let this be goodbye, Jarrod

photo by Samara Pearlstein

Jarrod Washburn had surgery on his knee, expects to be ready by Spring Training, and sure as squirrels will not be back with the Tigers.

That article is from the Mariners mothership and mostly talks about Washburn from a Mariner perspective, but he does say a few things about the Tigers:

“The knee limited me to what I could do [for the Tigers],” he said. “I was doing everything possible to figure out a way to get through it, but unfortunately it never happened. But they were very understanding and helpful.”

…

he admitted to having mixed feelings when the Mariners traded him to the Tigers.

“Going to a first-place team was nice,” he said, “but I was leaving a group of players that I loved. It was both good and bad.”

Jim Street, MLB.com

Well, Jarrod, it was mostly bad. But I guess we were all pretty optimistic for ten seconds or so back when the trade first went down.

In other news, there is no other news. Akinori Iwamura was just traded to the Pirates. Vicente Padilla shot himself in the leg at a shooting range. I am rooting really, really hard for the Phillies to pull this thing out. The Lions are terrible at football. What sad times these are.

a Royal mess

digillustration by Samara Pearlstein

I can’t even begin to process this game, or indeed the Tigers’ recent history with the Royals. What in the name of Paws is going on here? The Royals, cats, the Royals. Seriously?

–So I didn’t see the start of this game because I was at work; Washburn was removed because of the knee, right? It’s something to do with his ACL, but… is it a strain, or is it swollen, or partially torn, or twisted up like a Twizzler, or what? I guess it doesn’t really matter, because two things have become abundantly clear:

a) he can’t pitch on the knee when it’s like this, and

b) Seattle has magical knee-pain-suppressing air wafting in off of Puget Sound. Detroit only has whatever wafts in off of the Detroit River, which obviously ain’t cuttin’ it.

We’ve got to consider him out of the rotation at this point. Leyland is not going to start Miner, because he is weirdly in love with the concept of Miner-in-the-bullpen. Everyone really, really wants to avoid giving Bondo any starts. This leaves us with Arrrrrrmando Galarraga (tender achin’ elbow) and Nate Robertson (strained groinal bits). I suppose it will come down to who feels the least amount of pain come Sunday, which is when Washburn is supposed to pitch next.

If both Nate and Arrrrmando are still in relatively significant amounts of pain by then, I’m not sure what the Tigers do. Maybe Inge will feel up to pitching.

–Potential defining image of the game? Casey Fien standing on the mound, surrounded by embarrassed infielders, while Jim Leyland puts his hands on both of Fien’s shoulders as if he’s a Little Leaguer who is about to burst into tears on the mound. Poor Casey, he looked like he could have used a hug out there, or some other sort of assurance that it would all be OK, even though that would have been a cheap, dirty lie.

–I seriously don’t know what to make of this. The Royals are hitting the Tigers around like they’re aiming for the playoffs, and the Tigers apparently cannot make any sense at all of the Royals’ pitching. Sure, Washburn was hurt, but he only accounted for four runs yesterday; the Royals put up ELEVEN before all was said and done. The Tigers put up ONE. What is this?

–Fernando Rodney appealed his suspension and got it knocked down to two games, which he served on Monday and Tuesday. He should be available again for Wednesday. Whether or not you think that’s a good thing depends on what you think of Fernando Rodney.

now presenting Jarrod Washburn

Click the illustration to see it bigger.

OK, so his first outing didn’t go so well. He thought he had escaped the team that gave him no run support, but the joke’s on him! The Tigers only give the ILLUSION of run support, so long as nobody looks at them too closely. Ha ha! What japery!

Of course when you give up six runs in 5.1 innings, the support of your hitters isn’t really your main problem. It was a little worrying to see a guy who gave up three homers in all of July give up two in one game (in Comerica!), but it was his first game with a new team, he’s playing baseball that matters for the first time in a while, he really wants Edwin Jackson to think he’s a cool dude, I understand. We can cut him some slack and see how it goes in his next few starts.

In other news,

–Casey The Fiend Fien was sent back down and Wilkin Ramirez was called up. He hit leadoff against the left-handed Brian Matusz while Granderson got some rest, and went 0-for-3. Oh well.

–Immediately after this game Wilkin was bounced from the big league roster, this time along with Dusty Ryan. Chris Lambert and Alex Avila were called up. Lambert, as we know, is a reliever, and Avila is a catcher. Interesting. I assume the removal of the extra outfielder means that Carlos Guillen is close to ready to take up his nominal position in left again.

–Bobby Seay participated in a chat over at the mothership today, which I don’t particularly recommend reading because the only thing he revealed is that he’s incredibly boring. Figured I’d mention it anyways.

–Bondo and Nate were supposed to pitch for Toledo tonight as they skid on down along the greasy, filthy rails of injury rehab. I haven’t seen anything on their respective outings yet, but presumably if someone’s arm fell off, we would have heard.

–Losing to the Orioles at home. Sigh.