The Tigers started their 7-game road trip on a high note, beating the Tampa Bay Rays 5-2, notching win number 19 for Justin Verlander, the first pitcher to reach that win level this year. A rather ho-hum performance from Justin: 7 innings, 1 run, 3 hits, 3 walks, 8 strikeouts. You'd think it be moderately difficult to find fault in a game in which the Tigers would win their 4th straight ballgame, and increasing their division lead to 5.5 games over the Chicago White Sox AND the Cleveland Indians. But I will try my best and do it anyway.
Because all of us hate to see Jose Valverde when it is NOT a save situation.
But Jim Leyland does it anyway, because Ole Smokey doesn't really listen to what the fans have to say (not even a 6-yr-old girl), because if the fans pulled the strings, in hindsight, this team would theoretically be 127-0 right now. Leyland tends to out-manage himself on most days, such as going with lineups that might be righty-heavy for a lefty pitcher (queue tomorrow's lineup, to be sure)... And pitching match ups aren't any different in his world.
According to my quick research on baseball-reference.com, I noticed that Valverde does have 2 months out of this season where he has not given up a run in his non-save appearances (April and June). The numbers don't lie for the remaining months of the season, though. In May, he gave up 9 runs (8 earned), in July he gave up 6 runs, and so far in August he's allowed 3 runs (1 earned, and that was tonight). Overall, in a mere 19.1 innings pitched in non-save situations, he's given up 18 runs (15 ER), good for an ERA of 7.07.
Closers have a different mentality. Jose Valverde is just a different cat altogether. If you are going to send a character like that out there when he can't get the save, he may relax a bit too much, or lose focus. Either way, chances are, he's going to lob a few too many pitches, (22 tonight, only 11 strikes) and suddenly he's unavailable to pitch the next night. Who becomes the Tigers closer then? Not Joaquin Benoit either, also declared unavailable tomorrow night.
Valverde might be perfect in his save chances this year, but he's a bumpy roller coaster ride when that stat doesn't matter. Even though he won't, Jim Leyland needs to dig elsewhere in his bullpen to get those last 3 outs. As it is, should the opportunity arise tomorrow night, he's going to have to.
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