SERIES PREVIEW: DETROIT TIGERS vs CLEVELAND INDIANS

Fresh off a sweep by the Seattle Mariners, the (12-13) Detroit Tigers travel to Cuyahoga County to take on the division leading (16-8) Cleveland Indians for a three game series. The Tigers have lost three in a row and are 5-5 in their last ten games. The Tribe is 6-4 in their last 10 games and are 10-2 at home this season. At 4.5 games back, this is a solid opportunity to gain some ground on Cleveland.

SERIES PITCHING PREVIEW:

Friday, April 29th, 7:05 PM EST, Progressive Field

Max Scherzer, RHP

4-0, 3.19 ERA

VS

Jeanmar Gomez, RHP

0-1, 7.36 ERA

Saturday, April 30th, 6:05 PM EST, Progressive Field

Rick Porcello, RHP

1-2, 4.76 ERA

Alex White, RHP

0-0, -.– ERA

Sunday, May 1st, 1:05 PM EST, Progressive Field

Phil Coke, LHP

1-4, 4.88 ERA

VS

Justin Masterson, RHP

5-0, 2.18 ERA

INJURY UPDATE:

DETROIT:

CLEVELAND:

WHO’S HOT!

DETROIT:

• Brennan Boesch has reached base safely in his last sixteen games. Boesch is hitting a team high .350 this season and .412 in his last ten games.
• Alex Avila is batting .299 this season and is tied with Miguel Cabrera with a team high 16 RBI. Alex is batting .333 in his last ten games.

CLEVELAND:

• Grady Sizemore is batting .391 with 2 homers and 5 RBI in his last seven games.
• Shin-Soo Choo is batting .333 with 1 homer and 5 RBI in his last seven games.
• Rafael Perez has tossed  8 2/3 innings of scoreless ball this season. He is 2-1 with 3 holds and a 0.96 WHIP so far this year.

WHO’S COLD!

DETROIT:

• Will Rhymes is hitting .206 in his last ten games and .196 this season. He is slugging just .196 and is on his way to Toledo unless he catches fire soon.
• Ryan Raburn is just 2-15 with 6 strikeouts in his last four games after two outstanding games against the Sox. His defensive assisted homerun was quite humorous though.
• Brandon Inge is batting just .200 in his last 10 games and just .221 on the season. Hey, he’s also racked up 16 strikeouts too!

CLEVELAND:

• Asdrubal Cabrera is batting just .182 his last 5 games. After starting the season on fire he has finally started to cool off.
• Carlos Santana is batting just .189 this season and has just 1 hit his last 4 games.
• Chad Durbin has a 6.75 ERA and a 1.71 WHIP this season in 9 1/3 innings. Opposing batters are hitting .297 against him and he has issued 5 walks.

SERIES PREDICTION:

I am going out on a limb here but I see the Tigers taking two of three from the Tribe this weekend. The Tigers seem to rise to the occasion and play hard when they have too. I like Scherzer over Gomez and I believe that Masterson is due to lose this weekend. Hopefully I am right because I would hate to see the Tigers drop any further below .500.

*Injury Updates and Pitching Preview information obtained from MLB.COM

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