Finishing Them Off?

The Detroit Tigers open up another big series in Cleveland vs. the Indians today, 1 day after completing a big sweep of the White Sox, pasting them in the 18-2 finale last night.  With the Sox at 8.5 games back of the Tigers now, they should focus on keeping the Indians at the very least, 7.5 games back.

That would mean the Tigers would have to win 2 out of 3 in this set, which is what they should be doing anyway if they are to prove their worth as a playoff-ready team.  Not too much to ask, as 2 of your rotation stoppers will go in this series, being Doug Fister (today) and Justin Verlander (on Wednesday).  We've seen the offense do what they're doing, so there's no reason to believe the Tigers can't have an extra nice cushion with only a few weeks left in the regular season.  For today's game, it can be done... Ubaldo Jimenez goes for the Tribe, and his last outing vs the Tigers yielded 7 runs.

Of course, trying not to think too far ahead of the game here, a division lead that big of course has been erased before, as the Tigers may have the ghosts of 2009 haunting their fan base, saying nothing is imminent until it's all locked up.  Fair assessment, but while the Tigers did cough up a 7 game lead with 3 weeks to go in the season, they did it against what was a scorching hot Minnesota Twins team, who came down the stretch that season at a 42-17 mark.  Impressive, if not improbable: which is a word I'll use now.  For me, it's almost impossible to believe that either the White Sox or Indians could pull off what the Twins did 2 seasons ago, largely because neither team is healthy or hitting the ball with much consistency.  That is key when making a nice little run towards the postseason, and I don't forsee the Tigers coughing this up like they did in '09.

Far be it for me to say the Tigers will win the division right now, but for a while now, it's been their division to lose.  Imagine how different the division might look if the Tigers didn't stumble out to a slow start in April/May.  If they were playing then like they are playing now, we may be talking about a more insurmountable 10-12 game lead instead of 6.5.

The Tigers will win this division, even if I'm keeping my fingers crossed as I type this.