Rogers's Turnabout Continues
Lefty Dominant Again as Tigers Hold On and Get Even: Tigers 3, Cardinals 1

By Dave Sheinin
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, October 23, 2006

DETROIT, Oct. 22 -- The television cameras zoomed in on Kenny Rogers during Game 2 of the World Series, close-ups peering deep into his eyes as he stood on the mound at Comerica Park, hand-helds practically in his face, like prying demons, documenting each brisk, determined jog back to the dugout following another scoreless inning. If he noticed them at all, or if he considered the correlation, it was not apparent. Rogers -- the new Kenny Rogers, October hero, model citizen -- was focused on delivering his Detroit Tigers a victory they desperately needed.

Rogers did just that, in spectacular fashion, pitching eight dazzling, two-hit innings in the Tigers' 3-1 win over the St. Louis Cardinals on a chilly but electric Michigan night. The World Series is now tied at a game apiece as the production shifts to St. Louis for Game 3 on Tuesday night.

The feel-good story of Rogers's redemption, perhaps the overriding plotline of this postseason, continued to delight the heart and confound the mind. Once an outcast, a shover of cameramen, a washed-up journeyman who almost couldn't find a job in 2003, he is now a 41-year-old beloved teammate and unhittable out machine.

His eight stellar innings Sunday night extended his string of consecutive scoreless innings this postseason to 23, and if the series returns to Comerica Park for a Game 6 next weekend Rogers will take aim at the great Christy Mathewson's 1905 record of 27 for a single postseason.

"I'm no Christy Mathewson, that's for sure," Rogers said. The performance, he said, was "very satisfying, mainly because it's needed. Our team needed to win today, and I know it was huge."

And yet, there is a nagging question, a delicious bit of intrigue -- still partially unresolved after the game -- regarding Rogers's performance Sunday night: What, exactly, was the dark substance that Fox's prying cameras appeared to have detected on his left palm during the first inning -- and why, after an inquiry by Cardinals Manager Tony La Russa and an apparent intervention by the umpires, was it gone an inning later?

Rogers's answer: "It was dirt and I wiped it off." Rogers added that he did so on his own, with no prompting by the umpires.

The Cardinals' viewpoint, courtesy of second baseman Aaron Miles: "Somebody said they thought they saw pine tar. So he got rid of it, or he never had it in the first place." La Russa declined to discuss the incident.

The umpires' take: "There had been some question [about] the dirt that was on Kenny's hand," said MLB Umpire Supervisor Steve Palermo. "So the umpires . . . asked that Kenny just clean that dirt off, so that there wouldn't be any question [about] any foreign substance or dirt or whatever it may have been on the ball."

The rule book's interpretation: "No player shall intentionally discolor or damage the ball by rubbing it with soil, rosin . . . or other foreign substance," says Rule 3.02. The penalty: "The umpire shall . . . remove the offender from the game." (Palermo said the umpires did not believe Rogers had discolored or otherwise altered the ball intentionally.)

The bottom line: Whatever it was on his hand, Rogers did not seem to miss it when it was gone.

It was a night for knit hats, parkas and blankets among the 42,533 towel-waving fans -- a crisp 44 degrees at first pitch with a gusting wind of up to 30 mph. But Rogers pitched with just half-sleeves beneath his classic Tigers uniform, with the Olde English "D" on the breast.

And when he took the mound Sunday night, he was the same driven, emotional, untouchable cannonball who has come to be familiar to baseball fans in this, his month of redemption, as he dominated the New York Yankees and Oakland Athletics in earlier series.

At the end of each inning, having handcuffed three more batters with his assortment of modest but deceptive pitches, he was greeted in his dugout by a line of teammates with their hands outstretched, and Rogers offered up his glove hand, never his bare pitching hand, to each one.

"What he's done the last three weeks," said Tigers closer Todd Jones, "really separates him in my mind as one of the dominant and impressive pitchers I've ever played with."

By the time Rogers retired David Eckstein on a ground ball to open the top of the sixth inning, Rogers's postseason scoreless streak was up to 20 1/3 innings -- an interesting demarcation point, since one of Rogers's infamous legacies before this month was the fact that in his first 20 1/3 postseason innings, dating from 1996 to 2003, he allowed a staggering 20 earned runs.

And when he coaxed a double-play grounder from Eckstein to end the eighth, he let out a giant roar as he pivoted and headed back to the dugout for what turned out to be the final time on Sunday. When the ninth inning began, it was Jones, the closer, on the mound for the Tigers, and he nearly undid all of Rogers's wonderful work. With two outs, he gave up the Cardinals' first run, then loaded the bases -- helped by his own error on a comebacker -- before coaxing a game-ending ground ball from Yadier Molina. It was a messy save by a pitcher who has made them an art form.

"He's going to take a little [fielding] practice before he gets on the bus tonight," Tigers Manager Jim Leyland said. "That was not good."

Rogers's teammates accumulated all the runs he would need in the first inning off Cardinals starter Jeff Weaver, as about 800 feet of long drives -- Craig Monroe's solo homer to left, his fifth of the postseason, and Carlos Guillen's RBI double deep into the gap in left-center -- gave the Tigers an early 2-0 lead.

For the next seven innings, slugger Albert Pujols and the Cardinals' offense would never bring the go-ahead run to the plate against Rogers. They could barely touch him. He was brilliant, dominant, his hardened shell impenetrable, even when the television cameras got so close, zoomed in so tight, it seemed as if they were trying to bore straight to his soul.