It was a really good crowd at Comerica today. Detroit fans are always going to do their thing, but Toronto fans are known to travel whenever they come to play Detroit. I still don’t understand why these teams aren’t in the same division. I point out the crowd because it’s hard to express how lifeless the environment was. For the record, I’m not getting on the fan base because of that. Going back to last September, this team consistently falls behind early in games to a point where even the slimmest of leads feels insurmountable. When it was 2-0 in the first, it felt like Detroit was on life support. By the time it got to 4-0, it was all but over.
There will be people who take positives from that Jack Flair, considering that he gave them six innings. I am not one of those people. At the bare minimum, the job of a starting pitcher is to keep their team in the game, and he wasn’t able to do it. I understand that I probably wouldn’t have made much of a difference because Detroit's offense isn’t capable of scoring runs right now. Still, it’s so demoralizing to be down multiple runs before your team has even come to the plate, especially when facing off against a pitcher of Kevin Gausman's caliber. Just because Jack wasn’t a disaster doesn’t mean I’m going to give him any praise.
It’s not going to get any easier for Detroit. There is no off day tomorrow, and the Cleveland Guardians are coming to town. Cleveland is the team that his been the biggest thorn in Detroit’s side for well over a decade now. It is a four-game series, and if Detroit wants to keep their fans engaged until Memorial Day, they need to take a few of these games against Cleveland. Framber Valdez will be on the mound against Slade Cecconi.