By Punch N. Judy
BaseballBigMouth.com baseball news

The grind of a 162 game schedule can expose any team at any time. It’s August though  where every team faces the dread of overtime. For the Tigers, it was 29 games in 31 days.

That’s why they call em’ the dog days’ folks.

Now sitting 41/2 back of the surging Tribe, Detroit is actually closer to the wild card than first place in the Central. If you’re one to panic the time is now. Take heart though in knowing that regardless of today’s standings the real pennant race begins on September 1st. At some point the Tigers need to start playing consistently good ball. That means stringing together five or six wins in a row or at the very least winning some series.’

The Brew Crew activated ace Ben Sheets yesterday, which is certainly good news for a club whose season seems to be slipping back towards mediocrity. The only thing separating the collection of bum teams residing in the NL Central is quality pitching.  Even though the Cubs appear more than willing to fritter away the division after finally seizing control, they just might hold on if only they can finish .500.

Quick Fact: The St. Louis Cardinals, those Champions of the World, finished with the 13th best record in the game last season. If the rest of the bozos in the Central don’t buck up and take the division, Tony Drunk’s boys would be more than happy slink back to October baseball.

If you caught the day game in Oakland yesterday, you saw Matt Stairs drill a clutch two-out solo shot off Huston Street to send the A’s and Jays into extras. Hind sight of course being 20/20, I sure wish Detroit had re-signed the stubby Canuck.

Despite 242 career victories and a throwback delivery I dig, I was never much of a Mike Mussina fan. Like Roger Clemens, I viewed his decision to sign in the Bronx as a cheesy way to grab a ring by riding on Jeter and Co’s coat tails. Way too many of these signings have left New York with a club that lacks a full cup, if you know what I mean.

If push comes to shove though, and the Bombers meet up with Boston in the playoffs, for some reason I’m still picking NY. The Sox may have broken the curse in 04’ but they sure haven’t done much against the Yanks since. Remember it was this time last year when Torre’s boys reprised the Boston Massacre with a five game romp in the Fens.

Clown of the Week – Make it plural if you have to, but whoever was truly responsible for the 11:06 start time in Detroit should have they’re head examined and they’re job in jeopardy. These are the perils of pre-sale sellouts. Hopefully the Tigers give something back to those families who went to Comerica Park in good faith that day.

Quote of the Week – “We live in a materialistic society in which money doesn’t only talk -  it screams. The most predjudiced club owners were not as upset about the game being contaminated by black players as they were by fearing integration would hurt them in their pocket books.” – Jackie Robinson.

Editor’s note - Baseball and Eggs will appear every Thursday, and serves as a form of self–therapy for this clinically insane baseball fan. The baseball part is self–explanatory. The eggs however, could pertain to just about anything on Punch’s mind from Thursday to Thursday.

This entry was posted on Thursday, August 30th, 2007 at 9:30 am and is filed under Baseball and Eggs, Baseball. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.