Time For Hamilton To Lead Pistons, Like It Or Not

Rip Hamilton appears to be done grieving, and that’s a step in the right direction, anyway.

Hamilton chatted up the team during Media Day on Monday, and he spoke with a twinkle in his eyes and often times barely able to suppress a grin.

“We have to teach the newer guys, the younger guys, how to win,” Hamilton said as the press people cornered him in his creamy white Pistons home uniform.

I know who “we” is, in Rip’s mind, but he’d be best off placing himself at the top of the list of “we.”

The Pistons are Hamilton’s team, for better or for worse. And he’d better start acting like it.

Monday was a good start, albeit in a venue and situation where everyone tends to say all the right things.

But it’s still progress for Rip, because last season he didn’t come close to saying any of the right things. At all.

Hamilton went into mourning and soaked himself in grief after the Pistons traded longtime teammate and friend Chauncey Billups to Denver for one Allen Iverson. Then Rip got hurt. Then he didn’t want to be the sixth man. Then he openly and brazenly challenged rookie head coach Mike Curry.

Rip Hamilton fussed and kicked and screamed and it was hardly what a new coach like Curry needed—heaped on top of the Iverson debacle and the degradation in skills and attitude of Rasheed Wallace.

But Hamilton didn’t care, clearly. It was all about him and how things affected…him.

I’m willing to give Rip a pass and call last season a fluke—something we’d all like to forget in Pistons Land—if he’s willing to step up and be a leader.

The Pistons could use one, you know.

In the Billups days, the Pistons liked to portray themselves as a team bereft of superstars but who get the job done because of their work ethic and commitment to team. The sum was always greater than their parts.

They won a championship doing that, and came close to another one.

Not having a superstar was fine, because Billups was more of a leader than we knew, until it was too late.

The Pistons still don’t have a megastar, but now they don’t even have anyone in the captain’s chair.

Hamilton better get used to that seat and the controls before him in the cockpit.

This is Rip’s team, make no mistake. Whether he chooses to act like it, we’ll see.

I don’t want to hear this talk about “we’re all in this together” and “we don’t need a leader because we can all lead.” And I especially don’t want to hear it from Hamilton, who should know better. That’s a bunch of doo-doo.

So newcomer Ben Gordon plays the same position? Tough. Deal with it.

The Pistons need a solitary leader, and there’s nothing wrong with acknowledging that.

Who better than Hamilton, despite his gagging on the opportunity last season?

Hamilton (left) and newcomer Ben Gordon pose at Media Day

You’re not going to get it from Tayshaun Prince, the Marcel Marceau of the Pistons. Gordon and Charlie Villanueva, the new free agents, are, well, new. Rodney Stuckey is still too wet behind the ears. Ben Wallace, back from sabbatical, has never wanted any part of leadership.

Who else?

Kwame Brown? Chris Wilcox?

It’s Rip, by default.

But on Monday, at least, Hamilton seemed ready to take a step toward becoming the captain.

“Offensively, we can hold our own with anybody,” Hamilton said, again trying to suppress the grin of a cat about to swallow a canary. “But we have to make a statement on defense, by stopping people. We have to get back to that.”

So true, so obvious.

It’s a start—because Hamilton didn’t do or say the obvious things last year.

Maybe Rip finally has the Billups trade out of his system. For him, it’s the “Billups trade.” For the rest of us, it will be known as the “Iverson trade,” because AI’s last name is now synonymous in this town with “debacle.”

Rip seems to be done pouting and grieving.

“I was told by one of my first coaches in the league that the more positions you know how to play, the better chance you have of staying on the floor,” Hamilton said on Monday, smiling. “I look at it as a challenge, if I have to play the (small forward) position,” he added, referring to the logjam at shooting guard, thanks to the addition of the flash scoring Gordon.

Those are some nice words, almost cleansing, after last season.

It’s a start.

Last Night on “The Knee Jerks”: Pistons Talk Put On Hold, But Some Good Rants

Our NBA talk got put on hold for a couple weeks last night on “The Knee Jerks”, my weekly sports gabfest with Big Al from The Wayne Fontes Experience.

Our guest, A. Sherrod Blakely—Pistons beat writer for MLive.com—got caught up in some work-related stuff and couldn’t be with us, after all. But he WILL be joining us on October 12, so we’re pleased about that!

So given all that extra time to kill, Al and I started flapping our gums, as is our wont! And, as usual, a couple of good rants resulted.

We kicked things off by talking Tigers and their chances to wrap this division up (finally) this week.

Al, as usual, is a Nervous Nellie and I had to “talk him down,” as he put it. Because, after all, I AM the “Voice of Reason”!!

I reminded Al that the Tigers just need to win two of four against the Twins and that they certainly can do that.

Next, we moved on to U-M and their win over Indiana. The health of QB Tate Forcier is an issue, and again I “reasoned” Al down from the ledge, assuring him that the Wolverines CAN win without Forcier.

A good rant developed in this segment as we veered off into the college basketball programs in this area, especially the sad state of affairs at University of Detroit-Mercy.

We wrapped things up with the Lions and their historic win on Sunday over Washington. Another good rant formed here when the subject turned to Joey Harrington and how he never really fit in with this town’s fans.

Don’t forget to follow us on Twitter, for updates on scheduled guests, time changes, etc.

Next week’s guest: Marvin Hagler, Jr., who is launching a boxing career on October 10. Marvin will then fight Sugar Ray Leonard Jr. (I’m not making this up) in February.

Upcoming guests:

Oct. 5 Marvin Hagler Jr.
Oct. 12 A. Sherrod Blakely
Oct. 19 Bob Page
Oct. 26 TBA
Nov. 2 Jose Canseco (yes, THE Jose Canseco!!)

Some highlights from last night:

Big Al

On U-M football: “(QB) Denard Robinson…if he’s in there, the other team knows it’s going to be a running play. But the defense can’t stop a high school team right now.”

On the Tigers: “I’m concerned about the Twins! Are they in the Tigers’ heads? Carl Pavano’s been unhittable against the Tigers this year.”

On the UDM basketball program: “Perry Watson was a good coach and had a lot of ties to the PSL, but as far as selling the program and getting people excited about it, there wasn’t much there.”

On the Lions: “You have to say the 2009 draft was a home run. Look at all the guys who are starting. And they’re getting some contributions from the players in the lower rounds, too. But they’re still not a very good team yet.”

Eno

On the Tigers: “I think they can get the two wins they need against the Twins. As far as Pavano, no one can explain it. Pavano probably couldn’t, and the Tigers probably couldn’t. It’s just one of those things. That’s why baseball is such a great game.”

On U-M football: “If Michigan can’t win without Tate Forcier, then they have issues. The kid’s been good, but let’s not get carried away. I’m more concerned about their defense than the QB situation. Michigan is supposed to be deep at QB. So let’s see it.”

On UDM basketball: “One of the biggest recruiting obstacles is Calihan Hall. It’s old, decrepit, and is just a glorified high school gym. Plus the campus is old and not very attractive. And it’s in a bad part of town. You don’t even want to park your car there. They won’t even play Oakland University, because OU’s program is way better.”

On Matthew Stafford: “There’s something about this kid that tells me that everything’s going to be OK. He has that presence about him. We wanted to believe that about Joey Harrington, but he was from Oregon and he was a pretty boy who played the piano. It wasn’t a good fit.”

You can listen to the episode by clicking HERE.

Streaking Lions Win First Straight Game

Every dog really does have his day.

Every blind squirrel really does find a nut.

The longshot came in. The House lost.

It was “any given Sunday,” finally. The dice came up snake eyes.

Someone had to be the victims of the Lions’ losing streak ending, and it happened to be the team with some of the most ravenous, venomous fans in the NFL.

The Washington Redskins are today’s NFL patsies. They will now officially spend the longest week of their football lives.

The Redskins have lost to the Detroit Lions. No team in the league has been able to lay claim to such a distinction since December 23, 2007.

Oh, what a week they’ll have in Washington, with all their radio shows and TV shows and chat rooms.

These aren’t the Houston Texans the Lions beat. Not the Jacksonville Jaguars. Not some team that plays in a city where you can hear a pin drop.

These are the Redskins, and their followers were scared to death of this matchup with the Lions.

Worst fears, realized.

Like my friend Big Al wrote over at The Wayne Fontes Experience, let another team’s fan base pull its hair out this week. Let another city’s radio airwaves be filled with hate and frustration.

The Lions walked off the field winners Sunday, a homely 19-14 win over Washington, but it was the Lions’ homely win and they’ll take it.

Linebacker Larry Foote, the Detroit native and U-M grad, was caught by the candid cameras in the locker room after the game, pouring champagne over head coach Jim Schwartz’s head. Not sure where Larry got the bubbly from, but someone obviously was holding it for just such an occasion.

The Lions won a football game. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers will have to hold their 26-game losing streak longer in purgatory. But here come the St. Louis Rams, who are halfway there with 13 straight losses.

Let the Rams’ fans wring their hands now.

It’s off now, that King Kong the Lions were lugging on their backs for 19 games. But ole King wasn’t easy to pry off.

You just knew it couldn’t end with QB Matthew Stafford taking a knee as the time ticked away. You knew the Lions wouldn’t be able to be streak busters that easily.

No, it had to come down to a heart-stopping final drive by the Redskins, who managed to get to the Lions’ 35 in the waning seconds.

But this wasn’t Brett Favre, it was Jason Campbell. And this wasn’t 31 of the 32 coaches in the NFL, it was Jim Zorn.

Zorn ought to know better. He was a gunslinging QB when he played for the Seattle Seahawks, bombing away to Steve Largent et al.

But he stared down the barrel of a franchise-shaking loss and shook like a leaf.

Instead of chucking the ball into the end zone—for who knows what can happen when you do that, especially when the other team wears Honolulu Blue and Silver—Zorn had Campbell try one of those goofy hook-and-lateral plays after a measly 12-yard toss. The ‘Skins didn’t even sniff the 20 yard line, much less the end zone.

Ever since Cal beat Stanford in 1982, football teams have been trying to recapture that miracle. Hardly any have been successful.

Zorn would have been better off with a Hail Mary, but that’s the other guys’ deal to worry about today.

Zorn also made a questionable move to accept a penalty against the Lions, turning a 4th-and-four and a long FGA into a 3rd-and-14, which the Lions converted, enabling them to score a TD later in the drive.

They say you should never take points off the scoreboard, if you’re on offense. And you should probably not take fourth downs off the board, either, if you’re on defense. But Zorn did—more fuel for the fire that will engulf Washington and Redskin Nation this week.

They’ll be talking about this one for years in D.C. The Lions—a team the Redskins have dominated (never having lost to them at home in over 75 years)—mustered their first win in 20 games against Dan Snyder’s bunch.

The fun thing is, you don’t have to be relegated to wishing you were the proverbial fly on the wall in order to see what they’re saying in Washington. Thanks to Internet chat rooms, you can get a very nice picture indeed.

The Redskins fans want Zorn fired. Immediately. Some wanted him canned somewhere between Ford Field and Metro Airport. No joke.

The Lions are on the outside looking in again, but this time the view is just fine. This time the Lions can peer through the glass and watch debauchery and barroom brawls take place. The subject is still them, but in an entirely different way.

The Lions can watch as Redskins fans hurl empty beer mugs at Snyder and Zorn and Campbell and the like. They can press their noses against the glass and see a football team’s entire fan base bust up the joint, beside themselves.

All over the little Lions.

The 1-2 Lions—same record as the Redskins.

Stafford was pretty good—21-for-36, 241 yards, a TD and NO interceptions. He played smart. He “left some plays on the field”—his words—but he made a veteran move by slinging the ball downfield when he saw Bryant Johnson in single coverage at the goal line in the fourth quarter, drawing a pass interference penalty.

There’s the smattering of a connection developing now between the kid QB and the star receiver, Calvin Johnson. Stafford was also allowed to pass the ball on first down, when offensive coordinator Scott Linehan sensed a momentum shift.

The Lions will still likely only win two or three games this season. The Redskins are hardly a barometer against which to judge your team’s development. But a win is a win as they say, and though it was no Mona Lisa, it’s the Lions’ and they’ll take it.

The million-to-one shot came in. The tortoise won a race. William Hung came away with “Best Singer.” The Italian Army won a war.

The Lions are 1-0 in their last one game.

But keep the champagne chilled. No more bubbly in September. Never again, right?

Monday Morning Manager

My weekly take on the Tigers, also known simply and affectionately as “MMM.”

Week of 9/21-27: 4-2

This week: 9/28-10/1: MIN; 10/2-4: CWS

Goat of the Week

Curtis Granderson.

MMM has been riding Grandy all year long, and with good reason. This is easily his worst season, statistically, of his four full big league campaigns. Ironically, it was also the first season in which he became an All-Star.

It was hoped that MMM’s venomous words would light a fire under him, as it has with so many other players who’ve been filleted in this space.

But Granderson, heading into the season’s final week, is still muddling along around .250 with a distinct inability to hit left-handers—whether they’re of Cy Young quality or just up from AAA.

There are flashes—like what he did to the White Sox on Saturday—but nothing that’s sustained for any length of time. In that way, Grandy is like a microcosm of the Tigers’ offense as a whole.

Speaking of time, it’s running out. The Tigers need a big week from Granderson, if they want to clinch the division without it going down to the last day.

Dishonorable mention: The offense in general—again—which wasted Eddie Bonine’s no-hit bid on Friday night in Chicago.

Hero of the Week

OK, so Miguel Cabrera listened to MMM and its alter ego, Greg Eno, who waxed Miggy in a column last week about not carrying the team, like great players do.

Cabrera lit up the Indians and, to an extent, the White Sox last week, edging over 100 RBI for the sixth straight season—or, for his entire career, so far.

Cabrera took the scolding personally, apparently. That’s OK; we’re glad to help!

Honorable mention: Righthander Rick Porcello, who’s quieting any talk about hitting a rookie wall and/or wearing down, with a strong September.

Quick scouting reports: Twins and White Sox

This week marks the biggest regular season series in the ten-year history of Comerica Park.

The Twins are in town, for four huge games—games that will either keep the Twins in the AL Central race, or catapult the Tigers to their first divisional title in 22 years.

That’s all.

It’ll be fun at the “new corner”—Montcalm and Woodward—as every inning, every at-bat, every pitch will weigh significantly. This is what it’s all about.

The Twins, sans Justin Morneau, are on an 11-2 run, pulling from six games back to two.

Others are contributing, big time. Mike Cuddyer is the biggest bat right now. He has six homers and 18 RBI in his last 13 games, filling in for Morneau at 1B. Denard Span has been swinging a hot bat, too.

And there’s always Joe Mauer to worry about, too.

Beware Carl Pavano, too—who’s been able to vex the Tigers as both an Indian and as a Twin. He pitches on Wednesday.

The White Sox, who’ve had a miserable September, nonetheless took two of three from the Tigers in Chicago over the weekend, but the Chisox always play the Tigers tough—home or away.

The Tigers would be best served to have the division mostly sewn up by the time the White Sox arrive in Detroit. You know manager Ozzie Guillen will pull out all the stops to try to deny the Tigers an on-field celebration in front of his team.

Under the microscope

Granderson, as mentioned above, must come up big this week—especially in spacious CoPa, site of so many of his past doubles and triples. If he does, and Placido Polanco keeps up his strong September, then the Tigers’ offense will take on a whole new dynamic down the stretch.

If Curtis “does his thing,” it will go a long way toward clinching the division.

There’s just something about the Tigers’ offense, a certain je ne sais quoi, when the Nos. 1 and 2 guys are getting on base and wreaking havoc. That has been missing for alarmingly long stretches of time this season. If it returns this week, get ready to celebrate.

Bottom line: MMM wanted to see the Tigers enter these four games with Minnesota with no less than a two-game lead, and that’s exactly what they have.

Why is that so important?

The Twins now almost have to win three of the four games in Detroit to have a fighting chance. A split is great for the Tigers; it would keep their lead at two with three games to play. The magic number would be down to two.

If the Tigers, who’ve played so very well at home all year, can just hold serve and nullify the Twins with a 2-2 record in “the series,” then they’re almost assured of winning the division.

Of course, it would be even better to get greedy and win three, but let’s not get ahead of ourselves.

Tigers’ magic number to clinch the division: 6

That’s all for this week’s MMM. Join me every Monday!

P.S. Also join me and Big Al from The Wayne Fontes Experience every Monday night as we co-host “The Knee Jerks” on Blog Talk Radio. The Tigers are a weekly topic. We go live at 11 p.m. ET, and every episode can be downloaded for your listening convenience!

Red Wings’ Run of Excellence Taken for Granted in Detroit

I was in New York, one of my favorite towns, and I started walking. It was a June day, some 18 years ago, and if you haven’t been to New York in June, then your life officially has a missing ingredient.

I set out around Times Square and headed north, up Sixth Avenue, from around 42nd Street. Maybe a half hour or so had passed when I decided to stop and look behind me, to see how much concrete I had covered.

The blocks and blocks of midtown Manhattan that I had engulfed boggled my mind.

Wow, I thought—did I really do all that?

It’s time now that certain people stop in their tracks and take a look back—at the Detroit Red Wings and what they’ve accomplished since 1991.

There are still old-timers among us—I’m not quite in that fraternity—who remember the 1950s, and how the Red Wings, along with the hated Montreal Canadiens, dominated the six-team NHL.

Back and forth the Red Wings and Canadiens went, seemingly handing the Stanley Cup off to each other every spring. It was like the Lions and Cleveland Browns in the same decade, only more so.

The Red Wings—they of Howe and Lindsay and Wilson and Kelly and Sawchuk, meeting the Canadiens of Richard and Moore and Geoffrion and Beliveau and Worsley—every late April for a showdown for the Cup.

The old-timers will tell you that this was the heyday of Detroit hockey. The Red Wings did win four Stanley Cups in six seasons, from 1949-50 thru 1954-55. And when they weren’t winning them, they were coming damn close.

But those Red Wings teams, as mighty as they were, filled with as many legends of the game as they were, did not do what today’s late-20th, early-21st century Red Wings are doing—with no signs of letting up.

In a town besmirched by its football team, abandoned for 13 seasons by its baseball team until 2006, and teased relentlessly by its NBA entry almost yearly, the Red Wings’ annual contention for hockey’s Holy Grail is accepted almost casually, with a feeling of entitlement oozing from its faithful.

I have never been a fan of the designation of “Hockeytown,” which the team encouraged its fans to use in describing Detroit, sometime around the mid-1990s. Those of you unfortunate enough to consider yourselves regular readers will attest that I’ve derided that self-aggrandizing moniker with stubborn consistency.

“Hockeytown.” HA!

The Canadiens have won over twice as many Stanley Cups as the Red Wings have managed—with both franchises’ timelines running almost concurrently.

So what does that make Montreal? “Chopped Livertown”?

The Red Wings play in Detroit, er, Hockeytown, and it’s a yearly ritual to set out in June and take in a hockey game at Joe Louis Arena. A game with Stanley Cup implications, of course.

The hockey denizens in town are aghast when their team doesn’t win the chalice.

I was on the ice at JLA, in the aftermath of last June’s Game 7 triumph by the Pittsburgh Penguins, and Hockeytown was being vandalized by a group of happy Penguins and their families and staff.

Champagne was being sprayed into the expensive seats by Penguins players—who were soaking their own fans who made the trek from Pittsburgh, and who were hanging over the glass, trying to get blasted.

Player wives and children hugged husbands and daddies. Business-suited men and professionally-dressed women—presumably part of the behind-the-scenes functionaries—gleefully meandered on the same ice surface that, less than an hour prior, was being urgently skated on by dead tired Red Wings players trying to muster one more goal.

There were tears. There were hugs. There was hooting and hollering.

By the Pittsburgh Penguins!!

They had the temerity to win the Stanley Cup in Hockeytown. The horror!

The Red Wings of today have won four Cups in the past 11 seasons. In these modern days, that would qualify as a dynasty of sorts.

But there’s this.

Since the 1991-92 campaign—that’s 17 seasons in a row—the Red Wings have begun the post-season as legitimate Cup contenders. Not maybe contenders. Not “if everything goes perfectly” contenders.

Real, honest-to-goodness, they’re-likely-to-win-the-whole-darn-thing contenders.

For 17 straight springs.

The old-timers can’t boast of that kind of run from their 1950s Red Wings.

Nor can any team, in any sport.

Has there been the same legitimate World Series contender since 1991?

Not even the vaunted New York Yankees can say they were World Series ready in the early-1990s. And certainly no other team can lay claim to constant championship contention for 17 straight years.

The NBA has had its flavor-of-the-day dynasties—the Bulls of the 1990s, the Lakers of the early 2000s. And blips on the screen in between. But no NBA club has been consistently in the hunt since 1991-92.

The NFL, the League of Parity, purposely has constructed itself to prevent dynasties. And none of its teams can come close to describing itself as a Super Bowl contender—legitimately—on an annual basis since 1991.

But the Detroit Red Wings have gone into the playoffs every April, starting in 1992, with genuine hopes of raising the Stanley Cup two months later.

Every single year since 1992.

There have been first round knockouts, for sure. Conference finals meltdowns, yeah. Bizarre second round losses, absolutely.

And a couple of disappointments in the Cup Finals themselves.

But there have been those four Cups and deep playoff runs in most years.

Yet you won’t hear or read much about that in Detroit.

Instead, it’s always about why the Red Wings can’t, or won’t contend. Why the goal-tending will surely fail. Or some such worry.

A few years back, after the lockout, the league operating under a genuine salary cap for the first time, the haters were out in full force.

Let’s see how fast the Red Wings fall when their bottomless money pit is no longer to their avail, the haters said—many hailing from Hockeytown, USA.

This fall, the trendy thing to do is to pick the young, hungry Chicago Blackhawks to become the new rulers of the West. The worry du jour is all the free agents the Red Wings lost this summer.

It says here that the hockey fans in Detroit don’t know how good they’ve had it, in the time it takes a child to be born, grow up, and graduate high school.

They’ve been walking with the Red Wings for 17 blocks now, and it never occurs to them to stop and look back at all that’s been accomplished.

It’s a fan base that’s been spoiled rotten, and I wonder anymore how many of them know that we had another name for the NHL franchise in Detroit long before Hockeytown became all the rage.

The Dead Things.

Folks around here ought to remember from where their team came, and immerse themselves in the historical significance of what the Red Wings are doing at this very moment.

Because it ain’t been done, anywhere, since the great Yankees teams of the 1940s, ‘50s, and early-‘60s.

Yet they never called New York, the greatest of all our cities, “Baseballtown.”

They didn’t have to.

’84 Tigers Turned Pennant Race Mine Field Into A Walk In The Park

A lot of them will be there, standing on the Comerica Park field, not the place of their glory but still right smack dab in the city of their faithful.

Darrell Evans says he’ll be there. Alan Trammell, too—excused from his duties as Chicago Cubs bench coach. Kirk Gibson, as well—appearing with the consent of his employers, the Arizona Diamondbacks. The old white-haired manager himself, Sparky Anderson, has submitted his RSVP.

They’ll all be there, and more, when the Tigers honor the 1984 World Series champs on Monday, prior to an all-important tilt with the Minnesota Twins. It’s the Silver Anniversary of their mugging of the baseball world. If you’re approaching middle age, like me, then you’re ready to protest—wanting your 25 years back.

It’s interesting that today’s Tigers will go out after the pomp and circumstance on Monday and take on the Twins in a game with pennant implications, for a couple of reasons.

One, the Tigers’ magical 1984 season began with the Twins—the Tigers sweeping them in Minnesota, long before the Metrodome began vexing them.

Second, the ’84 Tigers didn’t really have to play any heart-stopping, nailbiting games in September—at any time of the month, let alone in the season’s final week.

If it wasn’t for the Toronto Blue Jays’ gallant effort, the Tigers would have had the AL East sewn up by Memorial Day. And that barely qualifies as an exaggeration.

You know the story of the ’84 ride. A 9-0 start, which became 16-1, which turned into 26-4, which had even the oldtimer baseball people scurrying to the record books.

But the Tigers weren’t done sprinting from the gate.

After another ten games, the Tigers’ record was 35-5—a won/loss mark that is as famous in these parts as other storied baseball numbers like 61 and 715 and 56 and 511.

Thirty-five and five. It rolls off the tongue now, even to those too young to recall when the Tigers made a mockery of their competition.

But the Blue Jays were playing at well above a .600 clip, and in doing so were able to at least keep the Tigers on their radar.

Still, the Tigers’ divisional lead was generally swaying back and forth between eight and twelve games most of the summer. Occasionally the Jays would get within seven, and there was cause for panic.

The 2009 Tigers mustered a seven game lead a few weeks ago and certain keyboard mashers like yours truly declared the race over with.

It’s all relative, huh?

I’m glad the Tigers are honoring the 1984 heroes, who authored a season that we may never see again. A wire-to-wire lead, that unworldly 35-5 start. A no-hitter by Jack Morris. An 11-pitch at-bat by Dave Bergman on Monday Night Baseball, before a walk-off home run—against the Blue Jays.

And on and on.

I remember the Tigers, too soon, acknowledging the 1968 champs after just 10 years, in ’78. Mickey Stanley was still an active player, to show you. It was nice and all, but ten years is gone in a flash.

Twenty-five years motor by, too, but it is a Silver Anniversary, so it’s time.

The 1984 Tigers thrilled, they amazed, they made folks proud to be Detroiters.

The 2009 Tigers have caused most people to run for the Pepto-Bismol.

Both will be, when the dust settles, divisional champs. After that, who knows?

So take some time out on Monday—whether at the ballpark or watching from home—to give a nod to some ballplayers who made an entire baseball season a breeze.

Bless You, Boys!

Whether Forced Or Not, Jimmy D Got Rooked In Federko Trade

Jimmy Devellano, recently announced as a winner of the Lester Patrick Trophy for dedication toward hockey, was the first man hired by Mike Ilitch when the latter purchased the sad sack Detroit Red Wings in 1982. One of the reasons was Jimmy D’s uncanny ability to sniff out NHL talent from the woodwork of small North American towns, and from other NHL teams.

It wasn’t a smooth ride at the beginning. Three years after his hire, Devellano presided over a brutal 17-57-6 season, his attempts at a quick fix via free agency—college and pro—having failed miserably.

But three years after that, the Red Wings were on the right path, seemingly.

Two consecutive visits to the Conference Finals, plus another Norris Division title in 1988-89, gave cause to believe that Devellano was finally the genius executive the Red Wings had been looking for, for decades.

Until he made The Trade.

There are urban legends—whispered myths—that Devellano engineered one of the most lopsided trades in team history because of something not hockey related, spurious in nature. I can neither confirm nor deny that.

But what can be confirmed is that, 20 years ago this summer, Devellano got absolutely fleeced by the intra-division St. Louis Blues.

A reminder of Jimmy D’s temporary loss of sanity and genius stands behind the Red Wings bench today, and has for four seasons now.

Current assistant coach Paul MacLean, one of Mike Babcock’s lieutenants, was shipped away in 1989 to St. Louis, along with burgeoning center Adam Oates, for aging center Bernie Federko and plugging forward Tony McKegney.

Ugh.

Coach Jacques Demers had Federko in St. Louis while Jacques coached the Blues and he loved him. Loved him so much, apparently, that he was able to convince Devellano to do whatever it took to bring him to Detroit to provide more veteran leadership.

The Blues said, “OK, you want Federko that bad? Then we want MacLean—and Oates.”

And Jimmy Devellano, usually so wise when it comes to personnel, agreed to such a travesty of a trade.

Federko (left) and Oates, who would eventually be traded for each other

MacLean, acquired from Winnipeg just one year prior, did what he was supposed to do, scoring 36 goals for the Red Wings in ’88-’89. And Oates was on the verge of greatness. He was 27 and had just recorded a whopping 62 assists.

But off they both went, to St. Louis, for 33-year-old Federko and McKegney, who was 31. McKegney scored 40 goals in 1987-88, but slipped to 25 one year later.

At the time, the trade was looked at with suspicion, but Jimmy D was on a mini-run and everyone liked Demers, so maybe he could work more magic with Federko and the question mark McKegney.

Not even close.

Federko played one clumsy season in Detroit before retiring, scoring 17 goals, and McKegney was gone after just 14 games as a Red Wing, shipped to Quebec for defenseman Robert Picard.

MacLean and Oates did wonders for the divisional rival Blues—MacLean scoring 33 goals, and Oates registering 79 assists as he combined with Brett Hull lethally.

The Red Wings failed to make the playoffs in 1989-90, the last year they did so.

OK, about the urban legend regarding this trade.

The young bachelor Oates was rumored to have done something untoward that didn’t please Mike Ilitch in the least. Ilitch, the legend goes, demanded that Devellano trade Oates. So Jimmy D was acting with a distinct lack of leverage, and it showed—if this is true.

Don’t know for sure, but that’s your urban legend.

Regardless, let it be known that 20 summers ago, the Red Wings made maybe their worst trade under the Ilitch ownership, long before the folks around town took to calling their city “Hockeytown, USA.”

Adam Oates and Paul MacLean for Bernie Federko and Tony McKegney, straight up.

Not too many have rooked the Red Wings since that travesty.

Last Night on “The Knee Jerks”: Can the Shaky Tigers Hold On?

The Tigers’ wobbly state as a first place team took center stage last night on “The Knee Jerks”, my weekly sports gabfest with Big Al from The Wayne Fontes Experience.

Our guest was Johnny Lawrence, one of the featured Detroit Tigers columnists for The Bleacher Report.

Johnny gave us his take on the Tigers’ chances to finally put the division to bed, and their outlook for the playoffs. While Johnny doesn’t see the Tigers advancing past ALDS, we all acknowledged that “anything can happen.”

The chat room was chock full of folks, which we appreciate. Of course, many were fans of Johnny’s, so we’ll see what happens next week!

After Johnny’s segment, Al and I got busy in a football kind of way.

We started by eulogizing ex-Lions coach Monte Clark, who passed away last week. It was mutually agreed that Monte got shafted by the Lions, being fired just one season removed from a divisional title.

Then we lamented the deaths of so many in the Lions family, past and present, in 2009. I called it “weird and sad.”

Speaking of weird and sad, Al said, let’s talk about the Lions on Sunday against the Vikings!

So we did.

To top things off, Al ranted about NFL officiating, particularly the mysterious chop block call on Gosder Cherilus.

Don’t forget to follow us on Twitter, for updates on scheduled guests, time changes, etc.

Some highlights from last night:

Big Al

On the second half meltdown: “It’s talent. The Lions just don’t have enough of it. You can talk schemes and strategy all you want, but it boils down to talent.”

On Jeff Backus: “His ‘miscommunication’ damn near got Matthew Stafford killed!”

On Brett Favre: “He’s nothing more than a ‘game manager’ now. And isn’t that another way of saying that you can’t win games anymore? Brett Favre didn’t beat the Lions on Sunday.”

On NFL officiating: “Make these guys full time, number one. All the other leagues do it. And you should be able to challenge more calls than you can now. As a fan it’s incredibly frustrating.”

Eno

On the second half meltdown: “I’m concerned that this new staff is being schooled by the other team’s coaches at halftime. The Lions played reasonably well for 30 minutes then just fell apart.”

On Calvin Johnson: “I love it when the Lions run Johnson on a reverse. No one can tackle him; he’s going up against these little DBs with a head of steam. I wish they ran that play more.”

On Brett Favre: “He may be a ‘game manager,’ but he’s still an upgrade from what they had, and that’s the bottom line.”

On NFL officiating: “I’m not sure making the officials full-time is the answer. They’re still going to make bad calls. But maybe they should broaden the scope of plays that you can challenge. Video replay showed that the Gosder play was no chop block.”

You can listen to the episode by clicking HERE.

Monday Morning Manager

My weekly take on the Tigers, also known simply and affectionately as “MMM.”

Week of 9/14-20: 3-4

This week: 9/22-24: at Cle; 9/25-27: at CWS

Goat of the Week

The Metrodome, pure and simple.

Oh, and Jim Leyland.

The Dome jumped up and got the Tigers again on Saturday, as left fielder Don Kelly lost a harmless (HA!) fly ball in the lethal combination of white lights/white dome roof/white baseball, opening the floodgates for the Twins in the 8th inning of a game the Tigers were leading, 2-1.

So the Dome gets blamed, but so does Leyland.

Why on Earth did he have the rookie Kelly in left field, in that situation and in that stadium?

It’s been whispered before about Leyland—that he sometimes places players in positions to fail. Yes, more veteran outfielders than Kelly have lost balls in the Metrodome’s roof, but don’t you feel better with a guy who’s played there many times before?

Dishonorable mention: The offense in general, which labored to score runs all week—contributing mightily to the Tigers’ losing two of three to the Royals at home.

Hero of the Week

OK, who had Nate Robertson in the “Tigers pitcher most likely to be the ‘x’ factor down the stretch” pool?

Good ole Nate saved the Tigers’ rear ends on Sunday, twirling five terrific innings, allowing just two runs and striking out six. A loss would have drawn the Twins to within one game. Instead, the Tigers left town with a small but not tiny three game cushion.

Robertson, since returning from his injury and rehab assignments, has been mostly brilliant as a spot starter, rescuing the Tigers with quality starts and providing for them, essentially, what they thought they’d get from fellow lefty Jarrod Washburn, their prized trade deadline acquisition.

The Tigers needed Robertson to stifle the Twins as much as possible, while hoping to scratch out enough offense to snatch a victory. And Nate did that, followed by some stellar bullpen work from Zach Miner, Bobby Seay, and Fernando Rodney.

Honorable mention: Justin Verlander, who deserved a much better fate on Saturday.

Quick scouting reports: Indians and White Sox

A few weeks ago, when the Indians came to town, MMM warned folks about them.

The Tribe was on a 35-game run in which they actually had won more games than the Tigers during the same stretch.

Beware, MMM said.

The Tigers swept them out of Detroit.

But no team is without some danger in the final two weeks, when it’s an accomplishment to win any game, regardless of opponent.

The Indians, since that sign of life, have sunk back into the morass of bad baseball.

But the Tigers often play, on the road, as if they’re in that same morass.

As for the White Sox, the Tigers are likely to get a look at starting pitcher Jake Peavy, who was acquired in July but who wasn’t able to pitch for weeks due to injury.

Peavy made his White Sox debut on Saturday and reported nothing more than general soreness after the 73-pitch effort. Peavy was returning from a three-month absence due to an ankle injury.

The White Sox probably didn’t think they’d be on the brink of elimination by the time Peavy got around to pitching for them, however.

But that’s where the Chisox are—on life support. They’re seven games behind the Tigers in the loss column, and the magic number to eliminate them is down to seven.

The White Sox do have six games left with the Tigers, and they pretty much have to win them all to have any shot at a miracle finish that would make the 1964 Phillies collapse look like child’s play.

Under the microscope

MMM says keep a close eye on Edwin Jackson.

The Tigers’ hard-throwing starter is showing signs of breaking down, and at the worst possible time.

Maybe the Tigers expected too much from Jackson after his wonderful first 2/3 of the season. Regardless, he’s just not the same pitcher. Yet an Edwin Jackson at 75% is still better than a lot of big league starters.

The Tigers need Jackson, big time—especially in the playoffs, where power pitching and pounding the strike zone is at a premium.

Watch EJ. Very closely.

Bottom line: The win on Sunday was a huge one for the Tigers. Not only did it mark the difference between leading the division by one game or three, it now puts the Tigers in a position where the “clock is their friend,” so to speak.

If this was a football game, the Tigers would need to just keep the ball on the ground, make a couple of first downs with safe passes, and drain the clock.

They can grab a couple of first downs by sweeping the woeful Indians. Winning two of three would be alright, too. The Tigers’ magic number to clinch is 11.

The goal?

Make the Twins need to win three of four—or all four—of their games in Detroit next week.

Tigers’ magic number to clinch the division: 11

That’s all for this week’s MMM. Join me every Monday!

P.S. Also join me and Big Al from The Wayne Fontes Experience every Monday night as we co-host “The Knee Jerks” on Blog Talk Radio. The Tigers are a weekly topic. We go live at 11 p.m. ET, and every episode can be downloaded for your listening convenience!

New Coaches And Players, But Lions Still Getting “INC” Grade Every Sunday

The Detroit Lions have been Kings of the incompletion.

Not talking about passing here; talking about overall performance.

On select Sundays, the Lions will play perhaps 15, 20 minutes of decent football. On special occasions, they might squeeze out 30 minutes. Things could even get dicey and they might tease you with 45 minutes, just to mess with your mind.

Two years ago, the Lions were also Kings of the incomplete season.

They sprinted out to a 6-2 start and folks who should know better started to talk about the playoffs.

Their hideous won/loss record in the 21st century has been pocked with weekly displays of incomplete football games.

Maybe they’ll fall behind in monstrous fashion—often in the opening few minutes—only to put together 15, 20 minutes of acceptable football before collapsing again into a heap.

The Lions have many other variations of this theme; but they switch it up, though—you have to give them that.

Sunday at Ford Field, in the home opener, the Lions gave us a rather simple, meat-and-potatoes version of their incomplete performance displays.

This version against the Minnesota Vikings wasn’t very creative, but it was no less an example of the Lions’ propensity to not put it all together.

The version was this: play 30 “not bad” minutes of football, then slide into oblivion for the second 30.

It was another example of halftime vexing the Lions and reviving their opponents. New coach Jim Schwartz and his crack staff have proven to be just as feeble as their predecessors in matching wits with their counterparts during intermission.

The Lions jogged into the locker room at the half, holding a precarious yet well-earned 10-7 lead. The seven points by the Vikings weren’t gotten until the waning moments of the second quarter. The Lions had established a bit of a running game, and were keeping Brett Favre and his offense in check.

Matthew Stafford had thrown his first career NFL TD pass. The Vikings looked out of sorts.

Fast forward to the final few minutes of the fourth quarter, and there were the all-too-familiar, telltale signs of another Lions game.

The other team on the sidelines, laughing, joking, relaxed. Relieved even. A safe 27-13 lead in their vest pockets as the clock ticks away.

The Lions hanging and shaking their heads on the bench, and wearing that look of defeat. It may as well be their official look, like how The Joker’s garish white makeup with the blood-red and green accents is synonymous with him.

Defeat isn’t just makeup on the Lions’ faces, though—it’s now embedded into their skin, like tattoos.

The Vikings played with their dinner for the first 30 minutes of Sunday’s game, then returned from another of those infusing halftimes and started devouring hungrily.

Lions rookie QB Matthew Stafford was sacked right out of the gate in the third quarter, and the route was on—despite the scoreboard showing the Lions with a three-point lead.

The Vikings made those adjustments that every NFL team supposedly makes at the break, and the Lions were ill-prepared for them. Again.

Turnovers—those guaranteed haunters—did the Lions in. They made three of them, which the Vikings turned into 14 points.

Fourteen points also happened to be the Vikes’ margin of victory. Fancy that.

About Stafford: the kid is hellbent on learning the hard way, which all kid QBs do. Matthew’s favorite seems to be the forced pass that turns into an easy interception. That mistake du jour might as well be on the rookie QB’s “Greatest Hits” album.

In the fourth quarter, the Lions were down just ten, 20-10, and were beginning to twitch. They made a couple first downs. The crowd was being reintroduced into the game.

Then Stafford struck again—throwing a groaner of a pick that Favre and company turned into a touchdown and an insurmountable 27-10 advantage.

So that’s 19 losses in a row, if you’re scoring at home. The last time the Lions won a game was two Christmases and two Pistons coaches ago. Hillary Clinton was the front runner to be the Democratic nominee for president. No one had heard of Susan Boyle, Jon and Kate Gosselin, or Twitter. Everyone still used MySpace instead of Facebook.

But the Lions were playing incomplete football games back then, and beyond. And very much so, today.

Nice to know that there are still things in this world on which you can count, isn’t it?