00:00shifting to the tigers the detroit tigers have been a lot of fun to watch lately they're winning
00:05games they're winning series they've now won the series against oakland or sorry oakland
00:09oakramento whatever we want to call them the athletics they've won the series they have the
00:14opportunity now to sweep them tonight uh hopefully the rain holds off and we can get that game going
00:21um but the the tigers are playing much better baseball they are now five and a half games out
00:29of the division lead four games out in the loss column of the wild card this is substantial
00:35progress we've seen over the last several weeks since june began we we had the numbers yesterday
00:41the number one in the american league with the record uh in in major league baseball with their
00:46era home runs and you know run differential whatever it is the a lot of a lot of categories
00:52were there um they've been the best in baseball since june 1st are you okay if i go through this
00:58real quick yeah 19 and 12 record best in the al uh plus 54 run differential since june 1st best
01:05in
01:05the al slugging percentage second home runs first era first opponents batting average third guess
01:12where they are run differential in the american league second best run differential in the american
01:17league guess where they are that's actually not true run differential american league oh i'm sorry
01:23since june 1st so no run differential american oh i'm sorry sorry okay fourth in the american league
01:29top 10 in major league baseball run differential entire league so they are really really really
01:36coming on right now um and what we are taking in is a reality that if they're able to play
01:45this way
01:46600 baseball not 650 600 baseball if they're able to play 600 baseball the rest of the way they're
01:55going to finish 83 and 79 now most years 86 is the magic number but if you've been paying attention
02:02to
02:02the american league wild card race as i have 83 and 79 might get it done this year can they
02:09do what they
02:11did in the month of june can they do that for july august and september because some of these numbers
02:17looks look like they are replicatable i mean that this looks like this can be sustained what it comes
02:25down to is in my mind is it's it's it's a god awful month of may that nearly killed this
02:36team i i think
02:38i think it's safe to say it nearly killed clearly it hasn't because they bounced back in june and now
02:43into july where they're winning baseball games to the point where they've made all these inroads like
02:47you're talking about now they've got a plus 20 run differential and now they've got this win-loss
02:51record now they're eight games below 500 which normally sucks but this was a team with 16 games below 500
02:57uh at its peak and that was a few weeks ago right they've made tremendous inroads seven other last
03:0310 games they've won uh they're doing a much better job and they're getting it done with the starting
03:09pitching has been outstanding but just putting things in perspective like we were six and six and 22
03:16in the month of may so that's 28 games six and 22 if you're just a bad have a bad
03:25may right you're less
03:26than 500 so you're going what 12 and 16 in the month of may that's a bad may if that's
03:34what they
03:34had done they'd be real close to 500 right now well you add six games to the win total they
03:41would be 48
03:42and 44 so you'd be above 500 thanks for doing the math because when it gets to the compound stuff
03:47like
03:48stuff but this is the thing the team is playing much better right now they're playing as well as
03:54anybody is in baseball maybe the exception of the dodgers but i don't care about the national
03:59league until you get to the world sure it doesn't matter what is it in the american league this team
04:02is playing awfully well and they've got winning records against the good teams in the american
04:09league with one exception and that's cleveland they can't solve cleveland uh who they're oh and six
04:14against but it presents an amazing opportunity to turn things around here after the all-star break
04:21when you've got games against cleveland when you've got games against chicago the white socks
04:25they're five and a half back in the division right now those are the two teams and then minnesota's
04:30only two games back of the division so the three teams in front of them in the division they got
04:34plenty of games plenty of opportunities to leapfrog and and really turn things around if they're playing
04:40like they are now this team by the trade deadline could be on top of the division they could be
04:48undoubtedly what do you think it is about this team that is so multiple personality disorder
04:53at the end of last year they didn't have injuries they scored 35 runs in the final 16 games 2
05:00.2 runs a
05:01game what's the explanation for that 248-539-9797 is a telephone number the mystery that is the
05:10detroit tigers what is this team what are they are the team that two years ago in the second half
05:16of the
05:16season caught everything by storm and and stormed into the postseason are they the team that sucked
05:22in the second half of last season but still got into the postseason and and you know they were
05:27fought they didn't lose until the the last game in the series against seattle are they the team that
05:33was the the team we saw in may are they the team we've seen since then are they in between
05:38what are
05:39they we'll discuss it next year 97.1
05:41you
