Free Curly Fries a Small Consolation for Sweep

Detroit 4, Minnesota 5 (box)

Well, that was no fun.

On an already somber afternoon, as Tigers fans worldwide mourn the loss of legendary broadcaster Ernie Harwell, their ballclub fell once again to the division leading Twins.

Rick Porcello has knocked around a bit again in this one, before he had escaped the first inning, he already trailed 2-0. He fell behind too often and his defense didn’t exactly bail him out, as right fielder Brennan Boesch’s error lead to a pair of unearned runs.

But even without that error Porcello put far too many runners on base, allowing five hits and four walks in his 5.1 innings.

The Tigers flexed their muscle on offense, but did so without runners on base. Two Tigers combined to belt four home runs, but all were solo shots. There simply wasn’t enough in the tanks today, especially in terms of timely hitting.

With the sweep at the hands of Minnesota in the books, Detroit can now look forward to five weeks or so without seeing those pesky Twins again. Even without Joe Mauer in the series, Minnesota never trailed in any of the three games. Sorta makes you miss the Metrodome, doesn’t it? Okay, not really.

But with all Tigers fans have gone through over the past 24 hours, I just can’t get myself too worked up over this series. Sure, it would have been nice to take a game today, but there’s a lot of year left, blah, blah, blah. If the Tigers can get Porcello worked out, or Max Scherzer, they’ll be in the race in September.

Cheers for

• Alex Avila– Obviously he wanted to atone for his baserunning error last night and he belted his first two home runs of the season today. It was his first career multi-homer game. To show you how bad it’s been for the Tigers catcher this year, Avila has now driven himself in twice on the year, and has yet to knock in any other member of the team.
• Miguel Cabrera– He came to the plate four times and reached base four times. Cabrera recorded his 15th career two-homer game and now has seven long balls on the year. With his 3-for-3 effort, Cabrera raised his average to .372, passing Austin Jackson for the team high.

Jeers for

• Don Kelly– Kelly looked lost at the plate today in his 0-for-4 afternoon. His day included two strikeouts.
• Scott Sizemore– Sizemore has struggled to make adjustments so far this season and it’s been awhile since he had a big hit. Another hitless day included two strikeouts and lowered his average to .237.
• Rick Porcello– I feel like I’m maybe being too hard on the kid, but Porcello hasn’t had anything close to quality outing since his season debut. How’s Armando Galarraga doing in Toledo?

What’s on tap?

Thankfully, the Tigers will spend the next 48 hours or so away from the ballpark. They’ll fly to Cleveland tonight, then spend the off day there before opening a weekend set at Jacobs Progressive Field on Friday. This ends the string of 20 consecutive days with a game for the Tigers. They went 10-10 during that stretch.

They’ll also use the off-day to evaluate Johnny Damon, who left today’s game with an injured calf. No word yet on the severity of the injury. Needless to say, Damon’s is a bat the Tigers can ill-afford to lose.