Tigers sweep Rangers

The Tigers smacked the Rangers 8-2 this afternoon to finish a sweep of a series in which they outscored the Texans 37-10. It was a familiar story today - poor starting pitching, powerful hitting and solid relief work. Curtis Granderson led off the game for the Tigers with his first home run of the season. Magglio Ordonez had a pair of homers on the day including a three run blast in the 5th which put them ahead 5-2. Brandon Inge and Ryan Raburn also added homers. Raburn's round tripper was originally ruled in play but was then changed to a homer. It is unclear whether it hit the top of the wall for a legitimate homer or whether it was touched by a fan.

Jeremy Bonderman gave up only two hits and two runs including a first inning homer to Michael Young but was extremely wild for the second straight game. He walked 7 batters, hit another and threw 111 pitches in just 4 2/3 innings before leaving the game with the bases loaded. That's 13 walks in his last two games for Bonderman, a pitcher who walked just 2.5 batters per nine innings last year. The one positive for Jeremy today was his season high seven strikeouts.

Fortunately, Zach Miner got the final out of the fifth with no more damage being done and went on to toss 3 1/3 scoreless and hitless innings. In the last 7 games, the bullpen has allowed just one run in 25 innings for an 0.36 ERA.

As usual, the daily injury report is lengthy. The good news is that Placido Polanco is back, although he went 0 for 3 and is now batting .140. The bad news is that Carlos Guillen was in a lot of pain today after fouling a pitch off his knee last night. He has a bruised knee and is now day to day. Jacque Jones also hurt is knee today when he fell into the stands trying to catch a foul fly. X-rays were negative but he'll still likely miss at least one game. Gary Sheffield received another cortisone shot and hopes to return to the line-up tomorrow.

The Tigers now host the Los Angeles Angels in a three game series starting tomorrow night. The first game will feature a match-up between Nate Robertson and Ervin Santana.