Recap: Tigers Can’t Invade Britton

The Detroit Tigers had their chances, early, often, even late.

But they couldn’t solve Zach Britton.

Britton, who came into tonight’s game with an ERA approaching 8, was shaky, but reasonably effective, getting himself out of his own jams while pitching 7 innings of 6 hit, 3 walk baseball. He struck 5 Tigers and induced three double plays, as he defeats the Tigers 3-2 on Saturday night.

Rick Porcello, the Tigers hurler for the evening, also pitched himself out of a few jams, but couldn’t record an out in the 7th, allowing the first 2 on w/ singles and giving up an opposite field home run to Chris Davis. Tigers came back in the 8th when Jhonny Peralta delivered a 2-run single to close the gap to 1.

Jim Johnson managed an easy 1-2-3 inning to close out the Tigers, who were a very disappointing 1 for 9 with runners in scoring position tonight. Series comes to a close tomorrow with Wei-Yin Chen pitching for Baltimore, and Doug Fister for Detroit.

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A few Random Thoughts for the series so far:

The umpiring in this series has been nothing short of a goat rodeo so far. With last night’s antics that ultimately cost Mark Reynolds and Buck Showalter the end of last night’s game, to tonight’s curious strike zone from home plate umpire Jeff Kellogg (who was the first base umpire in that disaster last night), we have seen a season of calls that are maddening to all parties involved. Orioles fans on Twitter last evening felt that “woe is me” and that only the Orioles get calls like this.

That of course, isn’t true.

Kellogg’s strike zone tonight was curious for both teams, and his inability to make a proper call at first base last night was curious for everyone involved. But the umpires aren’t out to make sure the Baltimore Orioles lose…. or the Detroit Tigers (or any other team) for that matter. They’ve been bad for everyone this season, not just your team.

In closing… no matter how bad that went last night for the Orioles, that’s not the reason they lost the game. The inability to keep Prince Fielder in the yard is why. We can all move along now, as the incident in question didn’t hurt the Orioles or help the Tigers.

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Follow me on Twitter, @DisplacedTgrFan.