September 9, 2011

The End of Denny McLain’s Career Began in 1966

A couple weeks ago, friend of the Fungo Lynn Henning wrote why it made sense to give Justin Verlander an extra day of rest heading into the three-game weekend series against the Indians. In the column, Henning pointed to specific examples in Tigers history where heavy workloads resulted in truncated careers – among them Mark [...]

June 9, 2011

Remembering Jim Northrup: My First Big-League Autograph

The first-ever autograph I scored was Jim Northrup’s. I’m fairly confident the year was 1978 and it was at my baseball banquet at St. Isaac Jogues in St. Clair Shores. Word had spread that there would be a Tigers player at the banquet and I held out hope, despite my brother’s assurances I was nuts, that the Tiger [...]

April 18, 2011

Little Good News for Zumaya

For a long time — even up until this spring training — I thought the Tigers had bought themselves enough time to get Joel Zumaya healthy by drafting Ryan Perry, signing Jose Valverde and then signing Joaquin Benoit. With today’s news that Zumaya is headed to the 60-day disabled list, with no clear answer on [...]

June 29, 2010

Tigers Today: June 29, 2010

Tigers’ Record: 41-34, 1st place; 1/2-game lead Today’s Game Tigers @ Twins| 8:10 p.m. ET – Target Field | On the air: FSD/AM 1270 and 97.1 FM Pitching Matchup Armando Galarraga (3-1, 3.68 ERA) vs. RHP Nick Blackburn (6-5, 6.10 ERA) Yesterday’s Results Tigers 7 – Twins 5 W: Jeremy Bonderman (4-5) L: Francisco Liriano [...]

June 29, 2010

Déjà Zoom

You may not want to admit it, but you always feared that Joel Zumaya was one pitch away from another – possibly catastrophic – arm injury. I certainly did. But as this season wore on, I thought about it less and less. We were finally seeing the Zumaya we enjoyed so much in 2006 — [...]

June 28, 2010

Tigers Today: June 28, 2010

Tigers’ Record: 40-34, 2nd place; 1/2-game behind Minnesota Today’s Game Tigers @ Twins | 8:10 p.m. ET – Target Field | On the air: FSD/AM 1270 and 97.1 FM Pitching Matchup Jeremy Bonderman (3-5) vs. LHP Francisco Liriano (6-5) Yesterday’s Results Tigers 10 – Braves 6 W: Justin Verlander (9-5) L: Tommy Hanson (7-5) HR: [...]

April 15, 2009

Remembering The Bird Across Michigan, from Grand Rapids to The D

Friend of the Fungo Justin Weeks (a.k.a. “Justin in Grand Rapids” on the podcast) sent along these two photos taken near Comerica Park and Grand Rapids, respectively. Thanks, Justin!