Bless You Boys: A Season Detroit Tigers Fans Won't Soon Forget

With only a few hours before the MLB playoffs begin, I sit here thinking about the year that has transpired. Goosebumps engulfed my arms.

Tonight marks only the third time since 1984 our beloved Detroit Tigers be participating in October.

As players, they undoubtedly deserve it. As fans, we undoubtedly need this.

Our proud franchise spent more than a decade in the doldrums of baseball, developing a reputation reserved for teams like the Royals and Pirates.

During the dreadful 1990s, the Tigers shuffled through players and managers looking to put together a team that could compete, only to get the same disappointing result year after year.

Hell, only eight seasons ago the Tigers lost more games than any other team in baseball history. However, since that dreaded 2003 season, the roar has slowly been restored in the Motor City.

And as much as detractors might hate it, Dave Dombrowski is the reason the Tiger's purr became a roar. Dombrowski put the pieces in place for the Tigers to be successful. Let's quickly review:

Ivan Rodriguez's leadership and Carlos Guillen's bat arrived in 2004. Magglio Ordonez's professionalism and smooth swing arrived in 2005.

The Tigers began to win and earned some respect, but no one around the league would say that they feared the Tigers. That's when 2006 arrived.

Jim Leyland was talked out of retirement to come manage the team and a scruffy gambler named Kenny Rogers was brought on to head a very young pitching staff.

Then this happened. That memorable playoff run will definitely never be forgotten because of the dramatic way the Tigers made it to the Fall Classic.

Detroit baseball was supposed to be back and by most measures they were. However, our Motor City Kitties couldn't get over the hump. 

The 2007 team was extremely exciting (Verlander's no-hitter, Ordonez's batting title) but came up  just short to a hot Cleveland team. 

Detroit's 2008 version wildly underperformed and is immediately forgettable. 2009 brought the heartbreaking extra-inning loss to the Minnesota Twins.

And 2010's late season collapse had Tiger's fans reeling (a sick feeling just came over me).

Coming into 2011, I believe fans were cautiously optimistic about the team's chances. Two straight seasons of disappointing endings left Tiger's followers holding their cards close to their chest.

After a disappointing April left Detroit three games below .500, many writers (including this one) was calling for Jim Leyland's head. We screamed that his lineups were ridiculous, his decisions were dated, and he no longer connected with the team.

I'm now happy to say that it seemed that our boys just weren't warmed up to the chilly Detroit spring.

However, as the temperatures started to rise towards the end of the first month, so did the Tigers.

On May 7th, when most of the country was watching the Kentucky Derby, the Tigers got the heat wave they needed, led by the inferno brought on by the nearly perfect no-hitter tossed by Justin Verlander.

As temperatures continued to tick upwards with summer's arrival, the Tigers were in the thick of the AL Central race with the surprising Cleveland Indians and ever-pesky Chicago White Sox.

June also saw the end of the Phil Coke experiment (thankfully), and the nation learned about a special player named Alex Avila.

After the no-no, Verlander immediately became a baseball superstar and his perfect 6-0 June backed up his claim for baseball's best pitcher.

Heading into July, the Tigers took the divisional lead just before the All-Star game and you could feel the Detroit bandwagon starting to get awfully crowed.

Facebook and Twitter were abuzz with every fan's opinion about how the starting lineup should look, who they should trade for and even the on-going battle to decide if Rod Allen is actually a good broadcaster.

Tigers fans everywhere embraced their team as they sent five representatives (Avila, Cabrera, Peralta, Valverde and Verlander) and booed enormously when the ever-annoying Joe Buck introduced the Seattle Mariners rather than the Tigers.

As the dog days of summer set in across the baseball world, the Tigers found themselves with too many question marks pull away from the rest of the division.

In a bold move to bolster the bottom of the lineup, Dombrowski traded for Wilson Betemit of the Royals, which forced the enigmatic Brandon Inge (struggling to even hit his weight) down to Triple-A Toledo to work out his problems.

This solution was bubble gum to the glaring hole of the team: the pitching rotation.

The acquisition of Doug Fister from the Seattle Mariners not only plugged this hole, but reinforced the entire pitching staff.

Since "Doug-E-Fresh" joined the pitching staff, the Tigers have developed a 1-2-3 punch of Verlander, Fister and Max Scherzer that is as formidable as any in baseball.

The final addition of Delmon Young from the Twins in August (and the September recall of Brandon Inge) seemed to make the Tigers complete.

Then came September. The month all Tigers' fans dread. Two straight season of unforgettable collapses left fans sitting on their hands as the boys in blue failed to strengthen their minuscule division lead.

Then it happened.

When looking back at this memorable season, there is no doubt the 12 game winning streak will be what Tigers fans talk about for years.

This winning streak, complete with the annihilation of the White Sox (on national TV) and demoralization of the Indians, led to the Tigers being the first team in baseball to clinch a playoff birth.

After the 2006 playoff berth left a sour taste in many fans' mouths, by losing our way into the Wild Card, the triumphant feeling of winning our first divisional championship will always be cherished.

But didn't this feeling subside quickly, like this year's team was meant for more?

Individually this team has all the makings of a champion. Verlander is no doubt the Cy Young winner and Miguel Cabrera winning the batting title solidifies his place as an elite hitter in the game.

Alex Avila developed into perhaps the game's best catcher and Victor Martinez showed that he is dangerous as ever (especially with runners in scoring position and two out).

We have an excellent line up, a deep bullpen, and the most exciting closer in the game. Regardless of how this playoff run develops, this will be a season I will never forget.

The idea that over the next month we could add another iconic memory into our minds. Who doesn't want to see the "Big Potato's" save dance after clinching the pennant?

Let these thoughts provoke you to into clapping longer, screaming louder and filling every social media tool at your disposal with unabashed Tigers' statuses and tweets.

Here's to making this a month that we'll live to tell our grandchildren about. The time is now. Go Tigers!