The season began with a giddy five-game road winning streak, led by previously unheard of and since-vanished Chris Shelton. It began by outscoring teams 39-12 with every single starting pitcher in Detroit's five-man rotation picking up one of the five wins.
But that's not really when it began.
The too-good-to-be-true five-game burst out of the gates soon came crashing back to earth with prompt four-game slide, three of the losses coming at the hands of the defending world champion Chicago White Sox. Order in the AL Central division seemed to be restored. The 5-0 start was nothing but a distant memory. It hadn't really begun in Detroit after all.
It began with — of all things — an atrocious 10-2 home loss to the Cleveland Indians on April 17 in front of just 19,126 fans, all of whom witnessed a striking resemblance to the 2003 version of Detroit Tigers baseball and then left Comerica Park with no reason to believe.
What they didn't witness — at least not until 11 o'clock SportsCenter — was manager Jim Leyland's post-game interview in the locker room.
"We stunk," Leyland said to begin the tirade before barking a Drew Rosenhaus-esque "next question" at the surrounding throng of reporters.
"What bothered you the most?" asked another.
Leyland: "It was lackluster. The whole ball of wax was lackluster. We had a chance to take the series, take three out of four, and we came out like we brought our luggage to the park like we had to play a game before we went on the road. That's not good enough."
Reporter: "It seems like this was your worst loss..."
Leyland: "Yeah we stunk period. We stunk and that's not good enough. This stuff has been going on here before and it's not going to happen here. We had a chance to take a series. I'm not talking about anyone in particular. I'm talking about the team, myself, the coaches, and everybody else included. It's my responsibility to have the team ready to play today, and they weren't ready to play. They were ready to get on the plane and go to Oakland. If they won it was okay and if they lost it was okay. That's not good enough."
This stuff has been going on here before and it's not going to happen here. There. That's the key phrase in all of this. That's the sign of change.
Just three short years ago, Detroit was the laughingstock of Major League Baseball. The infamous 2003 club finished with a gut-wrenching 43-119 record. Manager Alan Trammel and company were a whopping 47 games behind the Minnesota Twins in the American League Central when the season came to a merciful end. Perhaps even more humiliating is that the Tigers finished a dreadful 20 games behind the second worst team in baseball, the 63-99 Tampa Bay Devil Rays.
In 2004, the Tigers did well only to reach mediocrity, concluding the season with a 72-90 record. Then last year, they found away to take a step back, albeit by only one game, compiling an uninspiring 71-91 record.
The 10-2 loss to Cleveland on April 17 dropped the Tigers to 7-6 after 13 games of the season. In all other recent years, that would have been a more than an acceptable start. Even to this season's Tiger fans, 7-6 was overly satisfying. Mediocrity was not only an option, but it was an option that was openly embraced.
Not so for manager Jim Leyland. This would not stand. Not anymore. Nor was the losing culture of past acceptable in the hearts and minds of the players, on whom Leyland's attitude was wearing off.
Veteran closer Todd Jones got the message. "He didn't almost bust a gasket for his own pleasure," Jones said of Leyland. "He said it for a purpose. Guys have to realize the manager ... is not to be taken lightly. We're going to be a better team if he can make people understand it."
Chris Shelton understood it. "I don't care about personal success," Shelton said after hitting his major-league leading ninth home run in the loss. "It's all about winning."
"Right there, we knew what people meant when they said he had a lot of fire," added Justin Verlander. Right there the whole motley crew knew that they were part of a different culture. A winning culture.
Compare all of this with the attitude of the 2005 Tigers following that team's sixth loss of the season. That came in the form of 10-4 drubbing in the Metrodome, dropping the Tigers to 3-6.
"They humbled us," first baseman Dmitri Young said of the Twins. "They beat us the way they've been beating us. It's not a 16-game season. This isn't football. We definitely have time to redeem ourselves."
No sense of urgency. No fire. No nothing.
But hey, at least manager Alan Trammel was "extremely disappointed" after the loss. Great. That's good to know. If you're "extremely disappointed," why don't you do something about it so that you're not "extremely disappointed" after every other game?
Jim Leyland wasn't disappointed when his team didn't come to play against the Indians and paid a 10-2 price for it. No, he was bleepin' furious. Even before going off to the media, Leyland embarked on a profanity-laced tirade to his team behind closed doors. God only knows the exact nature of what was said, but whatever it was lit a fire under the 2006 Detroit Tigers.
They lost the next day in Oakland, but then sprinted to five consecutive road victories. After taking one of three games in Anaheim, the Tigers then ran off six in-a-row, including a three-game sweep of the division-rival Minnesota Twins. Shortly thereafter, between May 10 and May 27, Detroit won 15 of 16 games. There they were, just over a month after Jim Leyland culture-shocked his Tigers, with the best record in Major League Baseball.
Look no further than manager Leyland to bestow praise.
Sure, the additions of rookie flamethrowers Justin Verlander and Joel Zumaya didn't hurt. Nor did the offseason acquisitions of veterans Kenny Rogers, Todd Jones, Placido Polanco, and the midseason trade with Pittsburgh for Sean Casey.
But imported talent does not always materialize if it's strewn together carelessly. Without direction. Without purpose.
If they won, it was okay and if they lost, it was okay. That was the mindset of Tiger teams of old, and by old, I mean up to 2005. I don't care what kind of talent those teams did or did not have. They were the Detroit Tigers and therefore losing was both accepted and expected. These 2006 Tigers, 13 games into the season, were teetering dangerously on the precipice of a similar apathy. But...
That's not good enough. Not for Jim Leyland. Mediocrity was not good enough and it wasn't tolerated. This was the same Jim Leyland who guided the 1997 Florida Marlins to a World Series title and had the 1992 Pittsburgh Pirates one out away from reaching the Fall Classic before Francisco Cabrera and Sid Bream ripped their hearts out. Once you've had those experiences, there's no going back. Being anything less than the best is no longer an option.
Without Leyland, that would have been an option for a mostly-inexperienced Tiger troupe.
Troy Percival won a championship with the Angels in 2002, but he wasn't able to throw even one pitch this entire season. Kenny Rogers won in 1996 as a Yankee and also served up a walk-off walk to Andruw Jones to lose to the Braves in the 1999 NLCS. Pudge Rodriguez led the next bunch of Marlins to a title in 2003.
The rest of the crew, many of them rookies, barely even knew what winning was or how a winning attitude manifests itself in clubhouse.
Leyland showed them. He showed them all the way to the World Series, where even though they fell one step short of the ultimate goal, the destination reaffirmed everything the manager had to say back on April 17.
Despite the loss, nobody can take away from the Tigers what they accomplished in '06. Nobody can take away the winning culture that was finally infused in the Detroit clubhouse. Nobody can say the Detroit Tigers franchise no longer has it.
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