AL Central Report: What’s Wrong With Detroit?
If there was anything we could count on when the baseball season opened it’s that the Detroit Tigers were a mortal lock to win the AL Central. There might have been debate over whether they could win a pennant and a World Series—no one said they were better than the Rangers, Angels, Yankees or Phillies. But all of those teams had real-life competition in their divisions. Detroit did not. So the story went. But now we sit here with the games of June 7 about to start in the next few minutes and the Tigers are staring at a 26-31 record and are 5.5 games off the lead. It’s not that the deficit is insurmountable—heck, they could be in first by the All-Star break. But it’s that Detroit has dug themselves this hole without anyone else having to be great. What’s gone wrong?