Tiger playoff tickets go on sale Tuesday. Phone and internet sales only!

[Lefty48197]

No waiting in line overnight in sleeping bags, or any of that stuff. The tickets go on sale Tuesday at 10 A.M. and are only available via telephone or internet sales.

http://detroit.tigers.mlb.com/NASApp/mlb/ticketing/postseason.jsp?c_id=det

Unfortunately, the Tigers did lose today, and Minnesota did win, but the team's prospects for a playoff appearance still look very good. We're still one game up on Minnesota for the division lead. The White Sox are fighting for the sole wild card appearance, and are currently 3 games behind Minnesota (and 4 behind Detroit). The Tigers currently have 13 games left, and their magic number for clinching the division title is 13, but the magic number to clinch a playoff appearance is down to 9 (vs. Chicago).

Whomever wins the Central Division will not play the wild card team in the first round because of a MLB rule. The Yankees are currently 1 1/2 games ahead of Detroit for the best record in the American league, so they will probably play the wild card team in the first round. The winner of the Central will likely play the winner of the West division.

Oakland and the Yankees look like near locks to win their divisions.

[ScreamingMeemie]

1. Call me crazy, but I'm still betting the Tiger's will end up on top.

the bats are heating up. It's not probably it's a definite playoff appearance. :hi: Now, if only their fans would stay in their seats for the entire game instead of going home early when things look glum.

[TahitiNut]

3. The opposition bats are 'heating up' too.

While the Tigers had a laugher against Baltimore on the 15th, with 17 runs in a 17-2 win, they also got rained on with 12 runs by Minnesota on the 10th, 11 runs by Texas on the 13th, and 12 runs by Baltimore yesterday, the 17th. Those three games summed to 12 runs by the Tigers vs. 35 runs by the opposition.

I hope the best for Detroit fans ... they're the most short-changed fans in the country.

[TahitiNut]

2. They're 6-9 in September so far, playing White Sox in Chicago 3 games

If I were a betting man, I'd take short odds against 'em ... if only based on history. Detroit sports fans are far, far too tolerant and patient with their pro sports teams, continuing to support them even when the (right-wing) ownership gives the fans less than in almost any other city. As a kid growing up in the Detroit area in the fifties, graduating in '61, and having decent winning teams with 'heroes' to cheer - including Gordie Howe on the Red Wings, Al Kaline on the Tigers, and Alex Karras on the Lions - I look at the years since then and just shake my head.

I went to Ford Field to watch the Lions play Seattle. The tickets were comped. It was my first visit to Ford Field. It'a an appalling place (imho) with more than five full tiers of sky boxes. The Roman Empire wasn't even as bad in the Coliseum. The wealthy attend for free (on the taxpayers' and consumers' dimes) and the people whose neighborhoods were wiped out in the area can't possibly afford to attend - working people pay the most. Nonetheless, the stands are full of loyalists - people who buy expensive NFL gear (the stands were awash in Lions' silver and blue), $4.50 cups of flat beer, $6.00 hot dogs, and watch a losing team that the owner uses to broker players like some stud farm owner.

[ScreamingMeemie]

4. I'm a betting woman... and I already placed my bet.

:hi: I think you're going to be surprised. I have never seen worse fans than those in Detroit. (not including you TN) But I come from WI and even when the Brewers (who still suck far worse than Detroit ever has) were losing by double digits people didn't leave the stadium. Most of these "fair weather fans" have deserved what they've gotten.

[Lefty48197]

5. Never seen worse fans than those in Detroit?

I don't believe that, even if you're only talking about the Tiger fans.
The Detroit Lions seem to have the most loyal fans in the country. They sold out all their games in the Silverdome, for what seemed like forever, until a stretch of about 5 years recently, when the fans just got fed up. People used to gripe that the Lions would never be good until their fans stopped going to the games in protest. Lo and behold that began to happen awhile back and the Lion's home games weren't on tv for a few years because they didn't sell out. Since moving to the new (smaller) stadium, I believe they've sold out every game.
Red Wings? Probably sold out every game since '88 or so. Pistons? Probably sold out almost every one of their games for the last twenty years, or at least since they moved to the Palace. I'm pretty sure the NBA single game attendance record was set at the Silverdome.
Tigers? Yes, Tiger fans are fair weather fans, at least when it comes to showing up at the ballpark. Not everybody can get to the stadium. Not every fan wanted to go to the stadium. The downtown location may have hurt the Tigers' attendance because a whole generation of metro Detroiters are afraid to go downtown, to this day. Don't tell it to those of us with open minds, or the newer generations, who think Detroit is "cool".

[ScreamingMeemie]

7. Let me tell you a story...

Back in 1982 when we first moved here, my father got season tickets to Lions home games. We sat directly across from the sign that somebody cleverly made stating "Pontiac Pussycats"...and we watched the mass exodus that always happened at half time. Flash forward to a Lions/Packers game in 1996... Scott Mitchell booed when he was down hurt... the stadium cheering for the Packers, so loudly that the announcers started calling the Silverdome "Lambeau East". My father swore that day he would never go to another Lions game. As a Packer fan, he felt that badly. He kept that promise. Lions fans, Tigers fans and Red Wings fans (I'm not "into" basketball so I cannot comment on the Pistons) expect all or nothing...and they leave the game before a chance is had. It irritates me that I cannot get tickets for the games to take my children...and then I sit at home and watch them leave at half time, after the second period, or before the sixth inning. These teams have nothing to play for. Talk to my father about how it feels to be a Brewers fan... A Braves fan before that, he has suffered, and yet sits in crowded stadiums every losing season.

I applaud the few diehard fans. I know they exist, one is a friend of mine. It's just sad that the majority are not. Sorry.

[Lefty48197]

6. Denise Illitch is working for the Granholm campaign.

So there is hope that one day, at least 1/2 of the empire will be owned by a Democrat.

T. Nut, I agree with your rant about sports stadiums, their outrageous ticket and refreshment prices, and the suites all of which seem to squeeze out "the little guy", and encourage the wealthy corporate ladder-climbers to attend sporting events. Those same forces squeeze the true fans out of the stadium, and replace them with uneducated fans, who are there for everything BUT the game.

I can proudly say that I've been a loyal Tiger fan since shortly after the '68 World Series, and it's never been interrupted even by all the years when they've been terrible. Yes, they break our hearts far too often. What can ya do?

Baseball in October? It's been a long time. I'm looking forward to it.

[ScreamingMeemie]

8. As mentioned above, talk to my father about how it feels to be a

Brewers fan.

[TahitiNut]

9. I was a young bleacher-bum at Briggs Stadium.

I kept box scores and the whole nine yards. When I was lucky, I could afford a seat in the upper deck along the third base line (better than the first base line, for me.) I followed Yost, Kaline, Cash, Maxwell, Freehan, Colavito, McAuliffe, Bertoia, Foytack, Boros, Kuehn, Fernandez, Horton, Aguirre, McLain, and company for years. Then, as soon as I get drafted ... and when I was trapped in Viet Nam In-Country Training in the boonies of Texas ... they go to the Series! (Bums!) They couldn't even do it when I was able to hop a plane, let alone be in town. Then, a couple of strikes and a new stadium (on the taxpayer dime and destroying two neighborhoods), I get jaundiced.

Living in smaller towns with AA and AAA farm teams was a Godsend. That's how baseball got fun again, for me. I like the game. Sitting in the sun. The sense of community. Multi-million dollar salaries, politics, sky-boxes and $5 hot dogs ruins it. Seats so narrow my thigh has imprints of my pocket change screws it up. Hot dogs at farm club ball parks are $0.50 to $1 ... and taste better.

Not a single player on the Tiger roster was even alive when I was a bleacher bum. Kids.