{"id":16602,"date":"2011-07-21T11:27:44","date_gmt":"2011-07-21T16:27:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/?p=16602"},"modified":"2011-07-21T11:27:44","modified_gmt":"2011-07-21T16:27:44","slug":"mlb-handicapping-detroit-tigers-at-minnesota-twins-al-central-rivalry","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/mlb-handicapping-detroit-tigers-at-minnesota-twins-al-central-rivalry-16602\/","title":{"rendered":"MLB Handicapping: Detroit Tigers at Minnesota Twins AL Central Rivalry"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Detroit Tigers and Minnesota Twins start an important four-game series in the American League Central race at Target Field Thursday night<\/p>\n

Detroit Tigers at Minnesota Twins<\/strong><\/p>\n

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Minnesota Twins catcher Joe Mauer is batting .356 in his career against Detroit Tigers SP Justin Verlander<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Detroit dropped a 7-5 home contest to the Oakland Athletics Wednesday and now start an important weekend series against an American League Central rival.\u00a0 The Tigers were clearly frustrated with the effort and had its two-game winning streak snapped in the process.\u00a0 \u201cI\u2019ve never seen so many two-game series bloop hits and broken bat hits that killed us,\u201d said Tigers catcher Alex Avila.\u00a0 It\u2019s just one of those series where we were able to get one yesterday and this one was frustrating.\u201d\u00a0 The club has still won 39 of its last 68 games and is 19-10 versus division opponents this year.\u00a0 Detroit has recorded a losing 33-35 mark versus right-handed pitchers and is 24-22 following a loss.<\/p>\n

Tigers starting pitcher Justin Verlander is 12-5 with a 2.29 ERA in 21 starts this seaosn and has dropped two of his last three outings.\u00a0 He is coming off an 8-2 home loss to the White Sox, giving up five runs (four earned) and seven hits in six frames.\u00a0 The right-hander has tallied a solid 5-2 record and 2.08 ERA in nine road starts, as opponents are hitting just .184 against him.\u00a0 In 18 career starts versus the Twins, Verlander has posted an even 7-7 mark and 3.71 ERA, but has yet to record a decision at Target Field.<\/p>\n

Minnesota finished off its four-game set against Cleveland with consecutive victories and will now seek a third straight win Thursday night.\u00a0 The Twins have failed to collect a win against the Tigers this year, but things are much different in the clubhouse than the last time they matched up.\u00a0 \u201cIt wasn\u2019t fun leaving Detroit and flying wherever we went to after that,\u201d said Danny Valencia.\u00a0 \u201cBut a lot\u2019s changed since then, our team\u2019s really clicked a little bit.\u201d\u00a0 Catcher Joe Mauer is likely to prove key in the offensive attack against one of the league\u2019s dominating pitchers, batting .356 with three home runs in 45 at-bats against Verlander.\u00a0 Minnesota is 21-14 versus division opponents this year and 114-66 over the last three campaigns.<\/p>\n

Twins starting pitcher Carl Pavano is 6-6 with a 4.08 ERA in 19 starts this season and has led the club to six wins in his last eight outings.\u00a0 In his latest effort, he tossed seven strong innings in allowing just three runs in a no-decision effort that resulted in a 4-3 home win over the Royals.\u00a0 The right-hander is a solid 3-1 with a 2.90 ERA in eight home outings, surrendering just three home runs in 59 frames.\u00a0 In nine career games versus the Tigers, Pavano is 5-2 with a 3.79 ERA, including a 1-1 mark and 5.49 ERA in three games last year.<\/p>\n

Bettors will likely back the Twins due to their 7-2 mark as a home underdog, while the Tigers are 3-7 when opening a series<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Detroit Tigers and Minnesota Twins start an important four-game series in the American League Central race at Target Field Thursday night Detroit Tigers at Minnesota Twins Detroit dropped a 7-5 home contest to the Oakland Athletics Wednesday and now start an important weekend series against an American League Central rival.\u00a0 The Tigers were clearly […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":181,"featured_media":4777,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1444],"tags":[2004,48,990,104,240,1876],"class_list":["post-16602","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-headlines","tag-carl-pavano","tag-detroit-tigers","tag-joe-mauer","tag-justin-verlander","tag-minnesota-twins","tag-target-field"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16602","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=16602"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16602\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16603,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16602\/revisions\/16603"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4777"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16602"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16602"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16602"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}