Friday, May 15, 2009

Tigers Pound Athletics Between Rain Showers

The Tigers led 9-1 after four innings when the second rain delay started three Athletics outs short of an official game. Tigers fans feared a postponement would wipe out an easy victory. Ryan Raburn's grand slam and Magglio Ordonez's three hits would be erased and Edwin Jackson would lose a chance for a victory. Of course, the Athletics would have been happy to have their four errors removed from the books. After an hour delay, however, the game continued and the Tigers finished off a 14-1 rout.

Jackson returned when the game resumed and pitched three more innings to get his third win of the year. I was a bit surprised Jim Leyland left him in so long with a big lead after having sat for so long. Edwin pitched seven innings allowing one run on six hits and zero walks. It was his first start without a walk since 2004 and the first time he had ever gone more than five innings in a game without walking a batter. He has walked just 1.7 batters per nine innings this year after entering the year with 4.5 walks per nine innings. That's an amazing transformation if he keeps it up.

None of the Tigers lost their hits and they added more after the delay. Brandon Inge hit the second Tigers grand slam of the game in the sixth inning. It was the third time the Tigers had hit two grand slams in a game and the first since Jim Northrup hit two by himself in 1968. Clete Thomas, Miguel Cabrera added three hits apiece.

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