In Major League Baseball, the official strikezone consists of pitches that are above the batter's knees, below the batter's shoulders, and over the plate. This zone is generally more constricted in reality, as umpires rarely call the "high strike", or a pitch between the shoulders and the chest. Some umpires have even more constricted strikezones, while others have their own very interesting quirks.

Magglio Ordonez has fractured his right ankle and will be out for 6-8 weeks, meaning that he'll return at some point in September. This is, in a nutshell, the end of the Tigers playoff hopes unless they manage to come up with a bat to fill the 3-spot in the lineup, which simply isn't going to happen, as the Tigers are already at a big disadvantage to Minnesota and Chicago with regards to their depth and schedule.

Brandon Inge, greatest baseball player in the world, will miss the next 4-6 weeks after suffering a non-displaced fracture to his left hand. Roland Emmerich has already agreed to make a movie based on the occurrence.

This is the final post of a three part series evaluating the first half for the Detroit Tigers. Past posts covered the starters and relievers. This setup differs from previous posts, as we will cover player summaries for each individual player, then grades by position, then a grade and summary on the whole.

This is Part 2 of a three part series reviewing the first half for the Detroit Tigers. Part 1 covered the starting pitchers. Part 3 will cover the position players.

With their 12-9 win on Monday afternoon over the Baltimore Orioles, perhaps the second worst team of the decade (number one being the 2003 Detroit Tigers), the Tigers hold a record of 44-37 over the first 81 games of the year, meaning that we have hit the actual halfway mark in the Tigers season. This record is good for first place in the AL Central, 1/2 game over the Minnesota Twins.

In yesterday's Tigers game, as I'm sure all of you know by now, Armando Galarraga was robbed of a perfect game on an absolutely atrocious call by first base umpire Jim Joyce.

Yesterday’s Tigers game was a showcase in hitting. We saw a plethora of homeruns and both starting pitchers knocked out in the third inning. The game settled down after the bullpens for both teams came into the game and the Tigers took a 7-6 lead into the top of the fifth.

Then it rained.

And rained.

And rained.

And the game was eventually postponed.

Enter this addendum to MLB Rule 4.12(a):

No game called because of a curfew (Rule 4.12(a)(1)), weather (Rule 4.12(a)(5)), a time limit (Rule 4.12(a)(2)) or with a tied score (Rule 4.12(a)(6)) shall be a suspended game unless it has progressed far enough to have been a regulation game pursuant to Rule 4.10(c). A game called pursuant to Rules 4.12(a)(3) or 4.12(a)(4) shall be a suspended game at any time after it starts.

After Michigan football, I probably care more about the Detroit Tigers than any other team. As such, I completely despise the unbearable monstrosity of a baseball team known as the Minnesota Twins. So I didn’t shed any tears when I heard that Joe Mauer had injured his heel and would miss either part or all of the ongoing Twins-Tigers three game series. Mauer’s replacement is Wilson Ramos, a 22 year-old catcher who is getting his first stint in the Major Leagues:

Words alone cannot express how much this sucks.

One of many traits that make Major League Baseball unique among major sports in the U.S. is its unparalleled focus on the regular season. Only eight teams out of 30 make the postseason, namely 26.7% of the league. The NFL allows 37.5% of teams to go to the postseason, while the NBA and NHL allow over 50% of teams to go to the postseason. College football allows 57.1% of teams to go to the postseason, although only two teams get to play for the championship. Of course, in college football, what happens during the regular season doesn’t determine the championship game as much as a bunch of idiots, partisans, and a few analysts who have to compare teams with wildly imbalanced schedules think. College basketball, baseball, and hockey actually invite comparable percentages of teams to their tournaments, but in all three cases, many teams have virtually zero chance of making the NCAA tournament without winning their conference regardless of their record. So, basically, in baseball, the regular season is paramount.

Another important trait of Major League Baseball (unlike collegiate baseball) is the parity in the sport. Ignoring the MLS and other leagues that nobody cares about, MLB is arguably the league with the greatest parity in American sports. A top team will often win 60% of its games. A bottom team will win 40% of the time. Contrast this with the NFL, where we’ve seen teams go both undefeated and winless this year, or the NBA, where we have the Cavaliers and the Nets this year. Hockey at least has comparable parity, although statistically, baseball teams are more even.

Now, as Major League Baseball has a low percentage of teams making the postseason and a high degree of parity, three things are necessary to make a good championship system. The first is a large number of games in the regular season to differentiate teams. As each team plays 162 games, this criteria is met. The other is to ensure that the system for selecting playoff teams will take only the best teams. This is not the case by a long shot. The third is to make sure that the playoffs themselves are fair and award the most deserving team, while being entertaining. This is probably accomplished as best as is possible.

To start with the actual playoffs, the system is to have two best-of-five series for each league, then a best-of-seven series for the league championship, then the best-of-seven World Series between the American League and National League. This format is pretty good, as only playing a best-of-five in the division series keeps the playoffs shorter, which is important as overdrawn playoffs make attention from fans fall off. Meanwhile, a best-of-seven is probably the longest you can make a series in which fans will follow each game, so having best-of-seven series are acceptable for the later series. The only real criticism I have for how MLB runs the playoffs themselves is that the scheduling is irritating, as there are too many days off which draws out the playoffs unnecessarily and screws over teams that win in a sweep, as they sometimes have to wait a full week to play again. Even so, the playoffs themselves are generally as exciting as one can hope while working to fairly award a championship.

The problem with baseball is that undeserving teams often make it to the playoffs. This decade, in 2003 (Twins over Mariners), 2005 (Padres over Phillies, Mets, and Marlins), 2006 (Cardinals over Phillies), 2007 (Cubs over Mets), 2008 (Dodgers over Mets), and 2009 (Twins over Rangers), a division winner has gotten into the playoffs over a team or teams with better records. This is completely ridiculous. The whole point of the regular season is to separate teams from each other and then reward the best teams with postseason berths. Instead, we get a system where more deserving teams are routinely passed over for other teams based on little more than geography. The reason for this system is to try to get a nationwide audience for the MLB playoffs, rather than determine a legitimate champion.

Overall, the MLB playoffs aren’t that bad. Part of its problems is that it goes on at the same time as the NFL and college football seasons, and thus tries to schedule around major football games, in order to boost ratings. On the other hand, you can also say that the MLB playoffs value ratings disproportionately to crowning a champion fairly. Of course, most leagues do this, but MLB is arguably the most blatant offender in professional sports. These complaints are rather small, however, when you look at the BCS (and possibly the NCAA Basketball Tournament, should those who hate America expand it to 96 teams).

Part 1 and Part 2 for those interested.