Series Preview: Detroit Tigers wrap up June with 4 games at Los Angeles Angels

The Detroit Tigers embark on a 10-game road trip starting with an extended series with the Los Angeles Angels on Thursday night. The first four matchups will take place at Angel Stadium, where dreams used to die for fans of the Olde English D.

AJ Hinch’s squad is coming off a six-game homestand which they evenly split down the middle by taking two of three from the lowly Chicago White Sox while stealing a win from one of the best teams in baseball, the Philadelphia Phillies. The Motor City Kitties will not return home until July 8, however, so hopefully their past success on the road will translate into wins this weekend.

Below is a look at the pitching matchups for the next four games as the Tigers cross the true midpoint of the 2024 campaign.

Detroit Tigers (37-43) at Los Angeles Angels (33-46)

Times (ET): Thursday: 9:38 p.m.; Friday: 9:38 p.m.;
Saturday: 10:07 p.m.; Sunday: 4:07 p.m.
Place: Angel Stadium, Los Angeles, California
SB Nation Site: Halos Heaven
Media: Bally Sports Detroit, MLB.TV, Tigers Radio Network

Game 81: RHP Jack Flaherty (5-4, 2.92 ERA) vs. RHP Davis Daniel (0-0, 0.00 ERA)

Flaherty’s start was pushed back into the Angels series to give him a little extra time to deal with back tightness that has plagued him of late. Even so, the 28-year-old is in the midst of his best season since 2019 when he finished with Cy Young and MVP votes. While limited to just five-plus innings in all three June outings so far, the veteran hurler put up a 0.57 ERA and 2.26 FIP stretching over 15 ²⁄₃ frames.

Daniel is making his 2024 season debut on Thursday night after a rough go at it last season to open up his major league career. According to Baseball Savant, the 27-year-old utilized a four-pitch repertoire in 2023: four-seam fastball (53.2%, 93.4 mph); slider (18.3%, 82.0 mph); curveball (17.4%, 75.5 mph); changeup (11.0%, 85.6 mph).

Game 82: RHP Kenta Maeda (2-4, 6.00 ERA) vs. RHP Zach Plesac (1-1, 8.68 ERA)

Maeda finally clawed his way back to the zero fWAR mark despite a lackluster pair of recent outings, but an overall better performance over the course of the current month. The 36-year-old started June with a whimper, getting pulled from his June 5 meeting with the Texas Rangers after just two pitches, but bounced back from that with a scoreless four-inning effort. His 5.27 ERA over the last three games is a bit bloated but his 3.81 FIP is looking better.

Plesac became a member of the Angels this past offseason after the Cleveland Guardians let their former highly-heralded hurler hit the free agent market. The 29-year-old has struggled to recapture the magic of his 2020 campaign in which he posted a 2.28 ERA, 3.39 FIP and 0.80 WHIP and maybe a change of scenery is what he needs. That has not exactly been the case yet, however, as his stats look ugly in the early going.

Game 83: RHP Reese Olson (2-8, 3.35 ERA) vs. RHP Griffin Canning (3-8, 4.72 ERA)

Olson started the month with a three-game swoon that had many Tigers fans worried about their budding pitching star. Fortunately, the 24-year-old was able to assuage those concerns with a pair of quality starts in his last two outings. Over the last 12 ¹⁄₃ frames, the sophomore hurler allowed just two runs on eight hits — no home runs or walks — while striking out 11 to get back on track.

Canning is in his fifth major league season — all with the Angels — and while his numbers are not terrible, he has slipped a bit from his 2023 stats. The 28-year-old’s 1.34 WHIP is a bit on the beefy side while his FIP suggests that his sub-five ERA might be a bit of an illusion. The righty makes use of a five-pitch palette, headlined by his four-seam fastball (33.2%, 93.6 mph), followed by a changeup (27.3%, 88.8 mph), slider (23.6%, 88.1 mph), curveball (13.0%, 80.9 mph) and sinker (3.0%, 93.0 mph), respectively.

Game 84: RHP Casey Mize (1-6, 4.54 ERA) vs. LHP Tyler Anderson (7-7, 2.63 ERA)

Mize has been acutely inefficient over his last two games, punctuated by his 101 pitches thrown in just 4 ¹⁄₃ innings of work against the Phillies last time on the mound. The 27-year-old looked like he was figuring things out after a six-inning quality start against the Washington Nationals in the middle of the month, but his efforts simply were not enough in his last two. The good news is that he used those excessive pitches against Philadelphia to set a new career high in strikeouts with 10.

Anderson has been an absolute workhorse for the Angels this season, which is his ninth in the big leagues and second with the American League Los Angeles team. The 34-year-old is putting up some encouraging numbers except for one glaring wart: his 46 walks are currently the most given up in the majors. The southpaw has had a solid June, putting up a 3.00 ERA but a disconcerting 5.22 FIP stretching over five games and 30 innings, resulting in a pair of both wins and losses while getting a no-decision in a team win.

Series Outlook: Will the Tigers road warriors show up?

The West Coast road swings that take the Tigers to Angels Stadium have been the setting for horror stories in the lore of the Olde English D and the thought of facing off with the Halos out there for four games is a bit nauseating for the average fan.

This Angels team is near the middle of the pack offensively, ranking 17th in OPS (.690) and 14th in home runs (85) but only 25th in runs scored (324) while their pitching is among the worst in ERA (28th, 4.68) and WHIP (26th, 1.35); batting average against (18th, .244) is near the middle of the pack.

However, this season’s matchup might slightly favor the good guys as the home team is a rough 15-25 within its comfortable confines while the visitors are 18-21 on the road. Suffice to say, anything short of a split is unacceptable.