Just two weeks into the season, the Detroit Tigers have already reached a new level of ugliness.
There are big-picture problems, not to mention plenty of small ones.
In just the first two weeks of the season, we’ve seen flaws and flops, mistakes and miscues. Brain farts and baserunning blunders, popups that fall between four defenders and guys forgetting to do little things, like sliding into second base.
The Theatre of the Absurd.
It’s like watching bad youth baseball. Without the cute factor.
The Tigers entering Thursday’s series finale in Toronto on a six-game losing streak. They have been blown out four times (losing by five runs or more) and rank last in the majors in runs scored and hits and second-to-last in strikeouts.
Worst of all, that old evil friend — the injury bug — is popping up like a lost groundhog searching for Groundhog Day.
Matt Manning was about to finish his outing, and he broke his foot?
An injury so under the radar that manager A.J. Hinch didn’t even know he was being taken for X-rays?
The medical folks came up to Hinch in the dugout and informed him. At which point, I’m fairly certain Hinch wanted to scream: Ya gotta be freakin’ kidding me! What else can go wrong?
Oh, boy. Never ask that around this team.
The Tigers signed starting pitcher Michael Lorenzen to a $8.5 million contract to stabilize the rotation, and he didn’t even make it out of spring training. Last I saw him, he was getting on a golf cart, leaving the Tigers clubhouse in Houston to go on a rehab assignment (although he could return soon).
For the second straight season, Austin Meadows has left the team because of anxiety. Let me be clear: I applaud him tremendously for making this public, for sharing his struggles. It’s a great lesson for all of us, and I applaud the Tigers for how they’ve handled this. Mental health issues are real and it’s important to do everything we can to remove stigmas. We have to get to the stage where we talk about mental health issues no differently than a broken fifth metatarsal.
That’s at the human level — the only level that really matters.
But there is a baseball ripple effect; and Meadows’ absence is another starter out of the lineup.
It’s gotten so bad, so fast, that when pitcher Beau Brieske was diagnosed with a right ulnar nerve entrapment and got a nerve hydrodissection procedure, it felt a time to celebrate.
Just because it wasn’t season-ending elbow surgery.
And then you think: hydro-what?
The big-money problem
Could they do that to Javier Báez’s bat?
It couldn’t hurt, right?
Hydro-blast it.
Dissect it.
Just do something.
Because this just isn’t working.
Báez has been awful. He has four hits in 40 at bats, a cringe-worthy .100 batting average. Which means that every day he’s in the lineup, he has been worth at least three outs — an inning of futility, just on his own.
MORE FROM SEIDEL: Ryan Kreidler gives Tigers an ‘impact defender.’ They’re giving him ‘a long leash’
The Tigers are paying Miguel Cabrera, Jonathan Schoop and Baez more than $60 million this season and getting virtually nothing out of them.
All of this has left Hinch in a tricky position: Should he drop Báez in the batting order? He did drop him to fifth for one game on Tuesday.
Should he bench him, just to clear his head? That might appease some fans, who want to see Báez punished. But we are only two weeks into a season.
Báez isn’t going anywhere — he ain’t opting out, folks. The Tigers need him to hit. They can’t have him spiral even worse. And besides, there aren’t a lot of guys who are exactly ripping the cover off the ball, here.
So, yes, hydro-blasting his bat sounds like the best option.
As far as defense, Báez only has two errors, but I’d give most of the credit to Spencer Torkelson, who seems to save Báez every day, scooping a ball out of the dirt or jumping high into the air to snag an errant throw.
So that’s a positive, right?
HELP? Tyler Nevin hit .500 in Triple-A Toledo. Now, he plans to contribute for Tigers
Ugly mistakes piling up
All of this might be acceptable — OK, not really, but stay with me here — if the Tigers were playing a clean brand of baseball.
But this?
Ugh.
First, let’s review some basic things you learn in — oh, I don’t know — 9-year-old baseball.
When you are on second base, and the ball is hit in front of you — to your right side — you are taught to freeze.
But Eric Haase, 30, had a complete brain freeze on Wednesday night in Toronto. In the sixth inning, when the ball was hit to shortstop, Haase took off and started running for third.
He was a dead duck.
Out at third. In a tight game.
“It’s a bad mistake is the way I look at it,” Hinch told reporters after the Tigers’ lost 4-3 against Toronto in 10 innings. “He’s been around too long to make the mistake.”
Now, let’s review another lesson that you learn in your first year of travel baseball. When you try to steal second base, you slide.
But Matt Vierling forgot that little detail on Wednesday night.
He tried to steal second and went in standing up — slowing down tremendously — and was tagged out.
“I have no idea,” Hinch said. “Guys don’t run to second and don’t slide … “
Now, you can blame Hinch for these mistakes — the manager is ultimately responsible, right?
But come on. This is Little League stuff.
This is stuff you learn in grade school.
And we haven’t even gotten to the Tigers’ bullpen.
Or lack thereof.
When Hinch goes to his bullpen, I think: Oh, no, why is he doing that? Why doesn’t he go to Alex Lange?
And then, when Lange is pitching, I think: Why can’t Lange pitch the next inning? And the next one, too?
Yes, I realize that’s not realistic, but that’s the problem.
They just don’t have many options in the bullpen.
“I feel like we have to try to get 27 outs, and we have to get there a lot of different ways,” Hinch told reporters.
Translation: Hinch is trying to make lemonade out of lemons.
Here’s the root of the problem: the Tigers traded away Michael Fulmer, Gregory Soto and Joe Jimenez.
And they failed to bring back Andrew Chafin, even though they had a chance to sign him back. Even though it would have been smart to bring him back.
Right now, it would be easy to blame Hinch for his moves but that bullpen is beyond thin.
On Wednesday night, Hinch went to Trey Wingenter to pitch the ninth against the Blue Jays.
How did that go?
“Throw a ball to the backstop and hit a lefty in the foot,” Hinch said.
So, not so good.
Hinch is being forced to use guys in spots where they aren’t ready. Because he doesn’t have many other options.
So, the Tigers are in a tough situation. The starting rotation has been rattled with injuries. The bullpen is weak. The offense has struggled. And suddenly, guys are trying to do too much on their own, making strange mental mistakes, making it even worse.
“We’re clearly making some mistakes,” Hinch said.
That’s understating it.
One thing is clear: This team needs a good hydro-blast.
MORE FROM SEIDEL: Tattoos seen throughout Tigers clubhouse reveal interesting stories
Contact Jeff Seidel: jseidel@freepress.com or follow him on Twitter @seideljeff.
To read Seidel’s recent columns, go to freep.com/sports/jeff-seidel.