Clete Thomas Drives in Six in Mud Hens Rout of Columbus

Isn’t it fun when you spend a morning talking about the struggles of Toledo Mud Hens outfielders Clete Thomas and Andy Dirks, only to see them tear the cover off the ball later in the day? Maybe it’s just me, but I thought it was fun.

The Mud hens beat up on the Columbus Clippers today by a final of 13-5. Andy Oliver was just okay in terms of his overall results, but continued to rack up the strikeouts as he applies pressure on the Tigers starting rotation and their 12th ranked )in the AL) ERA. Oliver went six frames, allowing four earned runs today, but he did so while also striking out eight batters and improved to 2-0 on the young season, accounting for half of Toledo’s four victories this year. Oliver now has 22 strikeouts in just 18 innings of work, offset by six walks after issuing three free passes this afternoon.

The offense was plentiful for Toledo as seven ‘Hens contributed multi-hit games. Dirks lead the way with three hits and a walk, including a pair of home runs. Ryan Strieby added a two-run shot as part of a 2-for-4 day. But the real hero was Thomas.

Clete got the scoring started with a two-run single in the first and added a three-run homer in the seventh inning. He set a new career-high in RBI thanks to a sacrifice fly in the ninth. The last Mud Hen to drive in six runs in a game was Jeff Frazier in 2009.

Tigers Injury Update

Also of note in the Hens game was right hander Ryan Perry, who worked a perfect seventh inning, throwing 15 pitches. Perry in on the 15-day disabled list with an infected left eye, but the injury has healed sufficiently and Perry is eligible to re-join the Tigers on Wednesday.

In other injury-related news, Joel Zumaya was transferred from the 15-day DL to the 60-day version today by the Tigers. Zumaya is eligible to return at the end of May and moving him to the 60-day does open a spot on the Tigers 40-man roster, which would be useful should Detroit want to add a player to the major league team who is not already on the 40-man. No news as to whether or not that will happen as of yet, but it seems a little strange to make the procedural move of Zumaya without having something else in mind.

After all, the move is retroactive to the date Zumaya was originally placed on the 15-day DL, so in theory he could have stayed on the 15-day until a roster space was needed, and then shifter to the 60-day. This smells like there’s another move coming fairly soon, or why would they bother with this now?

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