Time for Detroit to Let The Tigers Out of the Cage

Is it time for Detroit to look at its Detroit Tigers in MLB Baseball?

As any chased rabbit can tell you, running from in front is not much fun. You can hurt yourself looking over your shoulder. And no doubt there are a few sore necks after the Chicago White Sox pounded the Detroit Tigers to gain a game in their chase.

But keep reminding yourself, folks, this is MLB Baseball, not NHL Hockey, not NBA Basketball, not, as Tigers manager Jim Leyland reminded reporters with a set jaw, ''NCAA College Football.'' The national pastime cranked up for real in Detroit with this game, foot to the pedal, hands locked on the wheel.

Sure, the Tigers have been gunning it hard since Opening Day. But it took awhile for the rest of us to hear their engines. First there were NHL Hockey Playoffs, and then there were NBA Basketball Playoffs, and then Steve Yzerman left, and then Ben Wallace left, and anyhow, all along, there was the little devil on your shoulder whispering.

''Don't believe it. They can't keep it up. They're the Tigers, remember?''

But now hockey and basketball are long over, and famous players have stopped leaving, and now there is baseball, just baseball, a groomed grass highway, for the rest of the summer.

And look who was in town, just a week after the MLB All-Star Game: The Chicago White Sox, the second-place team with the first-place image. The Sox had stumped the first-place Tigers so far this season, winning five of six games. So the challenge to the Tigers was clear.

The stage is all yours now. Prove yourself.

The skeptics are sure the Tigers' big rock candy mountain will melt into syrup under the late summer heat. How do you prove them wrong?

Easy. You win.

Can the Detroit Tigers go all the way to MLB Baseball's World Series and put the city of Detroit back on top of American Sports? Bodog has the odds, bet on Bodog today.