Back in April, Big League Stew’s Mike Oz introduced us to the larger-than-life bobblehead version of Detroit Tigers ace Justin Verlander that actually looked more like teammate Alex Avila (and a few other major leaguers) than Verlander himself.
The bobblehead was created by Fox Sports Detroit, which ran an "April in the D" campaign featuring life-size bobbleheads of local sports stars, which included Verlander and teammate Miguel Cabrera. As Oz noted, the bobbleheads were scattered all around downtown Detroit and people were allowed to take pictures with them and I guess just watch their head bobbles back and forth in the wind.
Here’s what I find a little strange though. It wasn’t until Friday that Justin Verlander finally got to visit the large bobblehead version of himself in person. You would think that meeting would have occurred some time ago to promote the campaign, but apparently that didn't work out. Not surprisingly, a video crew was brought along for the meeting, and while Verlander joined the Fox Sports crew for their nationally televised game against the Boston Red Sox on Saturday, the awkward footage was shown.
Or maybe I should say weird footage, since that's how Verlander described the experience on the broadcast.
Also, like Oz, he didn't appear to be all that impressed with the likeness, stating, "I don't want be too hard on it. They got the facial hair right at least."
Kenny Albert and Tom Verducci attempted to save the segment by discussing how cool it must be to have your own bobblehead, with Verducci suggesting it might make for a good yard gnome. Verlander wasn't really having it, though. Cool and weird is all they got from him.
The most entertaining part of the half inning actually came when Verlander provided pseudo play-by-play on the following play.
The throwing error didn't cost Max Scherzer as he improved to 11-0 in Detroit's 10-3 win over Boston, but the last thing you want to do is make an error while your buddy is on the air talking about you. Verlander may not have buried him on TV, but you can bet he heard about it in the dugout.
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