Comings and Goings

Good news or bad news first?

In this long and lonely offseason, it's almost safe to say than any news is good news. Almost.

Joel Zumaya agreeing to terms with the Twins definitely isn't our idea of a fantastic situation. Who wants to see a once-adored member of the team go over to the Dark Side? And here we were, just starting to really pity the Twins for how bad they're going to be next year. Screw that. Sorry Joel, but we are never again praying for your return to glory.

So now the good news…Rick Porcello and Phil Coke have avoided arbitration and agreed to terms with the Tigers! This makes us very, very happy, seeing as we love Phil Coke's insanity and interesting hairstyles and Rick Porcello's physique and gorgeousness sinker.

Dressing Like A Boss

And for all who did not catch our main man Justin Verlander on Conan, it was a treat. He showed off his  fashion-forward blue and brown suit with some kick-ass brown shoes, and seemed funny and at ease. As he should be. If the man can throw two no-hitters, he can sure as hell go on a silly talk show for ten minutes. 

Some people out there in the blogging world and Twitterverse didn't like JV's attire, but we really did. Maybe we should start forgiving him for the Ed Hardy and overly-jelled hair.

The fact that a Cy Young and MVP winner can eat Taco Bell before every start not only makes us question our own dieting strategies, but it also makes us marvel at the strength of Justin's stomach. Who the hell can eat that much Taco Bell and not be embarrassingly sick the day after?!

The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

Phil Coke = Hot Mess.

So, our team just finished the dreaded West Coast road trip, and there was so much of a confusing mixture of good, bad, and ugly that we had to break it down here at April in the D. Read on!

The Good
-Miguel Cabrera, Brennan Boesch, and Jose Valverde kick ass. We're really really hoping/praying Brennan keeps this up all year long. Is that so much to ask?! As far as Cabrera goes, we would lose almost every game without him. That much is obvious. And Valverde, despite giving up his first run of the year, is 2-0 and 4/4 for saves. Plus he struck out Milton Bradley twice (and his dancing got a death stare). Do your thang, Papa.

-Max Scherzer, as Mario Impemba pointed out, has been on the mound for 4 out of 9 of the Tigers' wins. That stat right there says enough about how good he's been. IT'S THE EYES. Speaking of Mario...

-Mario and Rod take over Twitter. Nothing delights us more than logging on to Twitter and seeing Mario's tame, boring tweets juxtaposed with one of Rod's exclamation point-filled ones. It's like hearing them on TV, only with a behind-the-scenes feel.

-Scott Sizemore is hitting .375 with an OPS of .991. It's soooo great that he's on our team, we really need him!...Oh, wait. He's not. This needs to be fixed.

-Minnesota and Chicago are sucking even worse than we are. Gotta love it.

-Bromances. See our last post for more on this.

-And, finally, rumbling out of the West with a winning record. We feel like that hardly ever happens.

The Bad
-Staying up until 1:30 a.m. watching the boys slug it out every night was not so fun the next morning. Most of the time it was worth it, but other times? Not so much. The things we do for our Tigers...

-V-Mart's new stint on the disabled list was probably a good idea in the long run, but we desperately need him back. Not just for his accordion playing skills, but also for his bat, which we really need.

-Austin Jackson is slumping, that's no secret. He showed signs of life on Wednesday's game, but the Tigers need to get him hitting, since he really is our team's catalyst. Maybe Lloyd McClendon could wake up long enough to help him out...

-Kansas City and Cleveland are atop the AL Central. Kansas City and Cleveland. Is this real life??
The Ugly
-Phil Coke looked like an ace in his previous two starts. Tuesday night he looked like a white version of Dontrelle Willis, complete with the mania. We hope this is just a bump in the road, but that was seriously the ugliest game pitched all year.

-That pitch...only Justin Verlander would throw a ball that literally didn't exist in the baseball world. It was so confusing that Rod and Mario were talking about it for not just the rest of the game, but for days afterwards. Crazy.

-Our bullpen, save for Valverde and Joaquin Benoit, is erratic at best and cataclysmic at worst. It's good that Enrique Gonzalez is gone, but the Saucy Aussie needs to go as well.

-We're going to guess V-Mart getting nailed in the crotch by Valverde's pitch probably contributed to his groin injury. Yikes. Heal fast, Victor...


After a much need off-day, our boys are back in the D taking on the slumping White Sox and...the Mariners. We need these wins.

For Your Entertainment

We know that a lot of Tigers fans out there are very adamant on reading serious, straightforward Tiger news. We agree with that...for the most part. Its pretty obvious that we like to keep it light here at April in the D, but sometimes we too take disciplined looks at the players, their stats, and their impact on the team. We can be serious.

However, today is not that day.

Hopefully you find our blog informative and interesting and funny at the same time. We're going for entertainment value here, people. With that being said, we would like to examine the two wildest, craziest, most absurd people in the entire Tigers organization (no, not Rod and Mario)!

No, we're talking about these two.

Yes, the most colorful people in the Tiger's clubhouse are Crazy Cokey and the Big Potato himself. We remember Jim Leyland two years ago saying that the 2009 team had great chemistry. Well, chemistry or not, we have two of the most fantastic characters in all of the MLB. Lets take a look, shall we?

JOSE VALVERDE


We had to capitalize his name because he is just all kinds of awesome. His dance moves are all kinds of amazing. Hasn't everyone wished players would celebrate more, or is that just us? Wouldn't you just love to see Verlander do a few fist pumps and hip thrusts when he strikes out the side? Or how about seeing Magglio whip his hair back and forth when he hits a home run? SEE? Baseball is already more fun. Hell, Jim Leyland can get into the mix too. Actually, no. That would be disturbing. Anyways, Jose Valverde is quite the character, from his sweet moves to his practical jokes. He also seems to have become the bullpen's version of a mob boss. Everyone answers to him. He rules all.
On the playing side of things...he needs to stay out of the Brennan Boesch Bi-Polar Season Zone and keep consistent this year. He was absolutely unbelievable at the beginning of last year. He needs to continue to Do Work. As well as dance.

Phil Coke


What...an oddball. From the way he says he's going to drive Jim Leyland nuts in the dugout to his insane hair choices, Phil Coke fascinates us. What interesting facial hair/hairstyle combination can he come up with next?!? Dreadlocks and a beard? Flowing tresses like Magglio used to have? Maybe he should dye it. Also--the sprinting thing. Cokey, in his bullpen days, used to literally sprint to the mound from the bullpen when it was his turn to pitch. I'm sure you all know everything we're saying, but just writing it all out makes us smile.
We hope Phil will be awesome in his starting role. We pray to the baseball gods that he will. But, we're not 100% sold on the idea. He's been doing pretty well in Spring Training, but it is just Spring Training. We shall see, Cokey. We shall see.