Looks like the Tigers aren't the only team who can't hit Seattle pitching

[Paul Meloche]

Mariners shutdown the Jays on two hits last night for a 3-1 win in the opening game of the ALCS.

Seattle pitchers only threw 100 pitches in the game. Probably lots of talk on the Jays list today about all the poor ABs and hacking. :)

[Roger King]

Yeah, I was going to post about this last night. The Jays looked like the team that had just played 15 innings a couple nights before.  Springer hit literally the first Seattle pitch for a home run and after that, the Jays got a grand total of one single the rest of the game. It was worse than any Tigers hitting performance.

So much for a tired Seattle pitching staff! 

On Mon, Oct 13, 2025 at 10:08 AM Paul Meloche <meloc...@gmail.com> wrote:

Mariners shutdown the Jays on two hits last night for a 3-1 win in the opening game of the ALCS.

Seattle pitchers only threw 100 pitches in the game. Probably lots of talk on the Jays list today about all the poor ABs and hacking. :)

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[Roger King]

We should also note that Seattle really didn’t do that great a job at hitting Tigers pitching either.

The final run totals for the series:

Tigers - 20

Seattle - 19

As I said before the game the other night, it really couldn’t have been a more even series and that’s probably why it took 15 innings to decide it.  

[Peter Welch]

And it was Bryce Miller who shut down the Jays last night.  Miller is the M's "worst" starter.  (Miller is way better than his numbers this year.  He had a lot of injuries earlier in the season).  Seattle's best starter this year, Bryan Woo, hasn't even pitched in the playoffs yet due to an injury.  They have a deep rotation.

At the start of this season, on paper you could argue the Tigers and Mariners had the top 2 rotations in the AL.  

The Tigers had Skubal, Flaherty, Mize, Olson and Jobe.  The M's had Kirby, Gilbert, Woo, Castillo and Miller.

Interestingly, both teams' rotations weren't quite as strong as predicted this season. 

For the Mariners, Woo was very good (although he has injury issues) and Castillo was good, but Kirby had a 4.21 ERA,  Gilbert spent a few weeks on the IL with an elbow injury, and Miller had injuries.  The M's other starter this year, Emerson Hancock, wasn't very good (4.90 ERA).

For the Tigers, Skubal was great, but Flaherty was a disappointment, Mize missed a few starts with an injury but was decent overall, although Hinch seemed to lose confidence in him in the playoffs, Olson was solid when he pitched but he only made 13 starts due to injuries, and Jobe ended up missing a big chunk of the season because of his elbow surgery.  Jobe was ok when he did pitch but he wasn't great.  The other starter the Tigers were relying on, Alex Cobb, never pitched.  Keider Montero had a decent 3.72 ERA in his 12 starts. Troy Melton only made 4 starts in the regular season plus one start in the playoffs even though Melton has the best stuff on the staff after Skubal.  The Tigers turned Melton into a reliever because of innings limitations.  The other Tigers' starters (Enns, Morton, Paddack, SGL) were a disaster.

The best laid plans....

Peter

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From: detroit...@googlegroups.com <detroit...@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Paul Meloche <meloc...@gmail.com>
Sent: Monday, October 13, 2025 10:07 AM
To: Tigers List <detroit...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Looks like the Tigers aren't the only team who can't hit Seattle pitching

 

Mariners shutdown the Jays on two hits last night for a 3-1 win in the opening game of the ALCS.

Seattle pitchers only threw 100 pitches in the game. Probably lots of talk on the Jays list today about all the poor ABs and hacking. :)

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[Roger King]

Seattle is annihilating the Jays tonight 10–3 so they’re about to go up 2-0 in the series. And of course, both of these games have been here in Toronto.

So far, the Tigers played the Mariners way tougher obviously. 

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[Roger King]

Well, this is turned into a weird series as the Jays have turned around and annihilated Seattle twice in their own home park to tie it 2-2.  They scored 13 runs on Wednesday night and 8 last night off that Seattle pitching staff.

And it was almost a case of déjà vu last night. I thought I was watching Skubal and Hinch on the mound in this exchange between our old pal, Max Scherzer and Jays manager, John Schneider. 

No, I’m just kidding! Max actually wanted to stay in the game and *refused* be taken out :-) 

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/xGNgr3SaSKQ

Roger King
El Presidente
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(416) 515-7195

[Paul Meloche]

Well, he hadn't gone six innings yet. lol

 

Yes, turns out Toronto can hit Seattle pitching a bit. In G3 they knocked Kirby around like it was a lineup full of Kerry Carpenters.

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[Peter Welch]

Scherzer is a crusty, firey old veteran who might be in his final season at age 41.  Not surprised he pushed back on being lifted.  

Max has been pretty bad this year (except, of course, when he pitched against the Tigers and he turned back into 2015 Max Scherzer).  That the Jays got 5.2 innings out of him with only allowing 2 runs (on 3 hits and 4 walks) they should consider themselves lucky.

Mariners' fans are probably sounding like Tigers' fans, complaining about their hitters not being able to do much against Scherzer.

Peter

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From: Paul Meloche <meloc...@gmail.com>
Sent: Friday, October 17, 2025 9:46 AM
To: Roger King <pnag...@pnagency.com>
Cc: Peter Welch <pw...@hotmail.com>; Tigers List <detroit...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: Looks like the Tigers aren't the only team who can't hit Seattle pitching

 

[Cal Lord]

This is exactly the reason why I think we should pay Skubal. We made a mistake with Max. He wanted crazy money but he would have been worth it.  He had some of his best years after he left us and was worth every penny. Verlander's situation was a little different. We traded him. I hope we don't make that mistake either. Imagine what would have happened if we kept both of them. We could have avoided ten years of futility and added another five Cy young Awards to our trophy cabinet. 

Pay Skubal and keep him. Build around him. Increase the payroll and the crowds will come!

Cal

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[Peter Welch]

Vlad, Jr. with a 1.470 OPS in the playoffs.

Funny that Vlad is only a year older than Tork.

Last night the Jays' "scrubs" at the bottom of the order actually did much of the hitting damage against Seattle.  Clement, Kiner-Falefa and Gimenez had 6 hits and 4 RBIs combined.

Last year there was talk the Jays were going to do a "tear down and rebuild" and trade guys like Vlad, Jr., Bichette, Springer, their veteran pitchers, etc.  They decided to go the opposite way and signed Vlad to the extension, didn't trade Bichette and Springer, and hung onto their veteran pitchers, and have been rewarded.  Ironically, the big free agent hitter they signed before this season, Anthony Santander, has been a complete bust, but it didn't matter.

Peter

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From: Roger King <pnag...@pnagency.com>
Sent: Friday, October 17, 2025 9:04 AM
To: Peter Welch <pw...@hotmail.com>
Cc: Tigers List <detroit...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: Looks like the Tigers aren't the only team who can't hit Seattle pitching

 

[Peter Welch]

Scherzer was about the same age (30) when he left Detroit as Skubal will be when Skubal becomes a free agent in 2027.

Dombrowski/Ilitch alienated Scherzer in their contract talks.  They burned the bridge.  That was unfortunate.

The Nationals signed Scherzer to a 7-year, $210 million contract.  They certainly got their money's worth as Scherzer was really good with them and they won the World Series in 2019 with him.

It would have been interesting to see how things developed with the 2015-2020 Tigers if Scherzer had re-signed with the Tigers in 2015.  

I guess the Tigers' payroll was just becoming too high by 2015 and something had to eventually give.  

The Verlander trade was still frustrating even if financially the Tigers had to do it.  The problem was Al Avila made the trade.  Dombrowski might have made a better trade.  (Franklin Perez...woof!).

Peter

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From: Cal Lord <calst...@gmail.com>
Sent: Friday, October 17, 2025 10:34 AM
To: Peter Welch <pw...@hotmail.com>
Cc: Tigers List <detroit...@googlegroups.com>

[Roger King]

Yesterday, one of the MLB guys reported that the Tigers and Skubal were $250 million apart… But it seemed to be referencing an offer they made him a year ago. Of course Tigers Twitter went nuts and didn’t see through this as probably something Boras was leaking.

I just kept chiming in that the real sticking point was the Tigers wanting Skubal to pitch the 7th inning on occasion.  All right, I’ll drop this joke for now :-)

Roger King
El Presidente
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[David Panian]

The Tigers offered Scherzer $144 million over six years or $24 million per year, which would have made him one of the highest-paid players. When he rejected that offer, the Tigers publicly ended the negotiations:

Detroit Tigers Obliterated Max Scherzer After He Rejected a $144 Million Contract - Business Insider

That's a rather sensational headline, but calling off the negotiations like that is not normal and indicated where things were at between Scherzer, Boras and the Tigers.

I think Max would have left, anyway. If he had stayed in Detroit he would've been second to Verlander, and I think he wanted to prove he could be a team's ace and not just put up ace-like stats.

David

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[Roger King]

The Jays are doing it without Bichette who has been injured the entire postseason.  He was also injured last season.  Having him healthy for most of this season was a huge boost.

Springer had an unbelievable comeback season at 36 years of age:

Hit .309 with 32 Home Runs and a .959 OPS.  Also scored 105 runs from the leadoff spot.

Truthfully one of the best seasons for a guy 35+ years of age in MLB history.  

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[Peter Welch]

Yep, sounds like Max wanted out regardless.

Peter

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From: David Panian <dpa...@gmail.com>
Sent: Friday, October 17, 2025 12:52 PM