Drew VerHagen is probably someone none of you know as a
Tiger. He was drafted out of Vanderbilt
where he helped them to a NCAA title. He
has been performing very well in our minors including a 3.67 ERA in 19 starts
in Toledo in 2014. The rightie was
called up to the Detroit and made his major league debut on July 19 in
Cleveland. The Tiges had just taken 2
from the Dodgers, and then 3 out of 4 against the Royals before heading to
Cleveland. The Tiges dropped 3 out of 4
against the Tribe and Drew started the second game of the series. He lasted 5 innings and gave up 3 runs on 5
hits. He also walked 3 and K’d 4. But the Tiger bats scored only 1 run in those
5 innings and Drew got tagged with a loss.
That was his only game to date as Tiger. He went on the DL after that and finished the 2014 season on the DL with a back. Maybe he will be part of the Tiger bull pen in
2015.
Brad Thomas has a very international flair to his baseball
career ending as a Tiger. Brad was born
in Australia in 1977. He played for
Australia in the Sydney Olympics in 2000.
In 2001 he made his major league debut as a Minnesota Twin. He started 5 games that season for the Twins
but was 0-2 with a 9.37 ERA. He spent
2002 pitching for AAA Edmonton in Canada.
He was back with the Twins in 2003 and 2004 pitching in 6 games for the
Twins. He was 0-1 for the two seasons
combined. In 2005 and 2006 he pitched in
Japan. In 2007 he was pitching in the
Seattle Mariners organization but went to Venezuela to pitch winter ball. This was followed by 2008 and 2009 when he
pitched in Korea. In 2010 he signed with
the Tigers. He had his best year in the
majors in 2010 when he was 6-2 with a 3.89 ERA.
His first win came against his old team, the Twins, when he replaced Max
Scherzer in the 4th with the Tiges trailing 6-1. The Tiges came back and scored 9 runs over
the next couple of innings while Brad blanked the Twins. After 2.1 innings of relief Brad was relieved
by Phil Coke. The final score was 11-6
Tiges with Brad the winner. Brad
returned to the Tiges in 2011 but his role was diminished. He appeared in only 12 games as opposed to
the 49 he appeared in during 2010. His
record was 0-1 with a 9.00 ERA. At the
end of the season he refused a minor league assignment by the Tigers and became
a free agent but has not played pro ball since.
Chick Lathers was a Tiger 100 years before Brad Thomas was a
Tiger. Chick was born in Dearborn, MI as
Charles Ten Eyck Lathers. He went to
Detroit Central High School and later the University of Michigan in 1909. He signed with the Tigers and played with
them in 1910 at the age of 21. He got in
41 games and hit .232 playing second, third and short as a back up. In 1911 he returned and hit .222 playing
first, second, third and short in 29 games as a back up. 1912 found Chick playing with the Providence
Grays of the International League. He
hit .313 and led the team in hits with 172.
But that was Chick’s last time playing pro ball. He went to run his own dairy farm for years
and died in Petoskey, MI in 1971.
Dan O’Leary is a colorful character who played one season
with the Detroit Wolverines. Dan’s exact
year of birth is in question. He was
famous for telling grand stories of himself.
He identified his birth year as 1856 later in his career. But this appears unlikely when compared to
the rest of his life. He was born in
Detroit but moved to Chicago when as a fire fighter in Detroit his company went
to help put out the Great Chicago Fire of 1871.
If Dan was born in 1856 he was 15 at the time of the fire. While not unheard of, it is not very
likely. He started in baseball back in
Detroit in 1876 with the Cass club. In
1877 he may have started in Detroit as President of the Cass club and catcher
but by the end of the season he was in Minneapolis playing for the Browns. He made the majors with Providence Grays of
the National League in 1879. He was in two games and went 3 for 7 getting 2
RBI’s and scoring a run. He was in
Boston in 1880 and was in 3 games there.
In 1881 he made it back to Detroit with the Wolverines. But he only appeared in 2 games and went 0
for 8 with 2 K’s. He also dropped a fly
ball in the eighth that led to a Providence come back and victory over the
Wolverines. Dan also claimed to have
found Hall of Fame slugger Sam Thompson.
Dan claimed to have found him playing for the local Danville nine while
managing in Indianapolis and signed him to a contract with Indy and then sold
him to Detroit the following year.
However, records show Sam was signed by Indy from Evansville where he
had been playing under contract and then sold to Detroit. In the end Dan played a total of 32 games over
5 years with 5 teams and had a .243 batting average.
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