Vote Of No Confidence

Rob Sanford

When a government in England or Canada gets a no confidence vote by its governing body...it calls for a new election. In that case I'm placing my no confidence vote in the Tiger bullpen. It shows that making predictions in advance of the season is almost meaningless. Going into the season, many felt the starting rotation was filled with question marks, but the bullpen looked ok. Instead it's just the opposite. Tiger starters are 16-10 with an ERA of around 2.86 in the last 36 games...but the bullpen is one of the worst in the American League. Who can figure??? Injuries obviously play a role, but every team has those and its something you have to anticipate going into the season. If the bullpen issue isn't resolved, and resolved very soon...you can kiss this season good-bye.

Ok, Ok....you can say I told you so. In my last post I talked about Miguel Cabrera's mini-slump, but I also said I felt like he would go back to his usual self. He was hitting lasers against Pittsburgh and looked like anything but a hitter in a slump. The stats back that up with a .565 batting average with runners in scoring position since April 18th.

Whatever was Austin Jackson's problems were early in the year, seem to be a bad memory for now. Over the last 20 games the Tiger lead off man has hit .305 with 9 rbi's. To Jackson's credit, all during his woes at the plate, his defense remained stellar.

This is a huge home stand for the Bengals. Tampa Bay, Boston and Minnesota all coming into town and if the Tigers aren't ready they could see their season suffering a huge set back. Even if they can play .500 in the next 10 days...it will at least keep them on life support.