{"id":15794,"date":"2011-05-25T09:27:08","date_gmt":"2011-05-25T14:27:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/?p=15794"},"modified":"2011-05-25T09:27:08","modified_gmt":"2011-05-25T14:27:08","slug":"how-sweep-it-is-tampa-bay-rays-at-detroit-tigers-pro-baseball-preview","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/how-sweep-it-is-tampa-bay-rays-at-detroit-tigers-pro-baseball-preview-15794\/","title":{"rendered":"How Sweep It Is: Tampa Bay Rays at Detroit Tigers Pro Baseball Preview"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Tampa Bay Rays and Detroit Tigers meet in the final game of a three-game set Wednesday afternoon at Comerica Park<\/p>\n

Tampa Bay Rays at Detroit Tigers<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Detroit catcher Victor Martinez loves hitting against Tampa Bay<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Tampa Bay has lost five of six games and manager Joe Maddon is confident his club will turn things around after dropping a 7-6 contest in Detroit last night.\u00a0 \u201cIf we play baseball like that on a nightly basis, I\u2019ll take it any day of the week,\u201d Maddon commented.\u00a0 The Rays are 2-5 on their current eight-game road trip that ends with this afternoon\u2019s finale versus the Tigers, but they still possess a solid 15-10 mark on the road.\u00a0 Matt Joyce has three hits Tuesday for the squad, including his eighth homer, raising his AL-leading batting average to .367.\u00a0 It\u2019s a surprising season when considering he hasn\u2019t hit higher than .252 in any of his three previous seasons.\u00a0 Tampa Bay is 10-10 in day games this year.<\/p>\n

Rays starting pitcher Andy Sonnanstine is 0-1 with a 4.21 ERA in three starts this season and the club has proven victorious in just one of his nine overall appearances.\u00a0 The right-hander picked up a no-decision on the road last time out against the Marlins, allowing three runs and seven hits over five frames.\u00a0 Sonnanstine has thrown well on the road without establishing a record, surrendering six runs and 14 hits over 14 2\/3 innings.\u00a0 In two career starts versus the Tigers, he has an even 1-1 mark and 5.40 ERA.<\/p>\n

Detroit knocked off Tampa Bay to capture the first two games of this important series and will aim for the sweep this afternoon.\u00a0 With a win today over the Rays, it would mark the first time ever the Tigers have swept Tampa Bay in Detroit.\u00a0 Offensively, the team has really come around in scoring 15 times during its three-game winning streak following a five-game slide that totaled seven runs.\u00a0 \u201cThe one issue we don\u2019t have around here is not playing nine innings,\u201d said manager Jim Leyland.\u00a0 \u201cWe play nine innings every night.\u00a0 When you play nine innings every night, you\u2019re going to sneak some now and then.\u201d\u00a0 Catcher Victor Martinez is happing to face Tampa Bay, entering today with a .378 batting average, eight home runs and 43 RBI in 58 career games against them.\u00a0 Detroit is 13-9 in day games this season.<\/p>\n

Tigers starting pitcher Brad Penny is 4-4 with a 4.45 ERA and will be making his 11th start of the season.\u00a0 The right-hander has compiled a 4-2 record and 2.40 ERA over his last six starts dating back to April 23.\u00a0 Penny will be standing on Comerica Park\u2019s mound for the sixth time this season, coming in with a solid 3-1 mark and 1.82 ERA.\u00a0 He is tied for sixth in the American league in home ERA.\u00a0 The veteran will be making his eighth career appearance (seventh start) versus the Rays, posting a 2-4 record and 5.45 ERA.<\/p>\n

Bettors will likely back the Tigers due to their 7-1 record in their last eight home games, while the Rays are 7-20 in Sonnanstine\u2019s last 27 road starts.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Tampa Bay Rays and Detroit Tigers meet in the final game of a three-game set Wednesday afternoon at Comerica Park Tampa Bay Rays at Detroit Tigers Tampa Bay has lost five of six games and manager Joe Maddon is confident his club will turn things around after dropping a 7-6 contest in Detroit last […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":181,"featured_media":15601,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1444],"tags":[2462,4799,2126,48,150],"class_list":["post-15794","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-headlines","tag-andy-sonnanstine","tag-brad-penny","tag-comerica-park","tag-detroit-tigers","tag-tampa-bay-rays"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15794","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/181"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15794"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15794\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15795,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15794\/revisions\/15795"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15601"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15794"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15794"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15794"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}