The Tigers have surrendered 22 runs this work week, and it’s only Wednesday.
Justin Verlander, the rock of the rotation over the last near-decade, now commonly allows hit and home run totals generally associated with slo-pitch softball.
The rookie manager is being second-guessed, the outfielders are scuffling, and the back end of the bullpen is a horror story that never seems to end.
Yet, despite what many in the town would lead you to believe on this day where the Tigers have finally fallen out of first place, there is no reason to panic.
Now, it is understood that the team’s current struggles cannot be sugarcoated or ignored. This squad is a complete mess.
The fall from grace began a month ago in Cleveland it hasn’t let up since. The demolition at the hands of the Royals over the last two nights just represents more of the same.
But here’s the thing; it’s not that big of a deal.
The importance of baseball’s regular season has changed dramatically over the last number of years. Whereas excellence was once mandatory, it is now optional, if not entirely unnecessary.
Baseball fans throughout the country still hold on to this archaic belief that the “pennant race” is some 162-game quest for greatness. That might have been the case in 1914, or even 1984. But the MLB in 2014 is more like that of the modern-day NHL -- just find a way into the playoffs, and hope to catch fire for a few weeks.
The setup of the baseball season doesn’t really allow for such patience, though. It’s the only game in town, every night, for several months. We have nowhere to turn.
And so when these perennially division-leading Tigers drop out of the top spot for a minute, it’s alert level orange throughout the state of Michigan.
But it doesn’t need to be.
The team is one victory away from reclaiming their AL Central perch, and if that fails, would still be right in the thick of the Wild Card race.
The Tigers would have to lose a lot more games over the next number of months to ever truly fall out of contention.
The St. Louis Cardinals destroyed the Tigers in the 2006 World Series. That championship team finished the year just 83-78.
The Seattle Mariners won 116 games in 2001. Needless to say, that franchise has been in existence for 37 years and they are still yet to even appear in a Fall Classic.
While this last month of baseball has been anything but a dream, it’s by no means a nightmare, either.
Verlander and Max Scherzer will snap out of their dueling funks soon. Their respective histories are too impressive to suggest otherwise. The rest of the team, they of the three straight division crowns, will follow suit.
The Tigers have played 67 games out of their scheduled 162. While the wild ups and downs of this season might make it feel as if this group has been torturing its fans for 50 years, it’s really only been a few months. Not even that.
The time to play your best baseball comes in October, and nowadays, sometimes even November. That is several calendar flips away.
So while this rut can be frustrating and oftentimes stressful, try to take a deep mid-June breath and grasp the bigger picture. The important stuff hasn’t really started yet.
A 98-win summer is nice, but 11 victories in the autumn is everlasting.
