Kuzul

Detroit Tigers slugger Miguel Cabrera is one of the most cerebral hitters the game of baseball has ever seen. A career .320 hitter, Cabrera is a superstar heavyweight boxer, champion chess player and big kid wrapped into a 6’4”, 240-pound frame. MLB pitchers who stare into the batter’s box at Cabrera know they have to outsmart the Triple Crown winner.  While some pitching staffs do have success against this 30-year-old Venezuela native, most find themselves kicking dirt in disgust.  This includes staffs from the AL Central Division.  Per Baseball-Reference statistics, Cabrera has batted .320 (463-for-1,445) with 88 home runs, 89 doubles and 293 RBI in 380 career games against teams in this division. While impressive, Cabrera has given five other teams outside the AL Central absolute fits in his 10-year career.  These victims of Cabrera’s brute wrath (minimum 150 plate appearances), are the subject of this slideshow. Source of Stats: Baseball-Reference.com and ...

Wax up the sleigh. Check it for flight. Shine St. Nick’s boots. Make sure Rudy’s nose is bright and squeaky clean.Test the GPS. Gather the weather reports. Check the sack for rips. Tell Mrs. C not to wait up.It’s gonna be another long night, but then it always is on December 24.The jolly, old, fat man is set to make his annual trek. Chimneys the world over wait. Fireplaces are about to be pounced on.Santa has something for everyone, or so they say. Keeping the faith, I’m going to accept that statement as fact. So, with that in mind, let’s see if he can find room in his big, red pack, upon his back—as Andy Williams sang—for these goodies.For Calvin Johnson, a new NFL record, but more importantly, a football team worthy of his gargantuan talent.For Matthew Stafford, highlight reels of Slinging Sammy Baugh and Fran Tarkenton, so the kid knows ...

We all remember musical chairs. It was a simple numbers game—there was no other way to look at it, unless you grew up spittin' game like me and always lined up behind the cute girl in class so that as soon as the music stopped you swooped right underneath her so her backside conveniently landed right in your lap—but that's neither here nor there. There weren't enough chairs to go around.A baseball roster has only 25 spots on it, and the Detroit Tigers have a problem similar to the level of suaveness of Arthur Fonzarelli: something we call a surplus.The Tigers just re-signed RHP Anibal Sanchez to a reported five-year, $80 million contract. There's a lot to like in Anibal's game, but shelling out $80 million on a guy without a "stellar" year to his credit is a lot like handing the role of Superman to Brandon Routh. Let's hope ...

For all intents and purposes, the World Series ended on Miguel Cabrera's pop-up in the fifth inning of Game 3. It was the symbolic play of the 2012 Fall Classic: The Giants have maximized their opportunities, and the Tigers have not. More than any one play, that pop-up summed up why San Francisco has a 3-0 lead and could very well end the series Sunday night.But Saturday night, Detroit lost a second straight 2-0 game and joined the 1966 Los Angeles Dodgers with the dubious distinction of being shut out in back-to-back World Series games. A pair of runs scored by the Giants in the second inning might as well have been 20, because the toothless Tigers simply could not generate offense against Ryan Vogelsong, Tim Lincecum and Sergio Romo.The shame of it is that Anibal Sanchez pitched well tonight for the second time this postseason, only to lose. Like ...

After watching the San Francisco Giants do a little bit of everything and a lot well to take a 2-0 series lead, the Detroit Tigers take solace in returning to their home field. Though history suggests a comeback is not in the offing, the club remains confident. To win the vital Game 3 though, Detroit has to improve in a few vital areas. First and foremost, they aren't hitting. Give the Giants credit, they have played brilliantly at times. But the vital organs of their potentially explosive offense have not been functioning. Hitting just .167 in the series so far, Detroit must start producing at the plate or the Major League Baseball season could be done before the weekend ends. But in all fairness, the problems have not just been limited to the Tigers' woes at the plate. With an ERA of 5.63 thus far, the pitching hasn't been playoff-caliber either. And ...

I remember the Detroit Tigers vs. Chicago Cubs interleague baseball game in 1998 like it were yesterday. It was June 25. And my friends and I had recently graduated high school at Southgate Anderson High School in suburban Detroit. This was the second full season that Major League Baseball had implemented interleague play. While I was always excited to attend a Tiger game, watching my home team play the Cubs made for an even more fun night.Five summers before, my father took me to my first Cubs game at Wrigley Field. I watched in horror as Orlando Merced of the Pittsburgh Pirates smacked a game-winning, two-run home run off Shawn Boskie.  While disappointed, I found solace in pictures of our drive to the Field of Dreams in Dyersville, Iowa, prior to our journey to Wrigley. Back to 1998, with very little money and no ballgames to play on our schedules, ...

By the end of this weekend, the baseball world will be swimming in highlights from 20-year-old Mike Trout’s call up in Cleveland and 19-year-old Bryce Harper’s debut in Los Angeles. Come Monday morning, fans will drag their bodies back to work, talking about these two future All-Stars over hot coffee and cubicles. “How awesome was the Dodgers-Nats game on Saturday,” the guy with a crooked tie will say to his co-worker checking his email. “Seeing Harper finally play on the big stage was off the hook!” “Never thought Trout would go hit-less in his call-up,” another will say to a fellow Angels fan lounging in the company’s kitchen. Meantime, in Lakeland, another 20-year-old will wake from slumber, the morning after raking more pitches . His name is Nick Castellanos. This 6 foot 4, 210 lb., power-hitting Florida native is considered to be the future face of the Detroit Tigers. Drafted (more like ...

With a wave of his hand, or should I say wallet, Mike Ilitch has dramatically altered the Detroit Tigers fortunes. With the signing of Prince Fielder, the cloud of despair that formed over the city when Victor Martinez went down has cleared. The forecast for next season is sunny skies and plenty of victories.It was surely one of the biggest, and most surprising, moves in Detroit sports history. It also showed how serious Ilitch is about winning. The addition of Fielder has made the 2012 season one of the most anticipated in Tigers' history.The Fielder signing has all the trappings of a feel-good story of the year. Everybody knows the story by now. He was born in 1984—the last time Detroit won the World Series—and grew up as a Tigers' bat boy. He learned baseball from his father Cecil, who holds the Tigers record for most home runs in a single seasonAs Ilitch pointed out at this ...

Everyone around the Detroit Tigers organization knew that the massive signing of first baseman Prince Fielder would create a shift in the way that the team plays baseball going into the 2012 season.The biggest shift was thought to be the expected move of Miguel Cabrera from first base to third base, and how the slugger would react to such a move.Cabrera didn't mind the move at all, according to manager Jim Leyland. At that point, everything involving controversy should have ended.But it didn't. Enter underachieving third baseman Brandon Inge.Now, Inge has had a great career as a Tiger. For many years he was considered one of the best defensive third baseman in the game. However, as time has gone by and injuries have accrued, Inge has found himself as a solid, yet not spectacular, defender.Then there's his 2011 campaign. Inge had a .197 average, and for most of the season ...

The Baseball Hall of Fame—holy ground for America’s national pastime. Within Cooperstown’s pantheon are honored 296 of the diamond’s royalty. Some are gods; some many have never heard of. A few don’t truly belong; others, having received the sport’s ultimate reward, remain under-appreciated. Each of them was immortalized by vote, a process vulnerable to an array of human foibles. Whereas most Hall of Famers fully deserve their honor, more than a few waited for enshrinement long after their achievements warranted such recognition (sometimes for decades), or, occasionally in the case of the Veterans Committee, wormed their way in via cronyism, inflated reputation or voter incompetence. Because (since 1958) the ballot permits—but does not require—voting to the 10th place, some very mediocre players garner votes. Often, this safeguard prohibits too many candidates from making the cut—lest the Hall grow even more overpopulated than it already is— although it occasionally detracts votes ...