As Losses Mount, Tigers Still Expressing Confidence Team Will Be Fine
By Ashley Dunkak
@AshleyDunkak
CBS DETROIT - Losers in five straight games and in eight of their last 10, the Detroit Tigers have hit a rough stretch, and in response, some fans have hit the panic button. A "Fire Brad" shirt - referencing second-year manager Brad Ausmus - was advertised for sale Wednesday morning on Twitter, the average fan's favorite outlet for team-related angst.
To be sure, the Tigers lost Tuesday a game they should have won, a game they led 3-0 before an unraveling that included a muffed catch by third baseman Nick Castellanos, a mental error by second baseman Ian Kinsler and a poorly timed bad pitch by reliever Angel Nesbitt.
Even with the bitter aftertaste of that loss still fresh, players expressed confidence the Tigers will eventually return to their winning ways. Castellanos was the most vocal in that regard.
"You've got to keep grinding," Castellanos said Tuesday night. "It's our job as a team to, no matter what adversity we face, to figure out a way to overcome it, and I know we will. We weathered this storm last year. We're going to do it again. This is the same team that everybody was praising big-time when we were 11-2 or something like that. Nothing's changed.
"[Justin Verlander] had a great start in Triple A, he's going to come back," Castellanos continued, "and we're going to be firing on all cylinders when we need to."
Kinsler, who might have made the most memorable mistake of his career Tuesday night when he threw home with no runner going home, was similarly positive.
"We just need to be free and play," Kinsler said. "That's really it, just trust our abilities and just play.
"We'll be all right," Kinsler added.
Catcher James McCann acknowledged that a sense of urgency to stop the losing streak likely has players trying to do too much as they try to help pull the team out of its slide.
"This team's built to win," McCann said. "A lot of guys on this team that have done nothing but win in their careers, so any time things aren't going your way, losses are piling up, five in a row, yeah, of course we're going to start pressing at times we don't need to. The only way to get back to having success is to relax and get back to the basics, start doing what we do well as a team."
Manager Brad Ausmus does not dispute that the Tigers are struggling - his shakeup of the lineup Tuesday makes it clears he realizes the team needs a spark - but he said before Tuesday's game that there are limits to what he can do.
"The personnel is the personnel," Ausmus said. "Today there's the lineup change. [Depending] on who's pitching for the other team, you can hit-and-run, you can try and create offense, but that can backfire, too, if the guy swings and misses or doesn't get the hit-and-run sign, all of a sudden there's an out at second base, so hopefully you have a situation or the right personnel where the hit-and-run's available as an option, but there's really not a ton you can do.
"You don't want to start bunting in the second inning," Ausmus continued. "Trying to get one run at a time I don't think is going to work either."
During his pregame session in the clubhouse, the manager said he believes the team will be fine over the season as a whole, and he said the fact the team is not scoring much now likely means pitchers will pay when the Tigers hit their groove later.
After the game, however, Ausmus was frustrated like everyone else, only able to explain the defensive miscues and blowing of the game by referencing the old tendency of rain to pour.
"When you are struggling, things like that happen, where on the night you hit, the other team hits more," Ausmus said. "On the night you don't hit, the other team scrapes out one. You need to get one out to get out of an inning, you can't get that out. That's just what happens when you struggle."
