Well well well, it's funny what can happen from the beginning of the season to the end. Just take the Tigers as a prime example: preseason favorites to criminal underachievers to division champs to possible World Series champs? All season long, the Tigers showed glimmers of hope and glimpses of despair. Pitchers who were downright dominant (Verlander, blue eye Scherzer, second half Fister) and pitchers who were awfully hittable (Porcello, brown eye Scherzer, Valverde). Hitters who were downright terrifying to face (Miguel "Triple Crown" Cabrera, Prince, AJax) and hitters who were downright pathetic in the batters box (Delmon, Boesch, Jhonny). So when the playoffs started, I was left to wonder: which team would show up? The Blue Eyes or the Brown Eyes?
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| The dichotomy of the Tigers season is written in Max's eyes |
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With games one and two in Detroit for the Athletics series, I had a good feeling about the Tigers. They had a hop to their step that I hadn't seen most of the season. The pitchers were hitting their spots. The bottom of the lineup were getting timely hits. The defense was actually looking like a defense (nothing sweeter than Lil' Miggy gunning Coco Crisp at the plate). I had a good feeling, the Blue Eyes were playing well.
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| Beware these particular kitties |
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Back in the Bay Area, the Oakland Zoo houses five female tigers. Five formerly ferocious felines now left to prowl their enclosure and dream of running wild and tearing apart those in their path. Similarly, four miles away, the formerly ferocious Detroit Tigers of games one and two turned into a spayed and neutered version of itself as the A's bounced back to take games three and four. A dread enveloped me as I watched those games. Once again, the Brown Eyed Tigers came out to play and the Tigers were reeling heading into a game five. Luckily, we had the fiercest Tiger of them all, ready to pitch that game five: Justin Verlander. JV saved the Tigers season, but I ain't lying when I say that heading into New York for games one and two of the ALCS, I had already accepted the fact that these Tigers were not anyhting to be feared, that they had turned into the team embodiment of brown eye Max Scherzer.
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| In Oakland, the Tigers had rolled over before JV fought back |
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So how do I feel now, that the Tigers are going back to Detroit with a 2-0 lead over the Yankees and Justin Verlander scheduled to pitch tonight in game three? Terrified, nervous, uncertain. Yes, these Tigers are pitching out of this world right now. Yes, they are getting timely hits and even timelier defensive help. Yes, deep in my heart and soul, I am confident of a Tigers championship being celebrated this season. But with all of that being said, this Tigers team is a dichotomy, a team with a good side and a bad side, a blue eye and a brown eye, and at any moment, that coin could flip and the Tigers could revert to their lesser selves. So I keep telling myself: I will not get overly confident going forward and I will be ready for when that blue eye closes and the other eye decides to look my way.
