Athletics at Tigers Series Preview
Hitting the Motor City for a series with a best record in baseball Tigers
A day off should help reset this club. Travel day was spent traveling to Michigan and now the Athletics are welcomed to Detroit by the Tigers for what will be the first of three weekday games. The Tigers are one of the best team’s in the league but are just 5-5 over their past 10 games. Can the A’s win a series against the team with the best record in the sport?
- Tigers W/L record: 49-30 (1st in AL Central)
- Run differential: +82
- Team OPS: .742 (6th of 30)
- Team ERA: 3.50 (5th of 30)
Detroit’s rebuild is finally paying off as their record is the best in all of baseball. While they’ve been led by outfielder Riley Greene and Spencer Torkelson on offense, the Tigers have gotten great production up and down the lineup from many contributors. Manager AJ Hinch has pushed all the right buttons as far as the position players go. There won’t be many easy outs for A’s pitchers in this series.
Their pitching staff has been just as productive as their lineup. Last year’s Cy Young award winner Tarik Skubal is building off that awesome season this year, and former 1st overall pick Casey Mize is living up to his potential in what is looking like his breakout year. They’ve dealt with some injuries in the back half of their rotation but overall the team’s pitching has kept up with its strong offense. Their weak link is in the bullpen, where they rank middle of the pack in most stats. The Athletics’ game plan should be to drive the starter’s pitch counts up high and fast and get into their relief corps.
Luis Severino will kick things off for the A’s in tonight’s series opener. The veteran righty has had a roller coaster of a first season with the Green & Gold, seeing his ERA swing between mid-to-low 3’s to high 4’s. He’s had five starts allowing five or more runs, but he’s also had nine starts of 2 or less runs allowed. For the year he has a 4.42 ERA and is coming off a pair of quality outings.
The Tigers meanwhile have one of the best pitchers on the entire planet set to start tonight’s contest. Right-hander Tarik Skubal is having another fantastic season, even better than last year’s Cy Young campaign. He’s on his way to his second straight award but maybe the A’s can throw a stick in the mud and be a bump in the road for him. He’s made eight career starts against the A’s and has a 2.60 ERA against the team. Who takes the first game between these two Opening Day starters?
Wednesday’s matchup will be left-hander Jacob Lopez for the A’s versus Jack Flaherty for the Tigers. Lopez has been on a roll of late. After getting hit hard in back-to-back appearances the rookie has made three starts and allowed just one run in 16 frames. During those three starts he’s struck out 23 batters compared to six walks. His development has been an under-the-radar development for the club but he’s continuing to cement himself in the starting rotation and becoming a much more reliable option for the squad. He’ll bring a 4.25 ERA into Wednesday and a quality outing could drop that number into the 3’s.
Flaherty meanwhile is having a much harder second season with Detroit. His first-half last year was fantastic, but with the Tigers falling out of playoff contention at the time they elected to flip him to the Dodgers at the Trade Deadline. He scuffled a bit with LA before hitting the open market and finding his way back into a Tigers uniform. It’s been a rough ride this year as he’s posted a 4.83 ERA through 15 starts.
Wrapping up the series on Thursday morning for the A’s will be left-hander Jeffrey Springs. For the most part the lefty has turned his season around after a tough start to his Athletics career. He was the team’s best pitcher in May (outside of one blowup outing) and has been much more consistent in recent outings. He’ll take a 4.24 ERA into what will be his 17th outing of the year.
Detroit on the other hand has yet to reveal their starting pitcher for the series finale, so that will be something worth monitoring over the next couple days.