Tigers 6, Yankees 2: A chilly victory will do just fine, thanks

Those who didn’t turn into popsicles saw the Tigers take the series opener.

With a skooched-up start time for the opener of a three-game weekday series at home against the New York Yankees , a showdown of division-leaders, started at 3:10 instead of 6:40. The snowflakes flew, the wind blew, and the Detroit Tigers beat the Yankees 6-2 on the strength of yet another solid starting pitching performance.

Casey Mize summitted the tiny, rounded mountain for the Tigers in this one. He looked great in his first start of the season on April 1 in Seattle , and this article from Just Baseball does a nice job quantifying exactly what sorts of things have clicked for him lately. Certain pitches have looked much better this spring so far, and if all goes well, he can be a valuable asset down the stretch and into a deep playoff run. (Hey, a fan can dream, can’t they?)

Facing Mize — figuratively, not literally, unless the two of them do that sort of pre-boxing-fight promo thing where they go nose-to-nose with angry looks on their faces — was Carlos Rodón. He spent many years on the south side of Chicago, spent a great year in San Francisco, and after a lousy 2023 in the Bronx he really had a fairly good year last year. He’ll usually strike out more than a batter per inning, and while his overall numbers won’t wow you, he’ll usually give you six innings and limit the damage to keep his team in the game.

Mize was looking good from the start, and he had his splitter working beautifully, getting multiple swinging strikeouts on it. The command on his fastball was sharp too. (Again, a fan can dream.)

Ben Rice hit a one-out triple in the third, and was dancing off third base. Jake Rogers very alertly snapped a throw to third behind Aaron Judge, timing it perfectly, and Rice was out easily. You’re no daisy, Ben Rice. You’re no daisy at all.

Editors Note: RIP Val Kilmer

The home plate-umpiring got a little weird in the bottom of the third, with some questionable calls. The left was on Rogers, the right on Ryan Kreidler; both at-bats ultimately ended in walks, which will become very important shortly.

Two batters later, and with both Rogers and Kreidler aboard, Andy Ibáñez got a hold of a low 1-0 changeup and thwacked it on a line over the left-field wall. A true Earl Weaver Special — two walks and a three-run dinger — put the Tigers up 3-0.

The Yankees got on the board in the top of the fifth with a single, walk, and a single by Judge to make it a 3-1 game. There were two out and two on for Cody Bellinger, who had a shot to even up the score, but Mize got him to chase a down-and-away splitter for strike three and further damage was avoided.

The Tigers got that back in the bottom of the inning: after Colt Keith reached base on an error and another Rogers walk, Kreidler bunted them both up a base (and nearly beat the thing out; and yes, this is an appropriate time for a bunt). The gambit paid off as Justyn-Henry Malloy cashed both runners in with a single over a drawn-in infield, with aggressive baserunning by Rogers for a 5-1 lead.

Mize’s day was done after six innings, and his final line showed a pretty similar outcome to his first start: 6 IP, 4 H, 1 ER, 3 BB, 6 K. The splitter is souped up and better than ever. Tyler Holton came on for the seventh and gave up a single, but the ol’ 1-6-4-3 double play got him out of the inning, with Javier Báez making a sensational glove-flip to Keith.

I mean, sure, Báez got picked off first base to end the previous inning (although it did have to go to a video review), but my goodness, this was a thing of beauty.

The Tigers loaded the bases with one out in the bottom of the seventh, and Trey Sweeney hit a soft grounder which ended up in a forceout at second and a run scoring for a 6-1 lead.

The Yankees got one back in the next half-inning, as Keith booted a ground ball, allowing the Evil Empire to narrow the lead to 6-2. But that was as close as the score would get, and Tommy Kahnle bamboozled his old teammates in the ninth with buckets of changeups to nail down the victory.

Remember, Tuesday’s game has a start time of 1:10 pm EDT; it is no longer a night game.

Stats and Whatnots

• Let’s talk about the Detroit pitching staff. Coming into today’s game, they’d given up the second-fewest hits per nine innings in the American League, and their WHIP (walks + hits per inning pitched) was third in the AL.
• They’ve been right around league-average when it comes to both walks and strikeouts per nine innings, so they’ve definitely allowed contact. But if the pitchers can be like Brenan Hanifee’s two wonderfully boring innings on Sunday — five groundouts and a lineout — then I don’t mind being league-average on those things at all.
• Both teams today had their DHs leading off. That’s weird.
• Today would have been legendary jazz singer Billie Holliday’s 110th birthday. She’s a member of the Grammy, R&B and Rock & Roll Halls of Fame, and I hear she’s up for Cooperstown in a couple of years. She had a tough life which ended tragically early, but her mark on jazz — and the rest of popular music — will live on forever.