Royal Sweep the Tigers in Historic Fashion

To start the season, the Kansas City Royals swept the Detroit Tigers in their three game series. This is only the second time in 28 years they've opened the season with a sweep and only the fourth in their franchise history that dates back to 1969. The last time they started out 3-0 was in 2003 when they opened the season with nine straight wins. They finished that year with 83 wins.

What's more impressive is that they held the Tigers to just 5 runs over the three game span. In all the three-game series' between the two, the Royals kept the Tigers to five runs only twice (2002 and 1988). Of the Tigers who played that series in 2002, only one batter had ever been on an All Star team (Robert Fick 1). This season's Tigers? A combined 41 All Star appearances (Ivan Rodriguez 14, Gary Sheffield 9, Magglio Ordonez 6, Edgar Renteria 5, Miguel Cabrera 4, Carlos Guillen 2, Placido Polanco 1).

That's a bad start to the season for the Tigers -- not to mention they now have the second highest payroll in baseball with $138,685,197 on the books.