Tigers bats dormant in nightcap as Twins sweep doubleheader
Chris McCosky
Detroit — Long day. Regrettable day. Forgettable day.
The Tigers lost both ends of a doubleheader Saturday against the Central Division rival Twins — 11-5 in 12 innings in the opener and 4-1 in a lackluster nightcap.
Manager AJ Hinch was asked if maybe the disappointment of the fatal seven-run, 12th inning in Game 1 might've bled into the second game?
"Man, I hope not," he said. "That's a bad sign if one game like that carries over into the other. So, I don't think it did. This team is too resilient. We've talked about that as a positive. I would be very disappointed if we gave away two and a half hours in the second game because of a bad inning in Game 1.
"I'm going to go with no because I don't think that's what the DNA of this team is."
What has carried through the first three games of this series, though — played in 24 hours — is the club's offensive struggles. They managed just three earned runs in Game 1 and failed to score the free runner in the 10th inning, then were shut down for six innings by Triple-A right-hander Simeon Woods Richardson, who was called up from St. Paul as the 27th man.
"He mixed pitches and we never really centered him a ton," Hinch said. "We didn't really pressure him or put a lot of guys on base. That was a little troublesome for us."
The Tigers managed just two singles off Woods Richardson, both singles in the second inning when a sacrifice fly by Javier Báez scored the only run.
One of those hits was an infield hit with a headfirst slide into first base by rookie Wenceel Perez, his first big-league hit in his first big-league start. He also stole his first big-league base in that inning.
"It's been a dream come true to get here to the big leagues and then to get my first hit, it's just an unbelievable moment," Perez said. "But it would be better if we had won."
Woods Richardson, who made his big-league debut at Comerica Park in 2022, one of just two big-league starts, set down 14 straight hitters after the Perez single.
Perez hustled his way to a double in the seventh inning against lefty reliever Kody Funderburk, which set the Tigers up at second and third with two outs. But Twins manager Rocco Baldelli summoned right-hander Cole Sands and he got Báez to ground out to end the threat.
The Tigers managed four hits in Game 2. Worse, they struggled all series to put balls in play. They struck out 15 times against Twins pitching Friday night, 17 times in Game 1 and 10 times in the nightcap.
"That's not a recipe for more runs," Hinch said. "We're certainly more of a contact team than we've shown the last few games. We want that to be a little bit of an anomaly. But it's been the story the last couple of days. You're going to have a hard time creating innings when there is miss (swing and miss). We've got to put the ball in play to play the game. We haven't done a good job with that."
The Tigers called up right-hander Matt Manning as the 27th man to make his second start of the season and he worked into the seventh inning — which was vital after the bullpen covered six innings in Game 1.
"He was good and he continues to be good," Hinch said. "I thought his mix was good. He missed bats. He got into the game shaky with the walks, which is uncharacteristic for him, but I was proud of Matty. He wanted to stay in the game even further and we needed to stretch him as long as we could with the way the day went and the days ahead.
"He did everything we asked."
Manning, who was making his first start in nine days, was hurt by two home runs. A solo home run by Edouard Julien in the third inning and a two-run homer by former Tiger Willi Castro in the sixth dug a 4-1 hole the scuffling Tigers offense couldn’t climb out of.
"The No. 1 priority was to save the bullpen," said Manning, went 6.2 innings. "Both times I've started now the first game went extra innings. So it's just going through that mindset of, I just have to grind through these innings and keep going."
The home run balls vexed Manning in spring training, too, and were a prime factor in him not winning a spot in the rotation. Six of the eight hits he allowed in 16 spring innings were homers.
"I'm not even mad at the home run pitches," he said. "It's the game part of it."
On Castro's homer, Manning was second-guessing his decision to start with a sweeper. He'd done that in his first two at-bats.
"I started him off with the same pitch three at-bats in a row," Manning said. "So I think he was sitting on that pitch and I threw it right in that loop. I know Willi. He's told me before he can't hit my heater up (in the zone). But I threw him a pitch he was sitting on. That's just the game."
Otherwise, Manning pitched very well Saturday. He posted seven strikeouts and got 12 whiffs on 50 swings. He also got 18 called strikes, 12 with his four-seam fastball.
"Matt saved our bullpen a ton," Hinch said. "We're set up now for tomorrow. We need a good start out of Jack (Flaherty) to win the game, but we have plenty of pitchers to navigate to the end."
Chris.McCosky@detroitnews.com
@cmccosky