Tigers roadtrip recap: Day 2

Back home after a long – and I mean long – drive home from Anaheim after Tuesday afternoon’s game.

We left The Big A at 5:38 p.m. PT and arrived in Casa de McClary at 1:15 a.m. We spent the first hour on the 57 Freeway going eight miles in an hour – in the carpool lane! – before kicking it into gear on I-10.

After breakfast with Lynn Henning, we hung out at nearby Starbucks before meeting with Bob Wright of (the highly acclaimed/recommended) The Baseball History Podcast. Bob was kind enough to drive to the stadium and give us a tour before game time.

Ominous beginning

When the first three Tigers hitters fanned, we were less concerned about the offense than we were with the still-winless Jeremy Bonderman. I warned Bob that Bonderman could be electric or he could be explosive, depending on how you look at it. From the Angels fans’ perspective, implosive looked to be on tap.

And Bondo delivered for the home crowd. Sorta.

The first inning was atrocious and Carlos Guillen’s defensive gaffes seemed to indicate an increasingly ugly afternoon was in store.

Not quite.

As you all saw by now, the boys chipped away and you could sense the home crowd – again, teeming with Tigers fans – gettin’ antsy.

Dazzling comeback

With the early deficit, John and I figured to be on the road back to Phoenix by 3 p.m. Given that we had about seven hours ahead of us, we weren’t going to complain.

Then the Tigers took control of the game from a suddenly wild Angels bullpen. When Gary Sheffield – who smoked the ball all series long – stole third base in the ninth, we knew the Tigers would tie it. And did they ever with a moon shot from Magglio Ordonez.

At first, I didn’t even look to see how far it went because all I wanted was a sacrifice fly. Then I saw that Garret Anderson chose to watch it rather than chase it.

A bomb not unlike the ones I used to uncork playing wiffle ball in my driveway…give or take 400 feet.

Bitter ending

I’d like to take something positive from the game such as Bonderman’s resilience, Tigers hitters’ patience and aggressiveness (can you have both?) or Sheffield’s apparent thaw.

Instead, and maybe this was fueled by the bumper-to-bumper traffic I could see from my seat in section T208, I focused on Todd Jones and all the baggage he brings into a game. And the fact Ordonez is the outfield equivalent of Sean Casey. And that we’d likely have to listen to the Baseball Tonight crew bringing up pitchers’ fielding practice again, yuk yuk yuk. (Unfortunately, Doug beat them to it.)

The load out

Given the whirlwind trip to the West Coast and two games in less than 24 hours, I suppose we can stomach a split.

But when a game is sitting there for the taking…on the road…after a terrific comeback…when you are in the stands to suffer through Jones’ wild pitch…you want a win. You want a sweep.

It wasn’t a total loss though. We had a splendid trip, a great visit with Bob Wright (who was the only happy man in the car after the game), did some stargazing and a ton of Tigers offense.

During Monday night’s game I leaned over to John and said, “We could be watching an ALCS preview.”

Wishful thinking, maybe. But if that’s the case, I’ll be making a return trip to Anaheim in the fall.