It’s too bad we can’t talk too much about the Tigers win tonight, but the victory was bittersweet because the Tigers got news that Jeremy Bonderman is likely out for the season with a blood clot in his pitching shoulder.  This is basically the same problem that sidelined Kenny Rogers for a bulk of the season last year.  Bonderman will be missed because so far this year, he’s been the Tigers most consistent starter of late and he seemed to be turning the corner with four straight solid starts. It’s worth nothing that, beginning in the 2002 off-season, individual health insurance policies were limited to 2 to 3 year increments, as opposed to the entire length of the contract. When Insurance Companies limit the length they will insure a player’s contract for or even offer insurance to, a team is less willing to accept the risk involved in offering a long-term contract to a player.

This gives the Tigers a reason to keep Armando Galarraga in the starting rotation and he’ll fill in for Bonderman for the time being.  It was also nice to see the Tigers hang Bonderman’s jersey in the dugout during the game.  If there ever were rallying point for this ballclub, this would be it. The Tigers did double up the Indians today.  Carlos Guillen, Marcus Thames and Edgar Renteria all went yard while Renteria had a particularly good game hitting leadoff.  He went three for four and his homer was a grand slam.

Kenny Rogers is slowly finding his groove and despite not winning this afternoon, he had his fourth solid pitching performance in his last five starts.  He gave up three runs (one earned) on five hits and two walks with three strikeouts in seven innings and he’s one good start from getting his ERA under five.  Zach Miner picked up the win and he improved to 3-3 while Todd Jones got the final out of the game and he picked up his ninth save of the season. Armando Galarraga gets the nod tomorrow and he’ll face Jeremy Sowers.  Game time is 1:05.

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