Rod Allen: A running diary

During tonight's game, I thought I'd track the wit and wisdom that spews from the pride of the '84 Tigers, Fox Sports Detroit color man Rod Allen. So what can we expect? Piercing analysis of the blantantly obvious! Deep thoughts! Drama! Laughs! Hyberbole! Controversy! Confusion! Clichés!

I'm conservately guessing we'll also hear appoximately 62 "Marios" and 15 "Pardners."


It's 7:05, time for Mario and Rod...

1st inning

White Sox are not bashful, they come out hackin'!

This IS NOT US Cellular Field!

(Harold Baines) The pride of St Michaels, Maryland! He could hit, HB. They called him "Silent Harold!"

He's (Baines) full today though, I brought him groceries, brought him some soul food today...

He (Jeremy Bonderman) may want to put a wrinkle in one.

We wached Bonderman carve up the first 3 hitters.

2nd inning

Bonderman's pitching like the top of the rotation guy, which he is...

Anytime you're ahead of Ichiro in anything, you're doing a nice job.

He's (Ozzie Guillen) a beauty, he tells it like it is...

(About Marcus Thames tendencies) 50 knocks to left, 12 to center, and you may as well not have a right fielder...

(Looks at arrow on the telestrator) He bunts it there, he's out! HEEHAHAHA!

(Craig Monroe K's) They might need a left handed bat the remainder of this season when you run into good right handed pitching like this. (Mario agrees most heartily, brings up...Dmitri Young.)

3rd inning

(Tiger killer Joe Crede homers) He's a bad boy.

Granderson gets on his horse and surrounds the lazy fly ball.

I'm about as high as I wanna go right now.

I'm afraid of speed, don't like motorsickles.

(Curtis Granderson is HBP in the foot) That hurt. (Said 3 different times)

Mind games in this great game of baseball...

(Pudge pops up on the 1st pitch) Ahhhh!

4th inning

He (The AFLAC duck) yelling at you tonight...

(To Mario) Peoria, "Illi-noise" is where you got your start?

(Jermaine Dye) Has very long arms and a very potent bat.

Somehow, someway they (the Tigers) got to get that offense going, pardner.

He's (Javier Vasquez) paintin' that outside corner...

(Pitch bounces in front of AJ Cheaterynski) Kick save and a beauty.

5th inning

Mr. Crede has probably seen his last fastball.

(Replay of Crede's HR) A fastball that darted right into the happy zone of Mr. Crede. He's got a lot of happy zones.

He (Bonderman) threw Crede everything but the kitchen sink.

You want it bad enough....and you got the numbers, you get a chance to move up every level.

(Juan Uribe homers) They are flexing their muscles in this series.

6th inning

(Placido Polanco legs out an infield hit) Polanco really busting it down the line, he smelled it!

"Puuuge" is a smart hitter...

No ground balls, easier said than done.

(Magglio Ordonez RBI single) That's what you call a seeing eye single.

(Carlos Guillen bloop drops in) It's better to be lucky than good!

That ball in no man's land, no one can catch it.

He's (Vasquez) been changing the eye level of Thames in this at-bat.

(Monroe grand slam!) Broke out that lean going around the bases...Go ahead on baby boy!

He ka-runched it!

(Shot of Nate Robertson's rally gum) He's still chompin' on it, man! HEEHAHAHAHA!

7th inning

He's (Justin Verlander) a good Friday night pitcher! (Mario asks for statistical proof, Rod explains that colleges play on Friday nights?)

(Tiger killer Crede robs Pudge) He's nice, he's really nice down there.

8th inning

(Sox hit a looong out to RF, Mario says it's 15 rows back at US Cellular) HmmHmmm.

Wow, that play happened quickly.

When teams are evenly matched, like these are, there ain't going to be a lot of offense.

9th inning

Fasten your seat belts...

Lot of room out there for Mr. Granderson to roam around.

He's (Paul Konerko) just able to get a piece of that ball and it's almost in Pudge's glove!

1 for 7 would be lovely (On Cheaterynski), that means we wouldn't have to see Mr. Crede. (Damn Tiger killer)

Game over! Tigers 5, ChiSox 2.

It probably wasn't a must win situation...But boy, they got the monkey off their back!

Yes they did, Mr. Allen. Yes, they did.