Detroit — After watching the Padres’ hitters launch five home runs and score 19 runs in the two previous games, Alex Faedo made a business decision.
Just called back up from Triple-A Toledo to make the spot start Sunday, Faedo seemed steadfastly opposed to the center of the strike zone. He was on a mission to burn the edges of the strike zone, even if it meant a few more walks.
Mission accomplished.
“It’s hard to say I felt like my command was pretty good today when I walk four,” said Faedo, who blanked the Padres over six innings, helping the Tigers salvage the finale, 3-1, in front of 24,523 eventually wet fans at Comerica Park. “But I was around the zone. I thought my misses were just off, so they were quality misses.
“A lineup like that, one through nine they have guys who not only hit it out of the yard but they hit gaps and do everything with the stick, I feel you have to be able to stay out of the middle. That’s why my approach was to live or die on the corners.”
He did walk four but allowed only one hit, a two-out double to Jake Cronenworth in the second inning. He only posted two strikeouts and got just three swinging strikes. But, he induced seven ground balls, three of which were converted into double plays.
It was artful dodging at its best.
“When the double-plays follow the walks, it feels that way, for sure,” manager AJ Hinch said. “He hung in there mentally and physically to get through a lineup he hasn’t seen a ton but one he saw do damage the last couple of nights and he knows the names.
“He stayed locked in mentally and got some really big outs, especially in the sixth. We extended him as far as we possibly could and asked a lot out of him and he delivered.”
Faedo had got through the fifth, going through the Padres order twice, in 81 pitches. Hinch, with his bullpen taxed by the Padres’ offensive onslaught the last two nights, rolled the dice and let him pitch the sixth, facing the top of the order again.
“I try not to look ahead,” Faedo said. “But after the fifth, I felt like I had a quick inning. So I was able to possibly go back out there. My pitch-count was good enough. I felt like I had a chance so my mind was ready for the sixth. I felt like, not that I earned the sixth, but I felt like I was prepared for it.”
He was. He walked Ha-Seong Kim to start the inning but got Fernando Tatis, Jr., to bounce into a 5-4-3 double-play.
“They made some great plays behind me and (catcher Eric) Haase called a great game,” Faedo said. “That double-play between (third baseman Zach) McKinstry and (second baseman Andy) Ibanez was nuts how fast they turned it.”
The Tigers offense was contained in two early innings, but they were the ones hitting balls over the wall this time. Against Padres right-hander Joe Musgrove, who had allowed only eight home runs in 85.1 innings in his first 15 starts, Spencer Torkelson and Ibanez both took him deep to left field.
Torkelson launched a 3-2 slider into the Tigers bullpen for his team-leading 15th homer. Ibanez led off the third inning slashing a first-pitch cutter 405 feet into the seats in left. It was his seventh.
The Tigers added a second run in the third on some aggressive base-running by Riley Greene. He singled with two outs. After Torkelson walked, Kerry Carpenter laced a ball to the right side of the infield. It left his bat at 102 mph and it went through second baseman Kim and into right field.
Tatis, Jr., who has nine outfield assists this year, charged it and made a strong throw to the plate. Greene, with a head-first slide to the back corner, beat the tag of catcher Gary Sanchez.
“That’s a daring move because of Tatis,” Hinch said. “He arguably has the best arm and he’s usually on the mark. We were fortunate there. By having some aggressiveness we put pressure on everybody and got away with it. But you have to take chances like that.
“Rarely do you want to test him but with two outs and with Joe Musgrove on the mound, that was the right time to do it.”
The Padres broke through in the seventh inning against right-handed reliever Beau Brieske. Xander Bogaerts doubled and scored on a two-out single by Sanchez.
Jason Foley pitched a quick, clean eighth and handed the baton to Alex Lange. He dispatched Juan Soto and Manny Machado on four pitches before things got tense. First, the rain, which held off until the end, started coming down heavily.
“It was a thick rain,” Hinch said. “It was annoying. It wasn’t a sprinkle and it wasn’t a wipeout downpour. Alex has had the unfortunate luck a couple of times where we had those types of elements. We knew it was coming. We just needed to get through that inning.”
Haase said the rain was so heavy that the umpire’s ball bag was soaked. He was throwing new wet balls back to Lange on the mound. Lange was trying to keep the ball dry by covering it up with his glove hand and forearm when he came set on the mound.
It was a factor. He walked Bogaerts with two outs and shortstop Javier Baez misplayed a routine ground ball from Cronenworth. The ball slipped out of his hand when he went to throw.
That brought Sanchez to the plate. A first-pitch wild pitch put the tying run on second base. With rain falling and the crowd standing, Lange threw seven straight curveballs.
“If it wasn’t raining and he wasn’t struggling really hard, maybe I would have mixed a changeup down below the zone or a heater up to move his eyes,” Haase said. “But the good part for us was, his breaking ball, some were backing up and some were really sharp. We were feeling for any kind of tack we could get.
“But it had the effect of kind of mixing it up by himself.”
Sanchez popped up the seventh curveball into shallow center for the final out of Lange’s 17th save.
“It wasn’t tough to watch that, not with (Lange) throwing,” Faedo said. “I have the utmost respect and confidence in him. I’ve been watching him pitch his tail off since my freshman year of college (when Lange was at LSU and Faedo at Florida). When he toes the rubber, I feel as confident as I am in anyone.”
Faedo was summoned to extend the Tigers’ rotation for possibly the next couple of times through. That was done in order to give Tarik Skubal, coming back off flexor tendon surgery, an extra day of rest between starts. Also, the Tigers are going to need to slot another starter in if either Eduardo Rodriguez or Michael Lorenzen get traded.
“I think Alex is settling in,” Hinch said. “He knows what he needs to do and how he has to use his pitches. I’m just seeing him growing and maturing. He was laser-focused today. You know, we want these guys to take steps forward and a lot of times we want quantum leaps.
“But sometimes it’s just putting one foot in front of the other. Today was an example of Alex controlling what he can control.”
Twitter: @cmccosky