Where are we at in society today? Come after me. I'm a man, I'm forty. Go ahead, make my day every single week. I put my freaking heart and soul into this. I don't go out there and laugh. It's not funny. Nothing's funny to me. I don't want to go out there and get embarrassed on Monday night football. For everybody, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship. So I ain't nothing changed from yesterday. Still the same person I was yesterday, and I got the
same thing for you that I had yesterday. You know why I'm here. You play to win the game. You don't play to just play it. That's a great thing about sports. You play to win, and I don't care if you don't have any wins. You go play to win. When you start telling me it doesn't matter, I can retire. Get out for the matters, pitching matters in baseball. Done it. He's damn right, it does. Tigers have it. They just don't have the offense. Again,
it's a waste. Don't you feel like it's a waste. Honestly, when you watch this team on a regular basis, I know it's gonna be every once in a while, but hell, you played forty two games. Man, you're twenty one up, twenty one down. Reese Olsen was so damn good career best eight scoreless innings. Sixty of his ninety six pitches were for strikes. While I watch this game, while I think of what this team needs to do to generate some offense, do something different and to try
something. When sil Perez had half their hits and they had four, same with Miami. Okay, as I watch it, I think, as a Tigers fan, you're probably going, how in the world do you not get to this, dude, Ryan Weathers? They're not very good? Stop me if you think this is familiar, that team's not very good, That team's offense is not very good at all. Who the hell is Ryan Weathers? How can he be taking a perfect game into the sixth inning? How is
he around the plate? Sixty seven of his ninety seven pitches were for strikes? How is he around the played so much and we can't hit him? Help me with that? Plays? And then I stopped myself and I said, wait a minute, put yourself in a mean Miami Marlins fan base, and what do you think they're saying? They're probably saying the same damn thing. They're going. First of all, who the hell is Resoulson? So
you and I know these people. We know the Tigers, but most people, I mean, you gotta be a serious baseball fan if you're knowing in a different market who Resoulson is. He's made eighteen starts coming into the season in his career. He doesn't have a win this year. So you can go to websites, Baseball Reference and all that other stuff and look his numbers up and say, wow, he's got a two point zero nine ERA. That's unbelievable. He's only given up eleven earned runs in forty seven innings.
That's impressive. That's fine, you can do that. That doesn't mean you know who that guy is. Maybe he gets on your radar. I don't know. But if you're a Miami Marlins fan, that's what you're thinking. You what the hell's going on here? How come we can't hit this dude? Why in the world are we struggling against a guy like this? Isn't this the kind of guy you're supposed to get well against. I mean, at least Ryan Weathers has got a couple of wins the Tigers couldn't do squat
against him. And yes, here's what you'll hear. And I get it. Lived it for a long time. Baseball's really hard. Your offense is going to be a thing of it goes, and it comes, and it comes and it goes. That's what's going to happen in baseball. Get used
to it. It happens with every team. So you have to be able to do what you have to. Be able to pitch, you have to be able to defend, but you have to be able to do something different instead of just getting in there, digging in the box, taking your hacks, give one for the team, do anything you can to get on base, all those things. I don't care if it's a cliche. I really don't. What I care about is whether or not this team is going to
be able to rectify its continuous offensive issues. You had five base runners it four hits in one walk, and yes I know they had four. All that was required was some type of clutch performance. You had your chance. You had chances, groundball, double play, pop up to third base, fly ball out to right. It's not like he didn't have chances. They were limited. But that's going to happen. They still might win this series.
They're just a eh baseball team right now. I was reading the other day at the quarter pole they were giving the grades for teams in baseball. I know it's all these websites. I get it. You and I are probably looking at it going Jesus, Bet. I mean, you really got to fill some space here, don't you. Yeah, they do. But sometimes it's nice to know what people outside your market think, because in your market, people are so concerned about pissing somebody off, not getting access.
I've complained before about you gotta be careful around certain athletes Tiger Woods, Lebron James, and Patrick Beverley. You saw what happened there right a week ago or two weeks ago the Milwaukee Bucks where he literally said to an ESPN producer, do you subscribe to my pod? No? I don't, Okay, then get that mic out of my face. Are you freaking kidding me? I have to subscribe to your podcast now. You don't make enough money playing basketball. Now in order for me to get an interview with you, I
have to subscribe to your podcast, you egotistical jackass. Are you kidding me? I'm in here doing my job, and you're gonna limit me be because I don't subscribe to your podcast. Think of that anyway. Sometimes people are so fearful of the repercussions they may get writing broadcasting answering questions to other members of the media about certain athletes, about certain coaches, about certain managers,
about certain front office personnel. Oh, I'm not going to get any type of access, so I better be nice in how I describe this pathetic, one nothing loss. So it's okay to look at some of the national writers and see what they have to say about it. What are the chances that this team is different than what I'm seeing? Who knows? So I read this article and I'm pretty interested in the various teams because I'd like to see what their grades were given that's sick at the quarter pole now, and what
those grades associated with are the same in comparison to the Tigers. In other words, if the Tigers are given a B, let's say, who else is getting to be and how do I compare this team to that grade of that team. I'll tell you what the Tigers got and who else got the same grade, and see if you agree when we come back. Just getting started on a Wednesday morning Middle of the week ex'es and bros. Across the Great State of Michigan on the Michigan Sports Network. Bill Simonson Here from my
good friend Josh Garvey. Now he's a managing shareholder at Jorn Mayhew's Grand Rapids office. Their world headquarters are in Troy, Michigan, on the east side of the state, and they have locations all around the world. They have over five hundred and fifty motivated accounting professionals ninety years in business, and I
mentioned the ten offices worldwide. So if you want to connect and partner with one of the top CPA accounting and business firms in the world, they're right here in Michigan, Dorn Mayhew's Troy office on the east side of the state, and Josh Garvey is a managing shareholder for their Dorn Mayhew gr office. Right there by the S Curve, you'll see the new Dorn Mayhew sign. You can find out more just google Dorn Mayhew. That's Doe ri n m
A y Hwordorn dot com. They're one of Americas and the worlds top CPA accounting and business firms. They're Dorn Mayhew, Hey Michigan. Let's go baby, I'm home and more appliance, all pro wide receiver and I'm talking real big time winning on the hottest slots and table games and one incredible app Eagle Casino in Sports. Sign up now and get up to fifteen hundred dollars. That's right, We'll match your deposit for up to fifteen hundred dollars and you'll
get one hundred free spins. Eagle Casino in Sports, made in Michigan, made for Michigan. Let's be twenty win er Old Michigan to play. You know, we didn't have any opportunities, but the opportunity at the end, you know, when you get the base runner at second to even extend the game. We've got a really deep pen and I always feel like we're going to be able to hang in there, especially at home with the with the
new extra inning rules. So you know, you're not going to create opportunities all the time, especially when somebody comes in and pitches as well as Weathers did. But you know, you know, these are winnable games because of the of the closeness of the score, and when you get pitching like this, it does hurt to not capitalize aj Hinch following his team's one nothing lost last night to Miami. The Miami Marlins are now twelve and thirty two.
Tigers dropped to five hundo. When do you start looking at the standings, not just when you're bored. I'm just wondering when they matter, Like five and a half back is not a big deal. And what you'll get from anybody associated with the game of baseball, and rightfully so, by the way, is that it's early. That's one of the favorite sayings in baseball. It's early. Twenty one and twenty one forty two games. It is early.
But you knew this was coming. There are certain things we're noticing that make you a little concerned, right I would think so if you're paying close enough attention. If you don't feel like it's the overall record, that's fine. How do you get to the record? That's the question. How do you see this team right now? What word comes to mind? Without trying
to be overreacting or not overreacting. The beauty of baseball is that there's plenty to come back from, you know, But it's also a situation that negativity can be every single day because you're judging a team every single day. You can't do that in any other sport because they don't play every day. Now, you can be negative every day about certain football teams because you've got five days to complain about it before they get back on the football field. But
you understand where I'm coming from in regards to baseball every single day. So what like, what grade would you give the Detroit Tigers at the quarter pole? Cbssports dot Com gave them a C, which surprises me a little bit. There are they're They're not giving any pluses or minuses. It's just a B, C, D, E or F. Here's what they write. There are some good things happening in Detroit. Riley Green might be the most improved hitter in baseball now. The Tiger's pitching staff has been an asset to
date. All true, I don't know if he's the most improved hitter in baseball. I'm not gonna sit here and try to try to give view the statistics of every single player who is, you know, up from a year ago. I think people will immediately look for Riley Green. They'll look at
his home runs. That's why they may think he is the perhaps the most improved hitter in baseball because he's up to a pretty damn good start from a home run standpoint, and what you look at, how you view a certain hitter and what numbers you're going to use to associate with that hitter is up to the individual. Like two forty two not that special, right, I mean, you would say that's down because last year he hit two eighty eight,
But the home runs is what people are looking at. I would guess this author is going, well, he's got nine home runs already this year. He only had eleven last year. Yeah, last year's average was better. His OPS is down or was down last year compared to this year. His war was higher last year. But in the power categories ops and slug, Riley Green's numbers are better along with the home runs. So I don't
know what they're using as that definition. I would say he looks to be improved, but I wouldn't know if he's the most improved hitter in baseball. I wouldn't go that far, but they said he might be, so let's not nitpicked there. That said the article rights, we felt like a C was as high as we could go because of the greater circumstances. Right on, you're not giving them higher than a C. If you're grading it based
on different aspects of the team. There are certain aspects you can give higher than a See they're pitching, you're going to give at least a B plus. But then when you look at their offense and you give it a D,
then it seems to balance out. They say the Tigers are mired in fourth place thanks to some surprisingly good starts and the Guardians and the Royals well, also because the Tigers start stinks and they have some hard questions to answer about why former number one pick Spencer Torkolsid and top prospect Cole Keith have started so poorly. If they can find some hitting between now and the deadline, they might be in for an interesting second half. As it is, this
team feels like a five hundred club, give or take. There you go. That last sentence, is it we have are open in the eight o'clock open The famous line from a movie Stryan Russell Crowe Gladiator? Are you not entertained? Ask yourself? This is this team entertaining? What does it take to entertain you? Is it wins style of play? Combination of both? Does it have to be offense. Those are the things that I asked myself when I watch this team a little bit, I think that last line hits
it right on the head. As it is, this team feels like a five hundred club. They do. They feel like a five hundred team. Who else got a C and you can compare your team to There's only two other teams that this poll gave a C grade two. One is the New York Mets, which sure as hell shouldn't cut it considering they have one of the highest payrolls in all of baseball. They're under five hundred. The other C grade was given to the Washington Nationals, who is slightly above five hundred.
Well, they lost last night, so no, there are a game under five hundred. They're twenty and twenty one. Tigers basically have the same record as the Washington Nationals. At the quarter pole. Washington they say better than expected. Mets, they say some of their best players have underperformed. The thing out. The other thing that I worry about a little bit with this team is they're getting sure. There are certain guys who are underperforming.
There are certain players you look at and you're like, I don't know, man, it's too bad about Torkos who went oh for four yesterday, And you think I'm not sure getting as good as they possibly could get out of Andy Vanyez Mark Canna is off to a good power start, and can this continue for a guy like Wenzil Perez? Is that possible? Sure? Or Shelley got hurt, but I expected that Veiling's off to a decent start.
There's another guy in this mix who has been horrid. The article says you're gonna have to make you're wondering about what the Tigers do with Torkolsen and Cole Keith. I think you should be wondering about a certain other player, and we'll get to that when we come back. Our phone number on the Meyer hotline is eight sixty six eight three eight forty eight forty three. That's eight
sixty six eight three, eight forty eight forty three. You can text the program sports Ready to twenty one thousand who they should be more concerned about than anybody else when we return Texas and Bros. Right after this huge Here for the Michigan High School Athletic Association. You can stay up to date on the latest from Lansing twenty four to seven at MHSAA dot com, at MHSA on
Twitter and MHSA on Facebook. The latest news, press releases and stories connected to every high school in the state of Michigan available for you twenty four to seven from the Michigan High School Athletic Association. Log onto MHSAA dot com, at MHSAA on Twitter and MHSA on Facebook. And if you're looking for archive boys and Girls high school Sports m h sa A dot tv. That's MHSAA dot tv twenty four to seven everything you need to know about high school sports
in Michigan. Log on to MHSAA dot com. We're teeing off our tenth year at the Meyer LPGA Classic for Simply Give. Get ready for the best who are yet to help neighbors in need while enjoying golf, food and family fun. Join us June thirteenth through the sixteenth at Blakefield Country Club for fabulous food, discoveryland for kids, and of course, elite women golfers from around the world competing to help feed our neighbors. Get your tickets now. Admire
LPGA Classics dot com. Jazz who takes strike three called It's a Slider and there's one away. He didn't love it. Three two day La Cruz goes down fast forward to the attic two away, one and two for Sanchez. There goes the bat, There goes the outfielder, There goes the neighborhood. The two two ground balled a second off to the glove side. Debanya's feels three sixty spin, easy toss. Another easy inning for Reese Olsen and the
Tigers chext wing strike three. He broke off another slider and the innings over threes goes up high for strike three on Gordon one gone scround balled a second down. Do we need to field it? Panyaz flips over the first? How about that outing for Reese Olsen? Eight shutout innings. He faces two batters over the minimum, doesn't walk a batter, and strikes out six,
just three hits allowed by results ninety six pitches. I thought we might get some people complaining that they didn't get enough, or they I should say, they didn't allow him to pitch long enough. I'm okay with eight scoreless three hits, six innings, or I mean six strikeouts. I'm okay with that. I would hope you would be too. That's not the question. The question comes back to the offense, right absolutely, and that's what you're going
to be hearing a lot about this summer. I would guess you should also hear a lot about what's wrong with Detroit's primary expect expected run producer or a guy who's supposed to stir some things, a guy who is supposed to be in the middle of it all, hove Er Bias. This has been a mitigated disaster for the Tigers so far. He has just been awful. First year struggle mightily, batting two thirty eight with an OBP of under three hundred, an OBP of under two eighty last year to twenty two OBP worse.
He has gotten worse since he has been in Detroit. Two time All Star, one time Gold Glove, a Silver slugger who finished second in the MVP in twenty eighteen. Twenty eighteen MVP voting, Javier Bias finished second to Christian Yelich. That's a year that Christian Yelich led the league and batting average slugging OPS had thirty six bombs, drove in one hundred and ten Baiaz that year with the Cubs twenty eighteen led the league in RBIs and had thirty four bombs
since that time. I mean the next year he was an All Star, but he was an All Star primarily because of what he did the year before. I mean, they had a good year in two thousand and nine team. Don't get me wrong, he did the gold Glove is a COVID year. Can't take it away from him. But still two years later he signs a big deal with the Tigers. You're well aware of it. It was a sixty year, one hundred and forty million dollars to contract and he has
been this team's single biggest disappointment. I hear people left and right bitching about aj Hinch, bitching about Spencer Torkelsen, complaining about Casey Mize. Where's your angst and anger for Hobby or Biaz Full disclosure. I like him. I do. He's a really good dude. He is not who you think he is on the field of play. Really good dad, really good father, really good husband because his wife is on a number of road trips and I see them working out in the gym all the time, first thing in the
morning. But production wise awful. It's not like it's a small sample size. First year in Detroity had five hundred and ninety played appearances, played one hundred and forty four games. Last year, played one hundred and thirty six games. He patted two thirty eight, then to twenty two. His first two years in Detroit, his OBP two thirty eight to twenty two, or I'm sorry, his OBP two seventy eight, two sixty seven. His slug I remember when they got him. Where he played with the Mets. In
the Cubs, he slugged five hundred. He slugged fi point fifteen with the Mets. He comes to Detroit, he slugs three ninety three and what could be the ballpark? Crap, it's not the ballpark. Last year he slugged three twenty five. The strikeouts, you knew you were getting that. Anybody who followed him, whether it be in Chicago or the brief stay with the Mets forty seven games, knew what you were getting. You were getting a high swing and miss guy, a guy who chases a lot. He is
exactly the opposite of what the current administration wants. Detroit was in such a dire situation to try and get a shortstop, even though they had a guy like Williadamas in their system. And had him for a brief moment, traded him to Tampa and the David Price deal. You got to give up something to get something fine. Who would have thought Williadamas would be that good with Tampa and then again with Milwaukee, because I remember Tampa traded him too.
But I digress. You were in such dire need of a shortstop, and that free agent class that included guys like Corey Seeger and Marcus Simeon, who's really a second basement and that's where he plays for Texas. Trevor's story, Carlos Correa, Javier Bias, those were the names Seeger and Simeon. I think Simeon was the first one to sign. Both signed in Texas. Correa signed surprisingly in Minnesota. That would have been the right fit, although he
gets hurt an awful lot. And then you had Bias in story. I remember ranking them quote unquote ranking them and suggesting that Bias the last guy I wanted because of the swing and miss. That's what I said, Beck. When there's a two thousand and twenty one off season ideal situation, I wanted Simeon first. I would have been wrong there. I wanted Correa second,
and he has when healthy, been really good. I wanted story third that has not worked out at all because all he has been done, all he's done is been heart then Seeger than bias, and Seeger's been the best.
Just not a huge fan of the person personality. The quote unquote leader really liked to Simeon's leadership and how he brought a room together, although after his first year in Texas, people were reporting about how disappointing it had been with him and seeing her in that room, and then they turned it around won world championship. This isn't to be revision is history. What I'm wondering is
what do you do with them? See he picked up the option, he had a player option after last year, and you know, people were crossing their fingers, crossing their toes and saying, please please opt out. That's the only wishful thinking. You knew that wasn't going to happen. Reality, Come on, no one else was going to pay him twenty five million dollars
whatever he's owed. Making twenty five million dollars this year, he'll make twenty five next, he'll make twenty four to the following and twenty four in the last year of the contract. How much are you willing to eat and don't give me this? Well, you could use that money elsewhere. You would have thought they could use the thirty two million that they were paying a Cabrera
elsewhere. Instead, this team is mired in the lower half of Major League Baseball's payroll at one hundred and six million dollars, so there's no guarantee that they'd be using that money elsewhere. Sorry for my skepticism, but I believe it to be true. This year I gave you his numbers right. Batting average two thirty eight is first year to twenty two last season one sixty four. This year, with no power, he has five five base hits,
a homer in four doubles. Thus the slug at two twenty one by far and away the worst of his career ops on base plus slugging by far the worst in his career at four twenty. It's horrid, man. You want to you're trying to figure out what the biggest problem this team has. It's at shortstop, and it's been at shortstop since. When you want to go back to Alan travel, don't give me this, Jose Iglesias crap. Carlos Gian Okay, fair enough, that's twenty sixteen, man, right, It's
unbelievable. It's unbelievable that you cannot draft and develop a play like that twenty eleven for Carlos Gian, not sixteen. That's how far back it goes. That's how that's how much of an issue it has been for this organization. Meyer Hotline eighty six, eight three eight forty eight forty three. You could text the program sports radio to twenty one thousand. I don't know if you remember spring training at all. Ryan Kraichtler had a really good spring. Now
he's been hurt quite a bit. I'm not saying he's the answer, but defensively he may not make the spectacular play like Baiez does, but he's a very steady guy. And I'm not suggesting you just eat twenty five mil this year, twenty five next, in twenty four, the following two. But how much worse could it really be if you had a guy at shortstop who was a better fielder or a more consistent fielder, for sure, And Kreidler is and there's no way he's hitting any worse than what Bias is hitting right
now. That can't be the mindset going in. You're looking for improvement, not status quo. Who are the guys in your system. Jase Young is not a shortstop. Cole Keith is not a shortstop. This goes back to the philosophy, and I've said this for a long time. This goes back to the philosophy of drafting players and making the best at their position. We are so damn and enamored with versatility in today's sports. It's not just baseball.
It's not just the Tigers either. Give me the guy who's really flipping good at his position that I can put out there day in and down. You don't think it's really helpful that the Houston Astros can put Jeremy Panya out there every single day. You don't think it's helpful that Texas writes Corey Seeger. I know that's a little extreme. Okay, I get it, because he's one of the best in baseball. All I'm asking you is, do you not think it's helpful? Eases the burden to a certain extent when you
get an everyday player at a specific position. I don't care if it's Trey Turner, Bobby Wood Junior. I don't care if it's O'Neil, Cruz, Anthony Volpi, Gunner Henderson in CJ. Abrams, You pick a guy, Okay, pick any of them, Bobishett. There are not that many great shortstops in baseball today. I would say four or five years ago there were, but right now it's there's a lot of guys who are not hitting for that high average. There's some home runs out there, and what do you
expect? Okay, I mean Gonnard Henderson. I think he's hitting like two sixty five, he's got twelve bombs and he's a young guy. Do you think Baltimore is pretty happy right now? They've got a twenty two year old at shortstop who's going to be there for a long period of time. One of the key positions in the entire sport is taken care of for them. This is not a situation of Milwaukee with Williadamas, who is a player he's twenty eight. He's been around for a long time and he's twenty eight,
or a Chicago cub situation like Dansby Swanson who's thirty. Not saying that it's too old, I'm just saying, from a youth standpoint, a chance to build a round a guy. That's what certain teams have, specifically Baltimore in this case, or Bobby Witt Junior. Love that guy. He's twenty three years old, fantastic player. If you consider Javier Bio's an everyday shortstop,
he is dead last. I used to love Francisco Lindor when he was in Cleveland, thought he was it. That's the guy you would want to have. Hits for power, good defensive player, hits for average. He's still just thirty years old. He's struggling big time with the Mets. I'm sure there are plenty of people in New York who are pissed off about his contract
because perhaps he hasn't been everything they expected. Hold on a second twenty homers, twenty six homers, thirty one homers a year ago while batting two fifty four and driving in one hundred runs or close to it, pretty damn good. I don't know if it warrants the contract. I'm just giving you the numbers. Bias isn't even close to anything like that, has not been close to anything remotely close to that. What do you do? It's not as
simple as saying get rid of him. I wish it were. He's going to have to become more of a part time player until he figures it out. But this has been two straight off seasons where Tigers have told us, well, we go down spend some time with him. I think we've got to figure it out. It's not working. Meyer Hotline eighty six six eight three eight forty eight forty three. The problem is you don't have anyone to take the place. It's not like Gie or Schell is going to play shortstop,
and who knows if he can stay healthy anyway. Matt Verlin can play third. He's not a shortstop. You don't have the guy when Silperez used to be. You're going to sacrifice an awful lot of defense if you try to shoehorn him in there. Exis and Bros. Monday through Friday, six till nine. Get your thoughts on that and more when we come back to begin the second hour of our program on a Wednesday morning. Throughout the great state of Michigan, we're team off our tenth year at the Meyer LPGA Classic
for simply give. Get ready for the best who are yet to help neighbors in need while enjoying golf, food and family fun. Join us June thirteenth through the sixteenth at blake Field Country Club for fabulous food, discovery land for kids, and of course elite women golfers from around the world competing to help feed our neighbors. Get your tickets now at Meyer LPGA Classics dot com.
Huge cheer for my good friends from Flying As Whiskey. Now it's an American made whiskey bottled right here in our great state of Michigan, and Flying a s Whiskey as partnered with the Folds of Honor Michigan Chapter to help Michigan children of men and women injured or killed in combat and also the children of our first responders who are injured or die and making the ultimate sacrifice while serving and protecting. And there's a simple, easy way for you to donate with that
money going to the Folds of Honor Michigan Chapter. Look for the Flying Ace Whiskey bottleneckers on bottles all across the state of Michigan here over the next couple of weeks and you can donate and that money will go directly to the Folds of Honor Michigan program on behalf of Flying a Whiskey and also Flying Ace Whiskey has put up four scholarships for the children. Flying Ace Whiskey, an American made whiskey taken a lot of pride in America. Look Fort and stores and
pubs all across Michigan. Friday, July twenty sixth, That's Soaring Eagle Casino and Resort, The Offspring, Rudy Fly for What, Same show, Same night, Simple Plan j plus special guest Hubas Dang, part of the Soaring Eagle Summer Outdoor Concert Series and tickets as low as twenty six dollars and on sale now in the Soaring Eagle Box office or online at etix dot com. Party Hard Rockharder The Offspring Simple Plan in Hubus Dang July twenty sixth, showtime
seven pm. Details at Soaringeaglecasino dot com. Attentioners fans, you can now get fifteen percent off every ticket for select games through May by going to Tigers dot com Forward Slash Huge Show. That's Tigers dot Com Forward Slash Huge Show