Las Vegas Sun

March 28, 2024

Tigers are staring at a 20-20-20 vision

Twenty defeats

Teams with four 20-game losers in a season:

Teams with at least three 20-game losers:

Last Wednesday's headline in the Detroit Free Press tweaked with any unassuming sports fan and must have given hardcore Tigers followers a rare moment of levity.

"Unbeaten in July! Tigers trip Jays."

Yes, Detroit had beaten Toronto, 5-0, the previous night -- which was July 1.

Now for the tragic part of the season that is unfolding in Motown. In Jeremy Bonderman, Mike Maroth and Adam Bernero, the Tigers have the potential to become the first team with three 20-game-losing starters in nearly 90 years.

The Philadelphia A's (1916), Brooking Dodgers (1908) and St. Louis Browns (1905) pulled off that hat trick, and the Boston Braves of 1905 and 1906 own the distinction of beign the only teams since 1900 with four 20-game losers.

Brian Kingman, who went 8-20 for Oakland in 1980, is the last pitcher to suffer 20 defeats.

"Some pretty good pitchers have lost 20," Detroit manager Alan Trammell told the Free Press. "And (Bonderman) will tell you, even if the losses mount, he wants to pitch."

Bonderman said he doesn't want to be spared.

"So what if I'm 2-25?" he said. "Stats for one year don't mean anything."

After Sunday's defeat to Kansas City, the Tigers are 21-65. That's three games worse than the pace of the 1962 expansion New York Mets, who finished with a post-1900 record of 120 losses.

(For the record, New York won 40 that season and tied a game, 7-7, in Houston on Sept. 9, 1962.)

Maroth, 25, dodged the devil Saturday when he improved to 4-12. The Tigers scored in each of the first five innings -- but still needed two in the ninth for security -- in a 9-5 victory at Kansas City.

A 6-foot left-hander, Maroth was a third-round draftee by the Red Sox in 1998. A year later, he was traded for Bryce Florie, who once pitched for the Las Vegas Stars. Last year, Maroth was 8-1 in 11 starts at Triple-A Toledo before the call-up to Detroit.

Or was it a call-down? He's 10-22 since the recall.

Despite registering a quality start Thursday in Kansas City, Bonderman dropped to 2-13. Starter Jeremy Affeldt, new set-up ace Curtis Leskanic -- already a fan favorite -- and closer Mike MacDougal were just a bit better in the Royals' 3-2 victory.

Bonderman, 20, was promoted from Single-A Modesto to the big club to start the season. Trammell has hinted that he might not let the young right-hander match his defeats with his current age.

"It would be a won-loss thing more than anything," Trammell told the Free Press about a circumstance that might remove Bonderman from the rotation. "But I hope it doesn't come to that."

Then again, Trammell has been impressed with Bonderman's mental makeup.

"He believes he belongs, and that's a great sign," Trammell said. "I know what his record is, but the guy will continue to get the ball."

Bernero, 26, slipped to 1-12 last Wednesday when he yielded five earned runs over 3 1/3 innings, pumping his ERA to 6.05, in an eventual 8-2 loss to Toronto in Detroit.

A 6-4 righty whom Detroit signed as a non-drafted free agent in May 1999, he had uneventful stints with the Tigers in each of the past three seasons.

Kingman talked about Maroth when reached by the Associated Press a couple of weeks ago, but he might as well have been talking about any of the Tigers' terrible trio.

"I'll bring out the voodoo dolls if Maroth gets up to 18 or 19 (losses)," Kingman said. "He doesn't have to win, he just has to stop losing ... it's something that just happens. You couldn't do it if you set out to.

"You need to be on a team with a poor offense. You have to pitch good enough to stay in the rotation. And it helps if you have a spotty bullpen. Losing 20 is just the reverse of winning 20 -- almost everything has to go wrong."

Detroit has only three victories to show for its starters' past 14 quality starts, when they allow no more than three earned runs over at least six innings. It is only 16-27 when getting a quality start this season, so their hurlers don't have to shoulder all the blame.

This would be a good time to start hitting, too. The Tigers might be able to make a move on those '62 Mets -- who lost 11 in a row, and 17 of their next 19, after their 86th game -- over the next few weeks.

Nine of Detroit's next 15 foes currently have sub-.500 records.

If the Tigers are not better than 26-79 after their game in Seattle on Wednesday, July 30, the slope will only get slipperier for them.

Dmitri Young, 29, admitted that it is a stretch to think the Tigers can improve from worst to first place next year. The Angels and Twins did it, though, he said.

"But to have the all-time worst record -- if that happens to us this year -- to popping champagne corks next year might be the craziest thing we've ever seen in the history of this game," Young told the Free Press. "That would really be something."

For now, it's only an exercise in extreme positive thinking.

Well, not exactly. We will extract some choice words in the interest of this being a family newspaper.

"I can't ask the questions," McClendon began. "It you got something to ask me, ask me so I can get the (bleep) out of here."

Did (starter Jeff D'Amico) have another tough game?

"No, my starter did fine," he said. "He deserved to win a (bleeping) game. We didn't (bleeping) execute. We were (bleeping) horse (bleep) on every (bleeping) facet of the (bleeping) game.

"You want to know the (bleeping) reasons why? Go out there and ask the players, because I don't have the (bleeping) reasons. Sometimes, the onus has got to be on them."

Plan to change anything?

"I don't plan on changing (bleep). The players we got are the players we got, and they'll be out there tomorrow. That's the end of the (bleeping) (bleep-bleeping) press (bleep) conference."

With a swipe of his paw across a desk in the manager's office inside the visitors' clubhouse at Olympic Stadium, papers and a tray tumbled to the ground.

"(Bleep) me. Ask the (bleeping) players. (Bleep.) Sometimes, somebody has to (bleeping) stand up."

It worked. Since the blow-up, the Pirates (38-46) have won seven of 10 games, creeping within 6 1/2 games of the lead in the average NL Central and within a game of the fourth-place Cincinnati Reds.

Once included in a trade for Tom Seaver as a player, McClendon, 44, should be included among the game's most passionate managers. Remember his shot-put of first base two years ago?

Oh, and the morning-after in Montreal, all was forgiven.

"Was I in a bad mood?" McClendon said, laughing. "I feel great today."

He can thank nationally syndicated sports radio show host Jim Rome.

Rome, to any neophyte, never lacks in self-promotion, and he takes particular pride in those whom he invites onto his show experiencing immediate benefits for taking time to chat with him.

Last Tuesday, Konerko went into "The Jungle" and spoke about his poor season, to date, how it had been affecting him and what he had been doing to try to combat it, and how it had relegated him to bench duty.

But I'll tell you what, Konerko said, I'll be called upon to do something soon, and I will not let my teammates down.

Lightning struck a day later, when he hit a pinch-hit solo shot off Minnesota reliever Eddie Guardado to tie a game in the bottom of the 11th. The Sox won it an inning later.

Rome can be condescending, among other faults. However, he has a keen sense of humor, depth that most sports shows lack and is sharp with follow-up questions. Most important, he has following among athletes that is unmatched, resulting in invaluable access.

He isn't afraid to swim upstream, either, which he did last week by inviting someone -- Konerko -- onto the show who, essentially, had no business being on it. Konerko started Sunday and went 0-for-4, plummeting to .185.

But his timing last week was impeccable, as was Rome's. Bravo.

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