IdahoBert

Oh….Thaaaaaat…… No. Those footballers are tough, but he will rise to the occasion and score many goals.

I’ll bite, what’s happening Saturday?

The boys comported themselves admirably enough today (March 4) by winning one game against Panama and tying the other against the Dominican Republic, even though it’s essentially meaningless. They get Thursday off, and then… then <drumroll> VERLANDER pitches Friday March 6 at Lakeland against the Red Sox. No TV coverage but it’s scheduled to be on the radio.

Finnegan, Holton, and Montero all pitched clean innings against the Panama squad, but I haven’t really checked their roster in detail. I don’t know how tough a roster this really was, but I know it did contain major league talent. Nice to see Montero throwing three innings.

The celebratory expressions of the DR players when they get a hit or whatever off of a AAAA pitcher seem lame to me, but this might just be a cultural norm in the DR so I’m really in no position to judge. When in Rome… as the saying goes.

So far in the March 4, game of the Tigers against Panama in Lakeland, Flaherty pitched three innings of shutout ball and struck out three and had a low pitch count of only 38 and Carpenter has hit a home run.

What happened? I don’t think I know about this.

By the way, the Tigers play Panama at Joker Marchant tomorrow (Wed. March, 4) with Flaherty as the starting pitcher. AND… they play the Dominican Republic again in the DR w/ Burch Smith starting! So it’s a split squad day and one of these depleted teams is playing the DR All-Star team. The game against the Dominican Republic will be broadcast on TV at 2:05 EST and have a Tigers radio feed but the game at Joker Marchant starting at 1:05 EST has no live coverage. Thursday is an off day.

Yeah, I was thinking of that and it’s probably true but looking at that DR team they just seem frightening. It might actually be interesting to see how this plays out.

This DR team is not only an All-Star team. It’s an All-Star team culled from both leagues. I think they’ll cake walk-through the WBC.

This game is starting to shape up the way I thought it would. I’m glad Kevin is shining. But a team like this is never assembled on an ordinary MLB club so this is an exceptional challenge.

It’s hard facing three the best hitters in baseball one after the other when normally you only face one of them per game. This DR lineup is stacked.

Yes, McGonigle “looks good” but it’s “only spring training“ and I guess the Tigers will have to think really really hard about letting the #2 prospect in all of MLB be allowed to be on this club… cause after all, he’s merely a Detroit Tiger and he’s not a Met or a Yankee or a Cub or a Dodger, you know a team that really matters…

Madden out there again for the third inning because the rules in spring training allow it.

I’m looking forward to an oppo taco just so I can say it.

Struck out Soto.

The announcers are talking like it’s just possible maybe unlikely but it could happen that McGonigle will make the team and “force the Tigers hand.“ phhtt

Kevin McGonigle singles on a line drive to right fielder Fernando Tatis Jr. Zach McKinstry scores. Thayron Liranzo scores.

Vlad Junior misplays McKinstry‘s ball for a single. Hey this is kind of exciting and this ballpark even though it seats only 13,000 just feels electric.

I can’t believe that Madden got out of that inning against that kind of a lineup. Wow, and he strikes out Vlad Junior to end the inning. Double wow.

I wondered who it was. Cool.

Wow, wow wow. Beat me to it.

I want to reiterate that I do not “hate“ the WBC, even though I’m not interested in it in the least bit. But one of the things that makes me roll my eyes is how all the announcers are making a big deal about Skubal pitching “only once” in the WBC and explaining it because “he’s looking at a big payday.“ Maybe he sees it as an intrusion into his usual spring training regimen and that he’s actually focused on the Tigers just because that’s what he does. Full stop. Although he probably wouldn’t look at it in this manner, because it’s the way I’m looking at it, it’s a corporate profit maximization scheme. Why sacrifice your health for the sake of a corporate spectacle? Of course, everything is a corporate spectacle for profit maximization, but this just strikes me as an egregious version of it.

An origin story…

I don’t have many “specialties,” but appealing to my “crowd” is among them. 😇