Tigers are full-grown, Cubs are not. Perhaps this outcome was inevitable.

illustration by Samara Pearlstein This was such a good series. I mean, we always want to see the Tigers win, and we always want to see them sweep series, and we always want to see them give the hometown crowd some quality entertainment, but for some reason it was even better when the opponent was the Cubs. Maybe because anticipation was running so high for this series? And all of the games were wicked close, so it was good baseball all 'round. I don't know. This series gave me a little spring in my typin' fingers, put a smile on my face, cliche cliche, etc. In fact, this is how happy it made me: Just look at that smile. Arrrrmando finally gets a win! The last time he managed to hang a W on his name was back in April, so this is heartening, heart-warming, encouraging, etc. He was far from perfect-- after that first inning I thought we were going to see a performance that would make his continued presence in the starting rotation Highly Awkward-- but he was good enough to out-duel Ted Lilly, and that's the main thing. When he came out of the game he got an enormous hug from Rick Knapp in the dugout, much to the delight of Rod and Mario and all right-thinking people everywhere. By the by, did you know that Ted Lilly's full name is actually Theodore Roosevelt Lilly THE THIRD? He and Frederick Alfred Porcello THE THIRD ought to start a club, or maybe a support group. Magglio hit a two-run homer in this one and was 2-for-4 last night, making him 3-for-8 with 2 RBI in the Post-Hair Era. This is plainly terrifying. Now he has reason to believe that the... the shearing had the desired effect, i.e. it was a slumpbusting move, and lo, the slump has been rendered bust. We don't want to encourage this! First Fernando cuts off his triangular pharaoh beard, then Nate kills his huge sideburns before they even have a chance to grow properly, and now Magglio removes a priceless work of art. Actually I feel that this string of bad decisions dates back to last season, when Brandon Inge did this. SIGH. Ramon Santiago also hit a homerun today, bringing his total for the season up to five, that being two more than Magglio now has. At the start of the year, who would have predicted that, by late June, Ramon Santiago would have more homeruns than Magglio Ordonez? Nobody, that's who, excepting possibly Ramon Santiago's mom. Since we're on the topic of homeruns anyways, we may as well address one of the few :( moments from Thursday's game: the Miguel Cabrera Lost Homerun. If you didn't see it, the ball hit the outfield fence rail in front of the seats, well above the wall and the yellow line. Because it hit the fencing, it dribbled down the wall and ended up back in the field of play, where it was called a double. For some reason Leyland didn't challenge it, even though instant replay definitely would have given Miggy the HR. For a short period of time, when the game was 3-2 Cubs, it seemed like it was going to be a big deal. Miggy did homer in the Wednesday game, and all's well that ends well, I guess, but he was robbed, yo. Rough. Oh, I suppose we also owe a small tip of the cap to the bullpen, who were used a crazy lot in this series (every single reliever except for Freddy Dolsi pitched on Wednesday) and did not, in general, Ruin Everything. Fernando made things dicey today by getting too cute and giving up a homerun and a double, as is his way, but he managed to scrape the save, keeping him deceptively perfect in that stupid category. I think I have trust issues when it comes to Tigers closers. Just as a side note, do you know how many errors the Tigers committed in this series? That would be a grand total of ZERO. I don't know what it is about the Cardinals, but it just gets creepier and creepier the more it looks like the problem really is with the Cardinals. Now the Cats are off to Houston, for THE AWESOMELY AWKWARD PUDGE RODRIGUEZ REUNION! I want to see him and G-Money exchanging stilted, uncomfortable smalltalk on the field. FSND, you know what you must do.