Tigers-Orioles

[Peter Welch]

Tigers up 2-0 after 3. McGonigle led off the game with a homer.  Back-to-back doubles from Workman and Lee in the 3rd produced the 2^nd run.

Interesting to see the O's put together a big batch of good position player prospects over the past few years but nothing has come of it.  They've neglected to develop pitching.  Their management has also been criticized for holding onto their prospects.

Peter

[Roger King]

I see Flaherty couldn’t get out of the 4th inning. Sigh. They’ve got to move him to the pen. He’s in Maeda territory now.  

6-4 Orioles in the 5th. 

Roger King
El Presidente
PN Agency – www.pnagency.com
Ethnic Voice Talent –www.ethnicvoicetalent.com
(416) 515-7195

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Detroit Tigers e-mail list" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to detroit-tiger...@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/detroit-tigers/DS0PR19MB727216A39715709C99BE24639A0F2%40DS0PR19MB7272.namprd19.prod.outlook.com.

[Peter Welch]

I’ve never seen such a frustratingly erratic pitcher from inning-to-inning or even within the same inning. 

Flaherty can get swings and misses and strike out hitters like Skubal for a few batters but then totally lose command and throw a bunch of mistake pitches and get lit up, but then find it again, and then lose it again.  McGonigle’s error tonight didn’t help Flaherty either.  Fielding mistakes behind Flaherty often shake his concentration.

 

I thought Flaherty was going to get out of the 3^rd after McGonigle’s error but Alonso took him deep with 2 outs for the 3-run homer and the Tigers never really recovered.  Alonso hit the homer on a 93-mph fastball that was outside and high. It wasn't even in the strike zone but Alonso drove it over the RF wall.

I think Flaherty should move to the bullpen. He might be more effective in 1 or 2-inning stints. Having him pitch more than 1-2 innings is playing with fire.

 

By the way, it looks like Brant Hurter got injured tonight. Sigh.

Peter

Get Outlook for iOS

---

From: Roger King <pnag...@pnagency.com>
Sent: Friday, May 22, 2026 8:49:08 PM
To: Peter Welch <pw...@hotmail.com>
Cc: detroit...@googlegroups.com <detroit...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: Tigers-Orioles

 

[Roger King]

At some point, management has to make some moves to show that they care. Just trotting Flaherty out there every time when he hasn’t had a single truly successful start in weeks gives the appearance that you don’t even care. And the fact is, he sucks. He deserves to be demoted. He’s being paid to do a job and he’s not doing it.

Obviously, there are injuries to the rotation, but Melton is coming back on Sunday, so put him into the rotation and take Jack out. Anderson went 4 innings to open the game the other day so he should be in the rotation as well.

Roger King
El Presidente
PN Agency – www.pnagency.com
Ethnic Voice Talent –www.ethnicvoicetalent.com
(416) 515-7195

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/detroit-tigers/DS0PR19MB727286079BB9FCBFE608A4549A0C2%40DS0PR19MB7272.namprd19.prod.outlook.com.

[Peter Welch]

Hurter and Burch Smith both got injured last night.  The Tigers put Smith on the IL with a shoulder injury and recalled Brenan Hanifee.

Hurter might got on the IL when Melton is activated.

I swear somebody put a curse on us this year.

Peter

---

From: Roger King <pnag...@pnagency.com>
Sent: Saturday, May 23, 2026 8:33 AM

[Michael W]

I think we get enamored with strikeouts as a metric, and it’s not that important.  For batters, it’s not important at all - plenty of great hitters strike out a lot (starting with Babe Ruth).  For pitchers, strikeouts aren’t more valuable than other outs.  It’s great when a pitcher really dominates and strikes out everyone, but the important word there is “everyone.”  If you are striking out guys in between the scorching doubles, it’s no different than if you were getting lazy fly balls between the scorching doubles.

Flaherty is just pitching poorly.  His style of poor pitching involves getting strikeouts.

Michael 

[Peter Welch]

I like it when pitchers miss bats.  Strikeouts are an indication the pitcher can miss bats.  The problem with Flaherty is that he walks too many hitters (5.6 BB/9), which puts runners on base, and then he makes mistake pitches that get hit because he loses command of his pitches for a few batters. 

 That's what makes him frustrating because you can see flashes of ability to dominate hitters, but he's way too inconsistent.  Unfortunately, this has been Flaherty for the past 2 years, so it's unlikely he'll get any better (at least as a starter).  Flaherty put it all together in 2024 and was very good, but that's looking like a fluke.

Pitchers who don't strike out a lot of hitters and pitch to contact rely on having good defense behind them and also good luck.  

I don't think the Tigers' defense is good enough to have a bunch of "pitch-to-contact" pitchers on the staff, but the Tigers have several "pitch-to-contact" pitchers.  I think having a groundball specialist like Valdez and the Tigers' defense behind him is a terrible mismatch.

Sure, Ks aren't that big of a deal for a hitter if they draw a lot of walks and hit a lot of homers.  Look at somebody like Kyle Schwarber.

The Tigers have guys who strike out a lot but don't hit many homers or draw a lot of walks.  That is a problem.  I'd rather see contact hitters if that's the case.

Also, if a hitting prospect is striking out 30-40% of the time in the minors that's a sign he's going to have trouble making contact against major league pitching.  I'd prefer hitting prospects have lower K rates.

Peter

---

From: detroit...@googlegroups.com <detroit...@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Michael W <miw...@gmail.com>
Sent: Saturday, May 23, 2026 11:56 AM
To: Detroit Tigers e-mail list <detroit...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: Tigers-Orioles

 

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/detroit-tigers/4c2f36e7-0503-4a22-b102-860a1587b8a1n%40googlegroups.com.