Curtis Granderson

Subject: Re: Curtis Granderson Wed Feb 13, 2008 5:25 pm

It seems like many of our players are at camp early. I guess they are as excited as all us fans to see the new season get started! I think they really want to win it all this year!

PARTY!

Subject: Re: Curtis Granderson Wed Feb 13, 2008 5:44 pm

Go Tigers!!!!!

Subject: Re: Curtis Granderson Thu Feb 14, 2008 12:26 am

Hungry for it this year!
_________________
There are three things in my life which I really love: God, my family, and baseball. The only problem - once baseball season starts, I change the order around a bit. ~Al Gallagher, 1971

Subject: Re: Curtis Granderson Thu Feb 14, 2008 10:27 am

"A Ring Is Our Fate in Two Thousand and Eight"!!

GO TIGERS!!

Subject: Re: Curtis Granderson Tue Feb 19, 2008 6:42 pm

I don't know if you all know, but Curtis has started his blog up again.

Just thought I would let you know.

Subject: Re: Curtis Granderson Tue Feb 19, 2008 6:55 pm

From Grandys blog:

Ready to start working out
posted: Tuesday, February 19, 2008 | Print Entry

The report date for pitchers and catchers has already passed, but the official start of spring training for position players is this Wednesday, and I'm getting ready for it. I've been down here in Lakeland, Fla., for about two weeks now, and a lot of people have been surprised that I came down so early. Every year since I was invited to big-league camp in 2005, I've reported on pretty much the same day, which is about two to three days after the Super Bowl. I usually leave Chicago around that time, because I'm ready to step up my workouts, and also to get outside. I can only do so much in Chicago during the winter months.

Coming to Lakeland allows me to get out in the heat and humidity and see the sun, which -- as funny as it seems -- is a big adjustment. Even though this year compared to others where I was competing for a spot is a little different, I'm still coming down to get my work done just like I have done in the past. Unless I buy a house in a warm-weather state, my personal report date won't change much throughout my career.

Now that two weeks of being in the Florida sun has passed and the official start is just a day away, I'm pretty much ready to get it going for the spring of 2008, which means I'll be working out every day -- except for one scheduled off day in March. People hear how many days we work out and wonder if it's tiring. It is tiring, but it isn't exhausting. Our coaching and training staff understands that the goal of spring training is to prepare us for the upcoming season, not to wear us down before we even play one of our 162 regular-season games. If we need or want extra work, the staff is also ready to work with us on whatever we want, which most of the guys usually take advantage of.

At the end of the workout day, I'm usually drained a little bit, but hungrier than anything, so I'll eat at the field right after. When I leave the park, if I have some friends and/or family in town, I'll go hang out with them usually around dinner (more food) and just get rest before I get ready to head back to the field the next day.

That's pretty much the breakdown of my routine until we start playing our spring training games.

Subject: Re: Curtis Granderson Wed Feb 20, 2008 2:10 pm

02/19/2008 10:08 PM ET
Notes: Granderson learning from Sheff
Leadoff man trying to emulate veteran's patience at the plate
By Jason Beck / MLB.com

LAKELAND, Fla. -- Tigers slugger Gary Sheffield sees the potential for a great lineup, but he also sees the need for hitters to learn patience. Manager Jim Leyland issued the challenge Monday that his hitters should strike out less than they have in the past.

Even before position players begin formal workouts this spring, Curtis Granderson has been listening and working.

"Staying aggressive, but hopefully eliminating two-strike counts," Granderson said. "That's going to be the game plan."

Few hitters in baseball made more progress in cutting down on strikeouts last year than Granderson, whose total dropped from an American League high of 174 in 2006 to 141 over nearly the same number of plate appearances in '07.

"At the same time, I was still among the top guys in the league in strikeouts last year," Granderson said Tuesday. "Hopefully I can continue to lower that number down."

Granderson ranked seventh among AL hitters in strikeouts, and ninth among AL hitters in strikeouts per plate appearance. In terms of strikeouts from the leadoff spot, however, only Cleveland's Grady Sizemore struck out more.

The strikeouts went a little overlooked, Granderson said, because of the stats he put up when he put the ball in the play -- the .306 average, 37 doubles, 21 triples and 23 home runs. Take away the strikeouts, and 40 percent of the balls Granderson put in play went for base hits.

Thus, the challenge for Granderson is how to cut down the strikeouts without cutting down too much on his aggressiveness. Indeed, hitting coach Lloyd McClendon has told Granderson not to go up to bat looking for a walk, but to make the pitcher throw strikes.

That's where Sheffield has some authority; he has finished among his respective league's top 10 in walks in nine of his 17 full Major League seasons, including 10th in the AL last year despite less than 600 plate appearances and several games played with a bad shoulder that affected his approach at the plate.

"He's aggressive, he knows not to get cheated and he knows the strike zone," Granderson said. "That's the thing that he said to me: 'As I knew the strike zone, walks went up.'"

That knowledge, Sheffield believes, is a matter of experience, not just for Granderson, but most young hitters. That experience, he said, was part of what made those Yankees lineups great.

"When you talk about capitalizing on every at-bat, working the pitcher through every pitch, you don't know what that does to a lineup," Sheffield said. "When you do that on a consistent basis, you wear teams down. That's what this team is going to have to learn. Everybody can hit, but the key to it all is patience. If you're patient, everything else will take care of itself.

The intricate statistical relationship shows in Granderson's numbers. His drop in strikeouts last year was accompanied by a drop in walks from 66 to 52. Thus, despite his improvement in strikeouts, his ratio of walks to strikeouts actually dropped from .38 to .37.

Granderson would like to push that a little closer to even, or at least 2-to-1. There's precedence for that in his history; he walked 80 times compared to 95 strikeouts at Double-A Erie in 2004.

Still, there's a positive flip side. Of the 33 strikeouts Granderson eliminated from his total last year, 18 were called third strikes, falling from 40 in 2006 to just 22 last year according to research on baseball-reference.com.

"For his ability," Leyland said, "he'll get better yet, I think."

Speaking of Granderson: Look for the left-handed hitter to potentially see more at-bats against left-handed pitchers this season, a situation where most of Granderson's days off came last year. He'll still rest there sometimes, but maybe not as often.

"We'll pick our spots," Leyland said. "We do want to play him almost all the time. The only thing is if we do rest him, it would probably be against a nasty lefty."

Holiday visitor: Though Placido Polanco has a home in Miami, he spent part of his offseason in his native Dominican Republic. He can visit family and friends there, but he couldn't have expected a visit from an AL batting champion.

Yet, when Magglio Ordonez was looking for a place to spend a quick vacation around the holiday season on short notice, he and his family flew to the Dominican to pay Polanco a visit.

"Magglio calls me," Polanco said, "and he's like, 'Hey, where are you?' I said, 'I'm at home in the Dominican.' And he said, 'I'm right here.' So I went and got him, and we had a barbecue. That was fun. My dad had a blast."

Six agree to terms: The Tigers reached agreement with six players on one-year deals, bringing their total number of players under contract to 31 members of their 40-man roster.

Right-handers Yorman Bazardo, Jordan Tata, Virgil Vasquez and Joel Zumaya all agreed to terms, as did outfielders Brent Clevlen and Freddy Guzman. None of them were eligible for arbitration, so the Tigers could've simply renewed their contracts if they couldn't agree to a salary figure.

Quotable: "The Cleveland Indians are the Central Division champions, not the Detroit Tigers. We sound good. We look good. We are good. But we haven't done squat." -- Leyland

Jason Beck is a reporter for MLB.com.
This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.

Subject: Re: Curtis Granderson Wed Feb 20, 2008 2:28 pm

Humility = a sign of greatness!
_________________
There are three things in my life which I really love: God, my family, and baseball. The only problem - once baseball season starts, I change the order around a bit. ~Al Gallagher, 1971

Subject: Re: Curtis Granderson Mon Feb 25, 2008 3:13 pm

DREW SHARP
Why Curtis Granderson is Detroit's dream guy

BY DREW SHARP • FREE PRESS COLUMNIST • February 24, 2008

LAKELAND -- The frequency and creativity of the marriage proposals is testing the modesty of Curtis Granderson.

"It's like a day doesn't go by when there isn't at least one," says Granderson, apologetically. "They're even approaching my parents now to see if they can get me to marry them. It's flattering, but I still have a difficult time wondering why."

The attention was initially limited to ballpark signs from mothers and their daughters, but it's now taken to brazen approaches in restaurants and sidewalk stalking through the streets of his hometown Chicago.

Tigers' first base coach Andy Van Slyke once said that he would have instantly set-up an "arranged" marriage with the young outfielder, but for one technicality.

He doesn't have a daughter.

"You hear about people having 'it,' whatever 'it' is," said Jim Leyland last week. "Curtis has 'it.' It's hard finding that one person who's likeable to everybody in every aspect."

"It" is the perfect blend of intelligence and enthusiasm, dazzle and diligence.

Athletes aren't role models, despite congressional opinion to the contrary. That's why there's parenting.

But athletes become a convenient repository for culpability because we've got to blame somebody other than ourselves when kids stray, unappreciative of the distinction between what's right and what's wrong. It's particularly true among some black families that tend to look at professional sports with a more reverential eye.

The obsession with athletic excellence creates a skewed perception of empowerment. As long as you've got game, nothing else matters.

The moral of Granderson is that you don't have to settle.

There doesn't have to be a choice between sports and education. Your kindness toward others shouldn't depend on what they can do for you.

It's possible to have it all and appreciate the opportunities you've earned if you're inspired and disciplined enough.

And therein lies Granderson's broad appeal.

A Free Press poll last year ranked him the most popular Tiger, standing out among a batting champion (Magglio Ordonez) and a no-hit pitcher (Justin Verlander).

Granderson's capable of becoming that transcendent Detroit athlete.

Grant Hill was supposed to be that guy when he first arrived in Detroit in 1994. It wouldn't have shocked anyone if one day Hill ran for the Senate. He combined the scholarship with the above-the-rim game, the son of a Yale graduate who became a star NFL running back and a Washington, D.C., power attorney who was close college friends with Hillary Rodham.

But as it turned out, Hill proved too perfect, too processed.

Granderson scores in Detroit where Hill didn't because there's a common, unprivileged touch to his life.

His parents, Curtis Sr. and Mary, weren't high-powered stars, but educators. Mary went to night school twice a week to earn her master's degree in chemistry. She's a high school chemistry teacher. Curtis Sr. is a retired elementary school physical education teacher. Their daughter, Monica, is an English professor at Jackson State University.

As the Tigers contemplated drafting him following his junior year at Illinois-Chicago, they received a letter from his college baseball coach, telling them that it remained Granderson's objective to get his degree first before committing to a baseball career. It was non-negotiable.

"It impressed us that those demands didn't deter the Tigers' organization from taking C.J.," said Curtis Sr. "I'm sure it surprised them because, normally, the demands are all about money, but this one was about finishing the education that C.J. started."

Granderson has two business degrees from Illinois-Chicago, but his natural ease in front of the camera suggests a potential future in sports broadcasting. He was a fixture on ESPN and TBS during coverage of last year's American League playoffs. He has a regular blog on ESPN's web site.

"People ask me all the time if I would consider a future in politics, but I don't know about that," Granderson said, wearing a shy smile. "I'm happy right now just going to schools in Detroit and using my experiences as an example of how anything is possible if you're determined to work hard enough."

If you insist that athletes double as role models and marriage bait, there's really no need to look any further.

Subject: Re: Curtis Granderson Mon Feb 25, 2008 3:59 pm

unfortunately, he has to expect this! He needs to find somebody and quick if he wants it to drop off a little!
_________________
There are three things in my life which I really love: God, my family, and baseball. The only problem - once baseball season starts, I change the order around a bit. ~Al Gallagher, 1971

Subject: Re: Curtis Granderson Thu Mar 20, 2008 3:47 am

Granderson quickly dashing to the top
Center fielder setting things in motion for talented Tigers team
By Jason Beck / MLB.com

"He's one of our big keys, because he makes us go," Tigers manager Jim Leyland said of leadoff man Curtis Granderson. (Paul Sancya/AP)

LAKELAND, Fla. -- Curtis Granderson clearly can hit. He can run. He can certainly cover center field, and as opposing baserunners realized last year, he can throw pretty well now, too.
But for everything Granderson does, there's one thing that goes unnoticed: He can organize.

On a given day, at a given time, he has a pretty good idea where he's going to be. When the Tigers are home, he can dash from his place to a community function to lunch to the ballpark like he's going from first to home on an extra-base hit without looking back. He has time allotted in his schedule to do his twice-weekly blog on ESPN.com. If he has free time at the ballpark between batting practice and his extra work, he'll use some of it to sign autographs.

On a recent day at Spring Training this past week, he had just received a schedule for what he has slated to do in the community over the entire season.

"That lays out all the way from April 1 through the end of the season," he said. "It has [Grand Kids] Foundation stuff, school visits, on-field stuff. But it's a good, full schedule already. So I'm looking at it and I'm going, 'Wow.'"

When you're filling as many shoes as he does sometimes, you have to.

On a team that has become cluttered with star players over the past few years, one can make a compelling argument that Granderson is becoming the face of the Detroit Tigers. From the batting order to box scores to the stats page to the community, he's around the top of a lot of lists. He's a catalyst off the field like he is on it.

He's coming off a season in which he reached a statistical feat last met by Willie Mays, and he won the team's nomination for the Roberto Clemente Award for community work. A year later, the Tigers don't want Granderson to worry about history repeating itself. They want him to focus on simply being himself.

"I just want him to do what he does," manager Jim Leyland said. "I don't want him to feel like he has to be the guy. We've got a pretty thorough lineup. Just do what you can do. Don't try to carry the team, blah, blah, blah. Just do what you can do and that'll be fine."

In many ways, this is who he is.

His emergence last year wasn't a total shock, given his work ethic and athleticism, but it was nonetheless sudden. A year ago at this point, Granderson was a promising hitter, trying to shed the title of the American League's strikeout champion while working on coming out of his shell as a baserunner.

As coach Andy Van Slyke put it at one point last summer, Granderson is someone who tries so hard to please everybody that he was afraid of risking a mistake. His progression as a player last year picked up when he became more willing to take a chance, whether it was on the basepaths or at the plate.

The result was just the third season of at least 20 homers, 20 doubles, 20 triples and 20 stolen bases by a Major League player. Willie Mays was the last; Jimmy Rollins became the next soon after Granderson. He also clinched a .300 average on the season's final day.

All of this came in just his second full Major League season. By contrast, Mays was in six seasons in when he hit his quadruple twenties in 1957, and he played for 16 more years without coming close again.

Given Granderson's drive, the last thing Leyland or the Tigers want him to do is try to repeat it.

"You've got to go into the season knowing you've got a heckuva player on your hands who's only going to get better," Leyland said. "But I think it would be unfair to ask him to duplicate last season."

Fortunately for them, Granderson already knows that.

"Last year, it wasn't even a plan or a goal to get to that point. It just happened," Granderson said. "People are stepping it up even above and beyond that, saying, 'Can you do 30-30?' Again, it's not on my agenda to do. ... If I get close to it again, great. If I don't, hopefully everything else ends up being positive."

His goals for this season are pretty similar to what he had in mind a year ago. It still comes down to runs scored, the stat that Gary Sheffield mentioned to him last spring as the focus for a leadoff hitter. He ended up with 122, third in the AL.

"The only stat that I'll put a number on," Granderson said. "That should be at 100. Everything else would be ratios."

Stolen-base success, strikeouts-to-walks and on-base percentage are the ratios he has in mind. The common thread is that they revolve around putting him in position for the guys behind him.

For all the talent in Detroit's lineup, Granderson's success puts the offense in motion. It puts Placido Polanco in a position to move him over or drive him in. It forces opponents to either challenge Sheffield or put him on base for RBI machine Magglio Ordonez. Then come Miguel Cabrera and Carlos Guillen. And so on, and so on.

"He's one of our big keys, because he makes us go," Leyland said. "There's no question about that."

To watch him work on the bases is like watching him in life -- organized, calculating and efficient. He was thrown out just once in 27 stolen-base attempts. He wasn't thrown out at all trying to advance, and his mere four outs on the basepaths all came while being doubled off. His baserunning rating in the Bill James Handbook put him in the same neighborhood as Carl Crawford, Orlando Cabrera and Juan Pierre, and within range of Ichiro Suzuki.

Considering he put up base hits nearly 40 percent of the time he put the ball in play, the Tigers have plenty of reason to encourage him to cut down on strikeouts. But they also realize the balance he strikes between aggressiveness and efficiency. After all, nearly a quarter of his strikeouts in 2006 were on called third strikes, which dropped to 16 percent last year.

He's one guy Leyland doesn't have to push. Leyland's big move with Granderson this spring was to rest him early on so that he didn't tire himself out. Granderson was afraid at first that he had done something wrong.

"I think he's such a proud guy that he's a perfectionist," Leyland said. "And, you know, perfectionists in this game fail seven times out of 10 [at the plate]. I just think that he's such a perfectionist that I think he's probably his toughest critic. I mean, you can manage forever and not get many guys like that."

"He pays attention. He works. He believes in the instructors. ... He works at it, never any questioning. Like I said, you can manage a long time and not find players like that."

The only thing Leyland pushes Granderson on is to not feel he has to do too much. Between community work and autographs, he worries about Granderson tiring himself out, and Granderson has tried to make sure he doesn't overdo it.

What looks like overtaxing, though, is nothing out of the ordinary to him.

"That's me," Granderson admitted. "I love being busy, no matter what. I love having this, followed by this, followed by that, because it keeps my mind focused on other things other than baseball."

He has no incredible feats on his schedule just yet. He's simply trying to help this team put some dates on their calendar for October.
_________________
There are three things in my life which I really love: God, my family, and baseball. The only problem - once baseball season starts, I change the order around a bit. ~Al Gallagher, 1971

Subject: Re: Curtis Granderson Thu Mar 20, 2008 3:58 am

Subject: Re: Curtis Granderson Thu Mar 20, 2008 4:05 am

He is an incredible feat! Of true sportsmanship, humility, and generosity!
_________________
There are three things in my life which I really love: God, my family, and baseball. The only problem - once baseball season starts, I change the order around a bit. ~Al Gallagher, 1971

Subject: Re: Curtis Granderson Thu Mar 20, 2008 4:05 am

oh, and incidentally, I WANT HIS AUTOGRAPH! Big Smile

_________________
There are three things in my life which I really love: God, my family, and baseball. The only problem - once baseball season starts, I change the order around a bit. ~Al Gallagher, 1971

Subject: Re: Curtis Granderson Sat Mar 22, 2008 5:10 pm

03/22/2008 4:26 PM ET
Granderson hit by pitch, should be OK
Tigers outfielder to have precautionary X-rays on right hand
By Jason Beck / MLB.com

CLEARWATER, Fla. -- Tigers center fielder Curtis Granderson planned on having precautionary X-rays on his right hand after being hit by a pitch Saturday afternoon, but he is expected to be fine.

Granderson was leading off the fourth inning when a fastball from Phillies left-hander Travis Blackley ran in on Granderson and hit him near the base of his hand. Athletic trainer Steve Carter attended to Granderson, who stayed in the game at first base for the next batter before heavy rains halted the game.

Had the game not been halted, Granderson said, he thinks he could've continued. Had the game restarted after the delay, however, he would not, since his hand was already being iced.

"Just for precautionary reasons, go check it out," Granderson said. "My reactions, I guess, made them think [it was more serious], but I grimace at anything. They think it's more [of a bruise]."

The Tigers have had their fair share of injuries already, from reliever Fernando Rodney's sore shoulder that will force him onto the disabled list to open the season to the leg cramps that delayed designated hitter Gary Sheffield's spring game action. Outfielder Marcus Thames missed close to a week with a strained left pectoral muscle.

This injury, however, does not sound likely to cost Granderson at-bats, of which he expects to get plenty down the stretch after being rested off and on early in the spring. He has played in nine of Detroit's last 11 games and has started every game since a scheduled personal off-day last Monday, which every player receives at some point in camp.

Granderson is batting .306 this spring, with three doubles, three triples, four home runs, eight RBIs and a team-high 12 runs scored.

Jason Beck is a reporter for MLB.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.

Subject: Re: Curtis Granderson Sat Mar 22, 2008 6:31 pm

thank U God that he's okay...
_________________
There are three things in my life which I really love: God, my family, and baseball. The only problem - once baseball season starts, I change the order around a bit. ~Al Gallagher, 1971

Subject: Re: Curtis Granderson Sat Mar 22, 2008 6:50 pm

Subject: Re: Curtis Granderson Sun Mar 23, 2008 12:47 am

sometimes I don't think they should play as many games in ST as they do!
_________________
There are three things in my life which I really love: God, my family, and baseball. The only problem - once baseball season starts, I change the order around a bit. ~Al Gallagher, 1971

Subject: Re: Curtis Granderson Sun Mar 23, 2008 12:47 am

save it for the season!
_________________
There are three things in my life which I really love: God, my family, and baseball. The only problem - once baseball season starts, I change the order around a bit. ~Al Gallagher, 1971

Subject: Re: Curtis Granderson Sun Mar 23, 2008 8:25 am

I hope he can get back soon. We need him. Inge in CF today.... I'm not liking that.

Subject: Re: Curtis Granderson Sun Mar 23, 2008 8:26 am

I didn't think he was hurt all that badly yesterday! wonder what happened?
_________________
There are three things in my life which I really love: God, my family, and baseball. The only problem - once baseball season starts, I change the order around a bit. ~Al Gallagher, 1971

Subject: Re: Curtis Granderson Sun Mar 23, 2008 8:30 am

I didn't even hear about it until today. I guess I was busy yesterday..... Frown

Subject: Re: Curtis Granderson Sun Mar 23, 2008 8:53 am

Broke a bone in his right hand! Out for 2 weeks, 8 games!
_________________
There are three things in my life which I really love: God, my family, and baseball. The only problem - once baseball season starts, I change the order around a bit. ~Al Gallagher, 1971

Subject: Re: Curtis Granderson Sun Mar 23, 2008 12:53 pm

Poor Curtis!!! Sad

Subject: Re: Curtis Granderson Sun Mar 23, 2008 12:56 pm

I'll be his nurse! Big Smile

_________________
There are three things in my life which I really love: God, my family, and baseball. The only problem - once baseball season starts, I change the order around a bit. ~Al Gallagher, 1971

Subject: Re: Curtis Granderson Sun Mar 23, 2008 1:05 pm

Hey!!!! We could go pretend we are nurses!!!! clap

We could be the tiger

nurses!!!!

Subject: Re: Curtis Granderson Sun Mar 23, 2008 2:12 pm

Seriously, there are some at every home game at a medical station inside the stadium. They don't get to see the game though! Frown

_________________
There are three things in my life which I really love: God, my family, and baseball. The only problem - once baseball season starts, I change the order around a bit. ~Al Gallagher, 1971

Subject: Re: Curtis Granderson Mon Mar 24, 2008 2:48 am

Curtis Granderson's broken finger places Inge in center field
BY JON PAUL MOROSI • FREE PRESS SPORTS WRITER • March 24, 2008

LAKELAND, Fla. -- Curtis Granderson positioned his right hand for one X-ray, then another, at a Lakeland hospital on Saturday evening. The technician took the images without saying anything, which Granderson figured was a good sign.

Then he rotated his hand again, for the third and final shot. He might have been 2-for-2, but everything hinged on this.

The machine clicked. This time, the woman reacted.

"Come here," he recalled her saying.

Granderson looked at the picture. And he knew.

"I'm not a doc," he said Sunday, "but I could see it."

Granderson, the Tigers' popular centerfielder, had sustained a fracture on his middle finger, below the knuckle. ("A little crack" was his description.) It happened when Philadelphia left-hander Travis Blackley hit him on top of the hand with a pitch Saturday, in a game washed out by rain minutes later.

That's right: One of Detroit's most valuable players was injured in a game that didn't even count in the exhibition standings.

"It's weird," Granderson said. "It almost tracked me, (like) it had a little device on it. It went just over my shoulder and somehow still found my hand."

Regardless of how it happened, the team must deal with the consequences: Granderson was placed on the disabled list Sunday and will miss at least three weeks. That puts his return in mid-April, at the earliest.

The hand has been placed in a splint, and Granderson will be X-rayed again in two weeks.

Until then, one of the most energetic Tigers won't be able to play at all -- and Brandon Inge will likely be in centerfield when the season opens one week from today at Comerica Park.

"You never like to lose a player," Detroit club president/general manager Dave Dombrowski said, "but it's a short-term thing."

Inge played centerfield for all 10 innings of the Tigers' 3-3 tie with the Cleveland Indians on Sunday. He made four catches, one of them a spectacular diving grab in the 10th. Tigers manager Jim Leyland said Inge would also play center today against Washington.

"He's got to play out there all week," Leyland said. "Andy (Van Slyke, the outfield coach) thinks four or five days and he'll be fine."

Leyland, though, didn't formally name Inge as Granderson's replacement in center, and it's not clear who will become the team's temporary leadoff hitter. Shortstop Edgar Renteria batted first Sunday, and he is a candidate to remain there; second baseman Placido Polanco will stay in the No. 2 spot, Leyland said.

Granderson's injury also opened up a spot on the team's 25-man roster, and club officials have roughly one week to deliberate on his replacement. Freddy Guzman, a speedy-yet-unproven centerfielder, and Timo Perez, who batted .414 for the Tigers last September, are among the candidates. The Tigers could also carry Dane Sardinha as a backup catcher, which would save Inge from having to start behind the plate once or twice during the first two weeks.

Still, it will be hard to replace Granderson's presence and production, after a year in which he became only the second player in big-league history to finish with 30 doubles, 20 triples, 20 home runs and 20 stolen bases.

"I've been working so hard to get my timing back, hitting-wise," Granderson said. "Now, I've got to take time off again. That's the only thing that's frustrating."

Inge said Sunday that he feels comfortable in centerfield, but emphasized, "It's Grandy's spot. I'm by no means trying to take anyone's spot. That's not what I'm all about."

Inge, though, should be an adequate replacement in center, because of his remarkable athleticism.

"He's a freak," marveled fellow outfielder Marcus Thames when asked about Inge's circus catch on Sunday. "He's just a good athlete, man. I'm sure if he's going to be out there, he's going to work hard to make sure he's doing a good job.

"That's one thing about him: He works hard."

For Granderson, the injury meant his first stay on the disabled list since 2004, when he was playing at Double-A Erie.

"He was upset, but I just told him, 'It happens,' " said Thames, one of Granderson's close friends. "He didn't do nothing wrong. He was trying to get out of the way.

"Everything will work out for him. He's strong, and he's got a lot of strong people around him -- positive people. He'll be all right.

"He'll come in, get treated, and hopefully we'll get him back soon."

The Tigers, though, have no choice but to play without him. And Inge, deemed undesirable by other clubs because of his big contract, could man a key position during the first weeks of a season that will begin with championship expectations -- and championship pressure.
_________________
There are three things in my life which I really love: God, my family, and baseball. The only problem - once baseball season starts, I change the order around a bit. ~Al Gallagher, 1971

Subject: Re: Curtis Granderson Mon Mar 24, 2008 3:28 am

At least Curtis will have some extra time now to visit some strip clubs with Joel!!

Subject: Re: Curtis Granderson Mon Mar 24, 2008 3:30 am

_________________
There are three things in my life which I really love: God, my family, and baseball. The only problem - once baseball season starts, I change the order around a bit. ~Al Gallagher, 1971