The Detroit Tigers bullpen put together a really impressive game as six different relievers handled the Rangers without much trouble. Meanwhile, Spencer Torkelson supplied some power, and a parade of soft hits that found holes helped them pile up the runs and win this series two games to one on Sunday night.
The Tigers have a penchant for making a series of odd but ultimately inconsequential moves, and we got an interesting set on Sunday before this game got underway. Zack Short was added to the 40-man
roster, RHP Grant Holman was designated for assignment, Short was called up, and Jace Jung was sent back to Triple-A Toledo. Explanation? I’m not sure I have one for you.
Gleyber Torres is day-to-day with what sounds like a minor oblique strain, so the Tigers need help at second base, but Jace Jung has always been a second baseman and only recently switched to playing mostly first base. If he can’t play second base, it’s hard to explain why he wasn’t the one DFA’d, particularly as the pitching staff being banged up is a bigger concern, but these were choices, and they were made. So Zack Short is here to mostly ride the bench for a few days while Torres tries to get his side loosened up. Zach McKinstry is healthy and should be back any day now, and a pitcher they liked enough to claim three weeks ago in Grant Holman was cut loose, soon to be followed by Shorty again.
Meanwhile, the Tigers would go with a bullpen game in Casey Mize’s regular spot, with left-hander Tyler Holton leading the way. And Hao-Yu Lee started at second base.
Tyler Holton has been shaky early on this season, but he actually has a bit more velocity than usual, sitting 91-92 mph more consistently. Brandon Nimmo greeted him with a single up the middle to start the game, but Andrew McCutcheon flew out shallowly to Wenceel Pérez in right field. Holton spun four straight well located sweepers in to Corey Seager and struck him out. That was nice to see, and that was also the end of Holton’s outing. Having faced the tough left-handed Seager, he gave way to right-hander Brenan Hanifee. Pitching chaos is back for an encore, though probably a short one.
Hanifee got ahead of Josh Jung 0-2, but then a sinker up got slapped to right field for a single. He got ahead of Jake Burger 0-2 as well, and this time finished him off with a good slider for strike three.
Jack Leiter was on the mound for Texas, and he quickly popped out Kevin McGonigle on a first pitch fastball, continuing a peculiar trend with McGonigle the last few games, and punched out a scuffing Matt Vierling, and then Colt Keith as well.
Hanifee got the left-handed Evan Carter to ground out to Keith at third. Hanifee got ahead of Duran with good sinkers, and then got a groundout to McGonigle for the second out. A good changeup to the left-handed hitting Josh Smith got a weak flyout to end the inning as Brant Hurter started getting loose. So the lynchpin of the strategy at this point appeared to be getting a left-handed reliever in against Corey Seager, and otherwise just play it by ear.
Young Mr. Leiter, son of Al, of course, was looking about the best I’ve seen him to start this one, and that didn’t bode well for the Tigers early on. He bullied his way trhough Riley Greene, Spencer Torkelson, and Kerry Carpenter with a mix of well located 98 mph heaters and good sliders and curveballs.
Hanifee quickly got catcher Kyle Higashioka to fly out, and then gave way to Brant Hurter as the top of the Rangers order came up for the second time with Nimmo and Seager both hitting left-handed with McCutcheon between them. Hurter dispatched Nimmo with well located sinker up for a called strike three. Hurter threw his sweeper and changeup for strikes against McCutcheon, keeping the sinker out of the zone. In a 2-2 count, a sinker up got a pop-up to Lee at second base. So far, the plan was going according to, err, the plan.
Leiter continued to function as a precision buzzsaw in the third. Pérez grounded out, and Lee whiffed at 99 just off the outer edge after falling behind in the count. Jake Rogers lifted a routine fly ball, and it was on to the fourth. A tendency to hang breaking balls has hurt Leiter’s numbers early this season, but there was no sign of that yet and he was getting ahead in count after count early on, retiring all nine Tigers the first time through the order.
That’s fine though, we have Brant Hurter. The big lefty carved up Seager on three pitches, whiffing him on a sweeper for the strikeout. Jung popped out to Torkelson down the right field line. Hurter was hitting all his spots as well, getting a pair of whiffs on good changeups from Burger. The meat patty in question fought off another changeup, and took a fourseamer up and away from a 1-2 count. Hurter missed with a sweeper, and then got a routine grounder to third for the final out.
Leiter finally missed with strike one to McGonigle, but worked back ahead in the count. Kevin missed a meatball of a curve right down the middle and fouled it off. Eventually, a high fastball got a weak fly out to retire McGonigle. Vierling got ahead 2-1, but grounded out on a slider down and away. Keith got a first pitch ball, but Leiter dropped a changeup on the inside corner down. Keith blew a challenge on that and was wrong, and eventually lined out to center field. 12 up, 12 down.
Hurter remained up to the challenge, quickly getting a soft grounder from Carter to start the fifth. McGonigle made a nice play charging that one to get the out. Two more good pitches got Duran on a roller than McGonigle again read and reacted to perfectly to get the speedy baserunner. Smith singled to right field with two outs. Hurter missed up and away with two sinkers against Higashioka, and walked the catcher on four straight pitches. This was the first trouble for either side in the game. Hurter missed with a sweeper against Nimmo, and that was five straight balls from the big lefty. Ricky Vanasco was warming, but the Tigers wanted Hurter to get through Nimmo, McCutcheon, and Seager again, ideally. Hurter fell behind 2-1, but a good sinker got a soft tapper back to Hurter, and he tossed to Torkelson to escape the jam.
Leiter finally showed a sign of weakness, walking Riley Greene on four straight pitches to lose the perfect game attempt. You can’t show weakness around a Tigers. Ok, frankly it doesn’t matter what you do if a Tiger is coming after you, but I digress…Two fastballs for strikes to Torkelson followed, but you remember what I said earlier about the occasional mistake hanger? Leiter hung a slider up in the zone 0-2, and Torkelson crushed it to left for a two-run shot. 2-0 Tigers.
Carpenter struck out, and McCutcheon made a great play on a drive from Pérez to right. Lee fouled off a pair of fastballs to fall behind 0-2, and a slider down and away got the whiff. Still, the Tigers had one hit but it was the one that counted in this one so far.
McCutcheon singled up the middle on a first pitch sinker to start the sixth. That brought up Seager, with Vanasco ready to take over afterwards. Hurter got ahead 0-2 and got a grounder to Torkelson who turned a slick 3-6-3 double play, and that was well as Vanasco has only a handful of major league innings with the Dodgers and Tigers. Really nice throw to second from Tork on that one. Hurter finished with three innings of scoreless ball and a fine job overall.
Vanasco is a long-strider with big extension, sitting 94-95 mph with a pretty average fastball, but he packs a really good power curve and a quality changeup. He got Smith to ground one to McGonigle’s left, but the shortstop threw it away despite having plenty of time. Would Vanasco crumble? No, he got ahead of Burger and then was supposed to throw a fastball up and away. Instead, he sprayed a 95 mph heater under Burger’s hands and got the whiff anyway. Nicely done. Vanasco still hasn’t given up a run this year.
Leiter got up 0-2 on Jake Rogers, but the Tigers catcher smoked a line drive to center field. Carter dove and missed on it and the ball rolled deep toward the wall as Rogers cruised around to third with a triple. Leiter got ahead of McGonigle 0-2 as well, but Leiter hung a changeup and Kevin did Kevin things, lining an RBI single to right field. 3-0 Tigers. Viering took a called strike three. Keith chopped one back to Leiter and he made a nice barehanded play to barely throw out the Tigers’ third baseman. Riley Greene grounded out, and we were on to the seventh.
Vanasco got Carter on a routine flyout to open the seventh, but Duran reached out and flicked a curveball on the outer edge just fair down the left field line for a double. Vanasco walked Smith, and then yanked a fastball that Rogers couldn’t quite corral, advancing the runners to second and third. Fortunately, he bounced back with a pair of well located fastballs to Highashioka, and eventually got a nubber down to Torkelson for the second out, though Duran scored. So it was a 2-1 game, and Kyle Finnegan was warmed up, but Vanasco stayed soft against Nimmo and got a foul tip into the glove with a nice changeup for strike three. 3-1 Tigers. There was nothing hard hit, and Vanasco struck out two while collecting four outs. Perfectly fine return to the major leagues for him.
Leiter was at 81 pitches coming out to start the bottom of the seventh. Torkelson battled him through a long at-bat eventually struck out. Carpenter watched Leiter shift to soft stuff and was ready for a first pitch changeup, flicking a little line drive single to right field. Leiter missed with three straight to Pérez, but grounded one to first on a play that Burger bobbled, but then recovered to get the out. Leiter was now at 95 pitches as Hao-Yu Lee dug into the batter’s box. Lee got behind 0-2, but took a pair of balls and then chopped one off of Smith’s glove at second and into right field for an RBI single. 4-1 Tigers.
That was it for Leiter, as old friend Todd the Painter, aka Tyler Alexander took over. Impressive stuff from Leiter, but he still just has that little flaw of a budding ace who sometimes goes a little haywire at the first sign of adversity. Still, he punched out 10 Tigers, and there were at best three hard hit balls all night. Nice job by the Tigers of battling him and coming through on their few opportunities.
Jake Rogers and Alexander nodded to one another as old battery mates. Jake then dumped a bloop single into right field as Lee raced from first to third. Kevin McGonigle pulled a bouncer down the right field line and over Burger for an RBI single. McGonigle feels like he’s in a tiny slump the last few games and it’s still 1 or 2 hits and an RBI every night. Ridiculous.
Rogers purposefully made a big turn around third base, attracting Burger’s attentions, and the Rangers bought it, throwing to third, where they really had no shot. Rogers was easily back safe, and McGonigle adroitly understood the assignment, sprinting to second base. That cost the Rangers a run, as Matt Vierling floated a dying quail into shallow right center field and just out of Carter’s reach. Both runs scored, and suddenly it was 7-1 after Colt Keith grounded out to end the inning.
You know what they say, if you can’t hit it really hard, hit it really soft. This principle applied to the whole inning.
Kyle Finnegan struck out a pinch-hitting Alejandro Osuna to start the eighth. Corey Seager singled, but Jung grounded into a force of Seager at second, escaping a double play only after challenging the call at first base successfully. Burger flew out to Vierling in center to end the frame.
Gavin Collyer took over from Alexander in the bottom of the eighth, whiffing Greene on a cutter to start things off and then striking out Torkelson as well. Carpenter fought off a slew of two strike pitches and worked the count full, but eventually popped out on the infield to send this to the ninth.
Burch Smith took over to close this out, and got Carter to fly out to Greene to start the inning. Matt Vierling made a nice diving play on a Duran sinking line drive for the second out. Josh Smith hit a little flare to left and Greene had to go to the ground and it rattled in and out of his glove for a single. Smith regrouped and got Higashioka on a groundout to Lee to put this one away.
The Tigers are 18-17, and welcome in the Boston Red Sox starting on Monday night. The entire AL Central is currently bunched within three games of one another.
We’d like to extend our heartfelt congratulations to the Detroit Pistons who rallied back from a 3-1 deficit to defeat the Orlando Magic at Little Caesar’s Arena on Sunday afternoon. Heck of a comeback.
