We’re back with a look at a whole lot of fun action from the Tigers and around the league, from MLB’s opening week. We’ll start with Tigers talk. Miggy in the snow. The legend of Akil Baddoo. A pretty good first six outings for the rotation. Matthew Boyd off to a good start. Michael Fulmer as reliever. Gregory Soto’s dominance but for one spectacularly errant pitch.
Then we’ll get into the new brand of baseball A.J. Hinch is preaching, and whether he’ll stick to his guns, or fold after a few mistakes the way Brad Ausmus and Ron Gardenhire seemed to. We also must address Nelson Cruz’s utter dominance over Tigers’ pitching over the past decade.
Then we’ll take the second half to look around the league at the many, many interesting stories we’ve already gotten out of the young 2021 season. We’ll talk Nick Castellanos and his quest to become swag incarnate. Jose Iglesias’ ludicrous highlight reel so far with the Angels. The glory of two-way Shohei Ohtani, and much more, before our attention finally turns to Trevor Bauer, as it so often does. We have to discuss MLB seizing Bauer’s—allegedly— sticky balls, the whole strange farce of enforcing a rule that has never really been enforced before, and why Bauer may have simply made himself the lamb with his prior criticism of the Astros.
Here’s the Nick Castellanos party in Cincinnati. We’ll talk about it. Nick has a 1.610 OPS so far through six games, so you know they are loving him down on the Ohio. His Yadi quote in a classic postgame interview? “That guy could punch me in the face and I’d still ask him for a signed jersey.” Now that Nick’s defense isn’t our problem, we love him all the more.
Oh and if you missed Jose Iglesias’ work this spring, this is but one of many highlights already for the Los Angeles Angels, complete with the Fister play for comparison. He’s been on fire with the glove. Thanks as always for listening to the show.