Posted by David Wade on Monday, October 5, 2009 at 11:34 am

With the season in the balance this past Saturday, The Detroit Tigers’ Miguel Cabrera arrived at Comerica Park with scratches and bruises on his face.  According to this article, police responded to a domestic disturbance at Cabrera’s house 13 hours before the first pitch and took the first baseman to the station for questioning.  Tigers’ G.M. Dave Dombrowski picked up Cabrera between 7:30 and 8:00 and drove him home.  Sometime between 6:30 and 7:30, Cabrera blew a .26, which means he was as still very drunk around 12 hours before that night’s first pitch.  The story also mentions that police believe Cabrera was partying all night with friends from the White Sox at their downtown hotel. 

That presumably left Cabrera with only a few hours of drunken sleep before he had to report to the ballpark for batting practice.  There is little doubt, given both the circumstances we now know, along with fairly safe conjecture based on that knowledge, that Cabrera was as hung over as a frat boy after a kegger during his 0-4 showing in that night’s game. 

I will go on out a limb here and speculate that Saturday night, though not likely spent liquored up with the boys from the Sox, could not have been easy for Cabrera, given he literally duked it out with the Mrs. early that day. 

So, with that background, it’s pretty easy to attribute Cabrera’s poor game Sunday (0-3 at the plate as well as pulling his foot off the bag at first and blowing his end of a double play attempt for no apparent reason at a crucial point in the game) to his impersonation of Frank ‘the Tank’ Friday night.

Faced with an off day today (Monday), Cabrera has the opportunity to catch up on some sleep, but will undoubtedly not rest easily as he’ll face questions from the media as well as be on the receiving end of his fans’ ire.  I’m sure many will be quick to criticize his actions, and perhaps rightfully so.  He not only got wasted before a huge game, but did so with his opponents. 

All with the season on the line. 

Cabrera is still only 26 years old and is unquestionably Detroit’s best position player (regular season of 33 home-runs and a .323/.395/.541 line).  We shouldn’t expect players to go through their careers mistake-free off the field and while people in their mid-twenties are often susceptible to making poor decisions, Cabrera’s mistake here will likely haunt him for a long tie to come. 

It usually takes a lot longer to repair a reputation than to damage one, but Cabrera does have once more chance to make up for his lapse in judgment on Tuesday and that would go a long way toward Tiger fans getting over the incident.