Offense Disappears In Oakland
Coming from behind is fine but winning from ahead is a part of the game Detroit needs to work on.
The Tigers won three times in their last at-bat during their four-game winning streak, but after winning two straight from Oakland, the Athletics rebounded to take the next two.
Detroit had just one unearned run off Oakland's starters in the first three games and a solo home run by Casper Wells in the fourth contest marked the only earned run of the series by the Tigers off the Athletics opening pitchers.
"Once again, it was pretty much a lack of offense," manager Jim Leyland said. "We gotta improve our concentration level a little bit. We swung at several, several pitches in the dirt."
Despite management assurances of career track records by Detroit hitters, their season track records aren't glowing enough to light up a closet.
Austin Jackson is batting .175; Will Rhymes .222; Ryan Raburn is down to .229 thanks to a recent spate of strikeout-filled games; Jhonny Peralta has sagged to .255 with a 1-for-18 week; Brandon Inge is batting .204; Victor Martin .237 thanks to a hot stretch; and Magglio Ordonez .214 when his ankle will let him play.
The most consistent hitters for the Tigers have been Miguel Cabrera (.304), Brennan Boesch (.280) and Alex Avila (.282).
"It's disappointing that after we win the first two games, we didn't win at least one more," Leyland said. "After winning the first two games and not getting a hit off their starting pitchers, we were probably pretty fortunate.
"But once you get the first two, you gotta learn how to go after it, come out and win the series. We didn't do that."
One area the Tigers have shown real improvement in is starting pitching.
Their starters are getting into the sixth and seventh with regularity, but more importantly are limiting big innings, and their string of nine straight games without throwing a home-run ball remains intact heading into Monday at Seattle.
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