Wily veteran Kyle Hendricks kept the Tigers down all night and a late rally fell short.
After a thrilling 9th inning power surge to take Game 2 last night, the Detroit Tigers started tonight going for the clinch of the four-game series. They sent veteran RHP Jack Flaherty to the bump opposite struggling, so-veteran-we-thought-he-retired RHP Kyle Hendricks. If Detroit is successful, this would be their first series victory on the road versus the Angels in over 15 years, so more history could be in the making, albeit less impressive than Riley Greene’s 9th inning heroics.
Never a hard thrower, Hendricks has firmly progressed to the “junk balling righty” phase of his career, to little success, Unfortunately, nobody told the Tigers this pre-game and they went 1-2-3 on 11 pitches. Flaherty was slightly less effective, but the only damage was a leadoff single to the antagonistic Zach Neto. No real threat in the 1st.
The Tigers got a runner on in the 2nd from a Riley Greene single, but a Colt Keith fielder’s choice and a Spencer Torkelson double play kept the Tigers off the board. There wasn’t any hard contact to be found so far. Flaherty gave up a leadoff double to backup catcher Travis d’Arnaud. He almost got out of it, but a 2-out error on a miscommunication and collision between Greene and Kerry Carpenter let d’Arnaud score, 1-0 Angels. Flaherty quickly recovered, but it wasn’t a great start for the Tigers.
The soft contact continued for Hendricks, as Jace Jung popped out and Trey Sweeney grounded out to short. Dillon Dingler made a bid with a long drive to the warning track in right field, but got just under it for the third out. That made 3 innings on 29 pitches for Kyle Hendricks. Flaherty responded with a 3-pitch K of Neto – the benches stayed put this time – and another K ended the inning. LA left a 1-out single stranded, and despite the miscue, Flaherty was only at 44 pitches through 3, so he was in good shape himself.
Hendricks continued to get soft contact with 85 MPH fastballs and an array of junk. Carpenter topped one back to him, McKinstry struck out, and Torres fisted one to short. If Greene hadn’t beat out that infield single, Angels’ announcers would’ve been dancing around a sensitive lack-of-hits on air. Flaherty continued to look sharp in the fourth; a leadoff single was immediately erased on a sharp 3-6-3 double play. Torkelson has really improved at 1st, possibly even more so than his offensive gains; this was just the latest example. Another grounder to Tork ended it.
The Tigers once again went 1-2-3 in the 5th inning, and that unearned run loomed progressively larger. They finally made Hendricks throw some pitches, though – 15, so still not a lot – pushing his pitch count ‘all the way’ to 54 through 5. Flaherty promptly carved up the Angels as his velocity ticked up and up throughout the evening. 15 pitches to strike out the side will do quite nicely.
Hendricks came a blooper from Dingler shy of another perfect inning and really had the Tigers off balanced in this one. Carpenter flew out to left to strand him, and all you could hope for at this point was to get Hendricks out of the game after 7 innings. With 72 pitches through 6, that seemed unlikely.
Flaherty finally got into some trouble the third time through the order, continuing a rough trend this season. Back to back singles led off the frame. A pop-out to center got the first out, but Flaherty than walked Soler to load the bases. A weak grounder to right then scored two. With runners on the corners, the Tigers almost got a strike-em-out, throw-em-out double play to get some momentum back, but the throw bounced late into 2nd. A line drive single cleared the bases, 5-0 Angels, and chased Flaherty from the game. Beau Brieske relieved him to stop the bleeding. Brieske gave up a single to left, then got a line out to right to stop the bleeding.
With the Tigers looking to claw back into this game, McKinstry led off with an out to a shifted third baseman reminiscent of the 2020 shift era. Torres hit a line drive to the warning track in left field and this really just felt like one of those games where a better team loses. Greene lined out to end the frame and Detroit was running out of time to mount the comeback. Sean Gunther came on for the 7th and gave up a chip-shot single to left field. Everything was coming up Angels; at least it was until a first pitch 6-4-3 double play wiped him away. A flyout to left wrapped up a clean inning for Guenther.
Hendricks refused to leave the ballgame and finally made a mistake. He hung a 1-2 curveball at the top of the zone and Torkelson tomahawked it into the left field seats to break the shut out bid. Would this kickstart the rally? In a word, maybe: the offensive blackhole that is Jace Jung grounded out to Neto. Sweeney followed suit, but Neto threw it away on a bang-bang play and Sweeney took 2nd. Finally, Hendricks was removed after 102 pitches and 7.2 fantastic innings. What is this, the 2016 Cubs ? With two outs, Dingler had to keep the rally rolling against LHP Brock Burke. Unfortunately, after a lengthy battle, he flew out to right.
Hurter came on for the 8th, his first appearance in a while. He worked a 1-2-3 inning including the most brutal strikeout I’ve personally seen; Rengifo swung himself into a pretzel at a strike three that hit him in the back knee and collapsed to the ground. Thankfully, he walked off, albeit a little gingerly. Hurter than K’d Campero on almost an identical sweeper. It was time for a 4-run, 9th inning comeback. Hopefully.
With the lefty Burke returning, Hinch emptied his bench. Malloy came on and lined out sharply to left. Ibanez then grounded one past a diving shortstop. As a side note, with McKinstry hitless and out of the game, his AL-leading 12 game hit streak was officially over. Torres doubled off the wall in center field, pushing Ibanez to 3rd, and Kenley Jansen entered the game to shut things down. Greene had an opportunity to cash in on the PTSD and instead grounded to first; a run scored, but they still needed 3 runs on only one out to play with. Unfortunately, Keith’s hard liner up the middle was snagged by Neto – really, why couldn’t he be a Tiger? – and the game ended at 5-2 Angels.
Once again, the third time through the order doomed Jack Flaherty. It’s a terribly small sample, but he will have to find a way to get more than 5 innings consistently to really front this rotation with Tarik Skubal the way he did most of last year. To put it in perspective:
https://x.com/Castellani2014/status/1918864520987984145
The Tigers will go for 3 out of 4 tomorrow afternoon at 4:07pm. Reese Olson looks to keep the momentum rolling from a stellar start against San Diego; the Angels counter with second year starter Jack Kochanowicz and his 5.29 ERA.