The Detroit Tigers are feeling pretty good about themselves.
Their bats have woken up to bring them back to respectability after a 4-2 win over the Royals on Friday night. The team was buoyed by another sixth inning home run by Delmon Young. It was the second straight game Young homered in the bottom of the sixth inning and the second straight game the Tigers came alive late in a ball game.
On Saturday at 4:05 p.m. ET will be game two of their series with the Royals and Doug Fister will take the mound against Bruce Chen. Fister's return from the disabled list has been up-and-down after he followed a six-inning shutout in his first game back on June 16 with 14 earned runs over his next 8 1/3 innings.
"I think it's just a matter of fine-tuning it," said Fister to MLB.com. "Just focusing on getting on top of the ball and driving through it instead of trying to get on the side of it and trying to make it do too much."
"I can't attest to knocking rust off," he said. "It's just a matter of I need to get some momentum and really just make my pitches."
Fister is 1-6 with a 4.61 ERA this season while Chen is 7-7 with a 4.83 ERA.
For more on the Detroit Tigers and the Kansas City Royals, check out their respective SB Nation blogs at Bless You Boys and Royals Review. More news and analysis on MLB can be found over at Baseball Nation.