Detroit — That one went off-script in a hurry.
Coming home off a successful road trip with two of their front-line starting pitchers returning off the injured list and starting a homestand against the team with the worst record in baseball — time to roll, right?
Nope. After losing 1-0 in 10 innings Tuesday, the Tigers were pummeled by the Oakland Athletics 12-3 on Wednesday at Comerica Park. Not exactly the way you’d expect things to go.
“I never come in after a loss and feel better or worse than the previous one,” manager AJ Hinch said. “They are all missed opportunities to win some games. I’d take that approach against anybody of any road trip or homestand. Sting more or sting less? They’re losses. They sting about the same.
“I hate them all pretty much the same.”
After Tarik Skubal pitched four hitless innings in his return Tuesday, things were much more choppy for Eduardo Rodriguez.
“Health-wise, he checked out good, which is very important and that’s the positive to take out of it,” Hinch said.
The first pitch Rodriguez threw since he ruptured the pulley in the index finger of his left hand on May 28 was bunted between the mound and first base.
It might not have been the last thing he expected, but it was pretty close. Speedy Esteury Ruiz beat out the bunt, stole second − his Oakland-record 43rd stolen base − went to third on a single by the second hitter, Jordan Diaz and scored on a sacrifice fly by Brent Rooker.
Two batters later, left-handed hitting Ryan Noda blasted a 3-0 fastball deep into the right-field seats − 3-0.
“That happens in baseball,” said Rodriguez, who went four innings and allowed five runs, including a solo homer to catcher Shea Langeliers leading off the fourth. “The only thing that matters is go to the next hitter and get an out. The location of my fastball was all over the place and I was getting behind. The hitter knows I have to come back to the strike zone and I paid for it.”
It wasn’t the return he’d hoped for but it wasn’t all bad. He struck out seven, getting four hitters to take called third strikes with his four-seam fastball. He was behind hitters in every inning but didn’t walk anybody.
“I felt good with all my pitches — the only thing was the command,” said Rodriguez, who threw 79 pitches and 49 strikes. “Endurance was fine. The velocity (93 mph) was right where I wanted. But the fastball, especially that pitch, I wasn’t able to locate it where I wanted and you always pay for that, no matter who you face in the big leagues.”
Rodriguez yielded a two-out, RBI double to Aledmys Diaz in the third. Not the return he or the Tigers were looking for, but it certainly wasn’t all bad. Rodriguez struck out seven, including four called third strikes with his four-seam fastball. He got nine called strikes total with his four-seamer.
It got much worse after he left. The Athletics roughed up lefty reliever Zach Logue for a total of six runs on six hits in 3.2 innings. Jordan Diaz capped it off with a two-run homer in the eighth. He had three hits, scored three runs and knocked in four.
The bigger issue was the continued slumber of the Tigers’ offense.
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Facing an Athletics pitching staff that came in the highest ERA and the most earned runs allowed in the American League, the Tigers were shutout in 10 innings Tuesday night and then didn’t score until the eighth inning Wednesday. Add the scoreless ninth on Sunday in Denver and they went 18 straight innings without scoring a run.
Worse, until the eighth, they’d mustered just one hit – a fourth-inning single by Zach McKinstry.
This is the same team that scored 23 runs in three games against the Rockies, bashing five homers on Sunday.
“Just not a good night,” Hinch said. “The faster we can get away from tonight and into tomorrow, the better. There’s not a lot of good to talk about tonight.”
The Athletics, as they have often this season, deployed an opener, right-hander Austin Pruitt. Over his last 11 games, working mostly out of the bullpen, he’d allowed just four earned runs in 15 innings. And he set down nine straight Tigers to start the game.
By the time the A’s switched to left-handed bulk-inning pitcher Ken Waldichuk, the Tigers were down 5-0.
“We didn’t get many good pitches to hit,” said Spencer Torkelson, who tripled and scored in the ninth. “When he’s nibbling and you’re chasing it’s tough to do damage, tough to get things rolling. They did a good job of not giving us anything to hit.”
Waldichuk has been hit around a fair bit this season (6.78 ERA), but the Tigers couldn’t string anything together until the eighth inning. Walks to Jonathan Schoop and Tyler Nevin — both inserted into the game in the seventh — set the table for Miguel Cabrera.
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He ripped a line drive into the corner in right field scoring Schoop. Cabrera has the Tigers’ hottest hitter since May 30. He came into the game Wednesday slashing .348/.416/.485 in his last 21 games.
Nevin scored on a sacrifice fly by Jake Marisnick.
“We’re not playing our best on either side of the ball,” Torkelson said. “It sucks. But you learn from it, take what you can from it and move on.”
The Tigers, just four games in back of Central Division-leading Minnesota on Monday, fall back to 11 games under .500 (37-48), 6.5 games behind the Twins.
chris.mccosky@detroitnews.com
Twitter: @cmccosky