnegan should be available for us.  Only one questionable is Holton, but even he is likely to be available.

[gehringer_2]

2 minutes ago, Sports_Freak said:

Any competent hitting coach could see he's swinging from the ankles and he can't shorten his swing when he gets to 2 strikes. Sometimes a player just needs to put the ball in play to put pressure on the defense to make plays. Greenes attitude of just shrugging off 200+ strikeouts rubs many fans the wrong way. Maybe even Hinch has seen enough?

I always wonder where Hinch is in all this in terms of what he is encouraging guys to do in a given AB - whether explicitly or implicitly. Torkelson is a good opposite field hitter and can reach the seat oppo in almost any ballpark, but he doesn't go that way as much as I would like to see him. So the question is do the Tigers get a lot of all-or-nothing hitting because that is what they encourage? IDK but it's a fair question.

[4hzglory]

9 minutes ago, 4hzglory said:

Me too.  And while I know they had to win this game, you would think a 5 run lead in the 9th would have been reason to make sure you could have Smith available tomorrow - unless of course he wasn't going to be anyway after warming up.

 

At least Vest and Finnegan should be available for us.  Only one questionable is Holton, but even he is likely to be available.

And while only throwing 5 pitches on Tuesday, Sabrowski pitched both Tuesday and Wednesday and threw 18 pitches today.  So he isn't likely available for much if any tomorrow.

[monkeytargets39]

24 minutes ago, gehringer_2 said:

I always wonder where Hinch is in all this in terms of what he is encouraging guys to do in a given AB - whether explicitly or implicitly. Torkelson is a good opposite field hitter and can reach the seat oppo in almost any ballpark, but he doesn't go that way as much as I would like to see him. So the question is do the Tigers get a lot of all-or-nothing hitting because that is what they encourage? IDK but it's a fair question.

With Tork, the adjustments he made for this year probably saved his career—so I can understand not trying to push the envelope too hard to try to get him to do too many additional things beyond what he has already improved on.  You don’t want him to go away from something that has helped him overall, struggle with that, and then not be able to revert back to what he was doing and go back into last years form.

This offseason you can probably push him to take the next step now that he has improved his contact rate, found his power, and improved his walk rate.  
 

Guys like Greene and Carpenter are a lot more frustrating to not have explanations for on what Tiger management is trying to do with them.  They both were lighting up the baseball savant page, and now both have had an enormous drop in plate discipline and are completely selling out for power all the time regardless of situation.

[gehringer_2]

19 minutes ago, monkeytargets39 said:

With Tork, the adjustments he made for this year probably saved his career—so I can understand not trying to push the envelope too hard to try to get him to do too many additional things beyond what he has already improved on.  You don’t want him to go away from something that has helped him overall, struggle with that, and then not be able to revert back to what he was doing and go back into last years form.

Fair point

[Sports_Freak]

50 minutes ago, monkeytargets39 said:

With Tork, the adjustments he made for this year probably saved his career—so I can understand not trying to push the envelope too hard to try to get him to do too many additional things beyond what he has already improved on.  You don’t want him to go away from something that has helped him overall, struggle with that, and then not be able to revert back to what he was doing and go back into last years form.

This offseason you can probably push him to take the next step now that he has improved his contact rate, found his power, and improved his walk rate.  
 

Guys like Greene and Carpenter are a lot more frustrating to not have explanations for on what Tiger management is trying to do with them.  They both were lighting up the baseball savant page, and now both have had an enormous drop in plate discipline and are completely selling out for power all the time regardless of situation.

And considering Carpenter's, Greene's and Torkelson's age, they are still relatively young. A couple more years to their prime. If Greene adjusts his swing, will fans be OK with less power? 20 to 25 home runs but less strikeouts?

[romad1]

I remember bitching about every one of the 1984 Tigers.  Its a failure game.  I think they do need something more dynamic in the lineup.  Someone who legitimately scares opposing managers.  Kerry Carpenter is close but too bound by platoon dynamics.   

 

[monkeytargets39]

5 minutes ago, Sports_Freak said:

And considering Carpenter's, Greene's and Torkelson's age, they are still relatively young. A couple more years to their prime. If Greene adjusts his swing, will fans be OK with less power? 20 to 25 home runs but less strikeouts?

I would be plenty fine with 20-25 HRs.  Assuming his Ks drop, BBs shoot up, and he is probably then hitting 40+ doubles.  
 

I want a lineup full of guys who put together complete at bats consistently, can go to all fields, and drive up the opposing starters pitch counts.  
 

Riley having 68 extra base hits this year but barely clearing an .800 ops on the season means he is doing a lot of other things poorly.

[casimir]

5 hours ago, GalagaGuy said:

And aggressive base running just cost you a run, great!

I can’t speak of this play in particular, but with the way they ain’t hitting, they’re going to have to be aggressive on the base paths to score runs.

[casimir]

6 hours ago, SoCalTiger said:

Shoot. I can not remember the last time Carpenter got a hit with RISP. Has to be a long time. 

.601 OPS wRISP this season.  Not good.

[casimir]

4 hours ago, gehringer_2 said:

Melton apparently thows very hard, and very straight.

 

4 hours ago, SeattleMike said:

He shouldn't be in the bullpen. 

If I had a nickel for every time I read that he should be in the rotation this season…..

[gehringer_2]

1 hour ago, Sports_Freak said:

And considering Carpenter's, Greene's and Torkelson's age, they are still relatively young. A couple more years to their prime. If Greene adjusts his swing, will fans be OK with less power? 20 to 25 home runs but less strikeouts?

It's not how many HRs he hits, it's his net production by any better standard - RunsCreated, OPS, oWAR, RE24 etc. In a year when he should have still been improving, he is overall down by all those measures despite the increase in his HR total.

[gehringer_2]

1 hour ago, Sports_Freak said:

And considering Carpenter's, Greene's and Torkelson's age, they are still relatively young. A couple more years to their prime. If Greene adjusts his swing, will fans be OK with less power? 20 to 25 home runs but less strikeouts?

I don't know if there is any easy metric for it, but just my casual sense watching Carpenter is that he has huge games with mulitple HRs/RBI, then disappears for a week. Looks pretty good on average but not very dependable day to day. Obviously with a >70% failure rate for hitters across the board, there always a lot of that with every hitter, but it's just my impression that it's moreso with Kerry. Or maybe his hitting is just more match-up dependent than some guys?

Edited October 2 by gehringer_2

[gehringer_2]

1 hour ago, monkeytargets39 said:

I want a lineup full of guys who put together complete at bats consistently, can go to all fields, and drive up the opposing starters pitch counts.

To me it comes down to "can you find a way to battle against a good pitcher?"

To me that means being able to battle against well located pitches and not just waiting for mistakes - though obviously hitting the mistakes is hugely important - if they have done even that today they win easily.

Every guy in majors can do it occasionally - for instance, we've seen McKinstry have some fantastic AB's this season. The trick is can you be at least somewhat consistent in bringing that level of compete.

Edited October 2 by gehringer_2

[monkeytargets39]

18 minutes ago, gehringer_2 said:

I don't know if there is any easy metric for it, but just my casual sense watching Carpenter is that he has huge games with mulitple HRs/RBI, then disappears for a week. Looks pretty good on average but not very dependable day to day. Obviously with a >70% failure rate for hitters across the board, there always a lot of that with every hitter, but it's just my impression that it's moreso with Kerry. Or maybe his hitting is just more match-up dependent than some guys?

His first several years he showed a good ability to work counts and draw some walks.  He was a highly valuable hitter overall.   This year it’s like all he’s trying to do is hit home runs and nothing else—and his BB rate has plummeted, and because he is so aggressive in his approach now, he’s down in the count 0-2 A LOT.  So that deteriorates the rest of his offensive statistics because he isn’t getting into hitters counts nearly as well as he used to.

[papalawrence]

First 3 WC series are going to game 3. Hoping Cinncy makes it 4-4

[kdog]

Tigers have not scored more than 5 runs since September 10th.

[Tenacious D]

1 hour ago, kdog said:

Tigers have not scored more than 5 runs since September 10th.

This.  Even if we eek out the win tomorrow, how far can this team go?  And more importantly, what happened to the offense?  They were very good during the first half of the season.

[SeattleMike]

13 minutes ago, Tenacious D said:

This.  Even if we eke out the win tomorrow, how far can this team go?  And more importantly, what happened to the offense?  They were very good during the first half of the season.

As recently as September 10 the Tigers were 7th in MLB in runs scored. And other than the 1-12 skid in July they avoided extended hitting slumps. Maybe they can recapture what worked for 140 games starting tomorrow. 

[papalawrence]

In 16 hours I'll know if I'll be canceling sling tv or not.

[Motor City Sonics]

This idea that AJ Hinch is untouchable should be flushed down the toilet after Game 2.      Brutal performance.  

[Motor City Sonics]

10 hours ago, SeattleMike said:

As recently as September 10 the Tigers were 7th in MLB in runs scored. And other than the 1-12 skid in July they avoided extended hitting slumps. Maybe they can recapture what worked for 140 games starting tomorrow. 

Pinch hitting for your best hitter might do the trick !

[RedTeamGo!]

I was at the game yesterday - myself and everyone around me (both Cleveland and Detroit fans) were confused when Greene was pinch hit for. Is he hurt?

[Tiger337]

2 minutes ago, RedTeamGo! said:

I was at the game yesterday - myself and everyone around me (both Cleveland and Detroit fans) were confused when Greene was pinch hit for. Is he hurt?

He can't hit lefties, so Hinch took a calculated risk that Jones would get a hit in a key spot as a pinch hitter.  It's the first time he's done that with Greene, but it wasn't a terrible idea.