Better. I don’t know if I can go so far as to say it was good, but that was definitely better. Detroit‘s offense still seems pretty stagnant. If there was any pitcher that you felt like they had a chance to get right against, it would’ve been former Tiger Gas Can Chris Paddack. Unfortunately, Paddack was able to put together a quality start, putting together six innings and only giving up two earned runs. It felt like Detroit had a chance to tack on early with a rally in the second inning, and they were only able to score one. After that, their only offense came off a Javier Báez solo home run.
But the story this evening was the pitching. Keider Montero, making his second start of the season, filling in for the injured Justin Verlander, put together one of the best performances of his career. He’s been put in some pretty awkward positions over the last few years because he’s never really had a spot promised to him in that five-man rotation, but he has had his moments as a member of the Tigers. His stuff looked legitimately great when he pitched in the WBC, and I felt like that carried over to tonight. He’s always been able to pitch. I just think that he struggled to find an effective strikeout pitch. Tonight, it felt like he had everything working. I thought the offspeed stuff was brilliant, and he was locating his sinker.
I’m not going to start feeling good about this tiger’s offense until I see them put together a big-time inning where they add 4 or 5 runs. There continues to be too many stops and starts, and they’re very lucky that the pitching was brilliant tonight, or else it might’ve been a sixth straight loss. But given how this team has been playing, I can’t necessarily focus on that now. You can’t start a winning streak until you win one, and the Tigers were at least able to get back in the W column this evening.
Detroit's solid start to the season at Comerica Park does inspire some confidence. The Tigers will hope to turn this whole winning thing into a trend tomorrow as Casey Mize takes the mound against Jansen Junk.