2011 DETROIT TIGER SCHEDULE AND RESULTS

Verlander two-hits Tribe, hurls Tigers into first
Detroit ace takes no-hitter into eighth, fans 12 Indians

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By Jason Beck / MLB.com | 6/15/2011 1:15 AM ET

DETROIT -- On a clear June night at Comerica Park, a Tigers pitcher held down the Indians' lineup and nearly made history. But this time there was no Armando Galarraga, and there was no controversial call at first base to bail out Cleveland.

The Tigers had Justin Verlander with an upper-90s fastball, a curveball he could spot for strikes and a changeup that left hitters waving. The Indians had Orlando Cabrera, a .325 hitter off Verlander going into the night.

Cabrera got to the Detroit ace with a one-out single in the eighth, denying Verlander's bid to become the first pitcher since Nolan Ryan in 1973 to throw two no-hitters in one regular season. Verlander didn't get the history, but he got a 4-0 shutout on a two-hit performance.

The Tigers, in turn, got sole possession of first place in the American League Central by taking the opener of this division clash. They're alone atop the division standings for the first time since July 10. The Indians fell out of first for the first time since April 6.

"Obviously, it's early in the season," Verlander said, "but you have to get there at some point. Hopefully we never turn back."

That doesn't mean Verlander can't look back to his night and wonder what almost was. The way he was pitching -- and Indians hitters were reacting -- it was difficult not to start thinking that he had it.

"Some of the swings they were taking -- I thought I had a decent shot," Verlander said.

He wasn't the only one.

"Oh yeah," shortstop Ramon Santiago said. "The way he was throwing the ball, I thought he was going to get it."

Alex Avila caught Verlander when he no-hit the Blue Jays on May 7 at Rogers Centre, and again when he took a no-hitter into the sixth against the Royals six days later. His batterymate at least had a feeling.

"By the fifth with him, when he's just cruising like that, it's not hard to notice," Avila said.

It happened just a short drive from the site of Tiger Stadium, where Ryan tossed his second no-hitter in 1973. Tigers first baseman Norm Cash provided the one highlight for Detroit that day when he stepped to the plate with a table leg he had taken from the clubhouse, providing a statement about just how dominant Ryan was before the umpire sent him back to get a real bat.

The Indians didn't go for the furniture, but the game had that feeling.

For six innings, the only Indian to reach base safely seemed to do so at Verlander's will. Catcher Carlos Santana, batting second in manager Manny Acta's revised lineup, took back-to-back brushback pitches, the second of which hit him. It seemed to be a reaction to something that went on during the Tigers' visit to Cleveland at the end of April, whether it was Santana's reaction to a walk-off homer to open that series or a hit-by-pitch to Miguel Cabrera at the end.

"Missed my spot," Verlander said.

It was one of the rare times that he did. The one hit he gave up was another, and it wasn't by nearly as much.

Seven of Cleveland's first 12 batters struck out, including four in a row into the fourth inning. Seven of the nine batters in the Tribe's starting lineup struck out, the exceptions being Cabrera and Matt LaPorta. Grady Sizemore struck out four times in as many chances, including on a nasty curveball on the outside corner to take the no-hitter through the sixth.

"He was dominant," Indians manager Manny Acta said. "He had every one of his pitches working and throwing for a strike -- every one of them. He started early with the one sequence, and later on, he changed, but it didn't matter, because he was throwing all his pitches for strikes and every one of his pitches are above to way-above average."

The one Cleveland hitter to force a defensive gem was Shin-Soo Choo, whose drive to left-center took center fielder Austin Jackson to the fence before he made a leaping catch. Replays suggested the ball probably wouldn't have been a home run, but it would've at least been a hit.

With that taken away, Verlander started cruising.

"I got my curveball going pretty good and my changeup pretty good," Verlander said. "When I've got those two working, and my fastball's usually there, it's kind of tough on hitters, I would think, when I can change speeds and elevate and do what I want to do."

Michael Brantley's one-out walk in the seventh gave Cleveland another baserunner, but a swift reaction from Miguel Cabrera turned Asdrubal Cabrera's ground ball to first into an inning-ending double play and a no-hit bid through seven.

Danny Worth, inserted at third base as a defensive replacement, bobbled Choo's grounder but quickly recovered for the out to start the eighth. Enter Orlando Cabrera, who went 7-for-14 off Verlander two years ago but didn't face him last year as a Cincinnati Red.

Verlander had induced a groundout from him on a first-pitch fastball in the second inning, and in the fifth he followed up a 96-mph heater with a curveball that Cabrera grounded to third. The second baseman was one of just two Indians to connect on the curveball, which drew 18 called strikes, according to data on MLB.com Gameday and brooksbaseball.net.

Once Cabrera fouled off the curveball for strike one in the eighth, Verlander brought a 99-mph fastball on the outside corner. Cabrera lined it into center field.

"Cabrera put a good swing on the pitch," Verlander said. "Sometimes you just tip your cap, and that's one of them. The fastball was up a little bit -- more than I would've liked -- but still on the outside corner, and he had a pretty good swing."

Said Cabrera: "With that guy, you have to feel lucky anytime you get a hit."

Verlander (8-3) took the applause then finished the job, striking out 12 batters while using 117 pitches. The only other hit was Santana's liner to left with two out in the ninth.

Three Tigers runs in the third inning, including an Andy Dirks RBI single, provided more-than-enough support for the victory.

Jason Beck is a reporter for MLB.com. Read Beck's Blog and follow him on Twitter @beckjason. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.

After dropping early lead, Tigers fall to Tribe

By Jason Beck / MLB.com | 6/16/2011 1:22 AM ET

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DETROIT -- Brad Penny had to figure he was living right early in his outing Wednesday night. He watched Carlos Santana's drive to right field go foul in the first inning, saw Asrubal Cabrera's drive to left field die in the wind and fall to Brennan Boesch at the fence in the second, then watched Jack Hannahan's drive to left do the same four batters later.

When he saw Orlando Cabrera chop a ball over third baseman Don Kelly's head in the fourth inning, his immediate reaction was a lot different, and it wasn't particularly quotable.

Though long reliever Charlie Furbush ended up with the decision in the Tigers' 6-4 loss to the Indians on Wednesday, Penny was the one with the damage from the blown three-run lead. None of it came on any particularly crushing blow. His outs, in many cases, were hit harder than the hits he allowed.

"It was a tough day," Penny said. "Tonight, ground balls just got through, for whatever reason."

The impact on the standings is the same. One night after Justin Verlander nearly no-hit the Indians to put Detroit alone atop the American League Central, Cleveland's struggling offense awakened from its June swoon to put it back in a tie. The Indians, with one fewer win and one fewer loss, technically have the lead by percentage points. But whoever wins Thursday's series finale will leave town with the division lead.

Only once in Penny's 12-year career had he given up eight hits in less than four innings. Half of those hits were for extra bases. On Wednesday, none of the hits off Penny were. The only extra-base hit for Cleveland was the one that put the Tribe ahead for good, a double by Orlando Cabrera down the left-field line to score Shin-Soo Choo in the fifth.

"It wasn't a good pitch by me," Furbush said." I left the slider up the zone. I'd expect anyone to hit that pitch."

It was easier for him to take than the damage off Penny that led up to it.

The only other time the Tigers blew a three-run lead in a loss this season, Carlos Santana was admiring his walk-off grand slam on April 29 at Progressive Field. Detroit built an early lead in that one but left a lot of runners on base with chances to put the game away.

Same teams, different venue, more runners stranded for Detroit, including the bases loaded in the third inning as mercurial Indians sinkerballer Fausto Carmona struggled to locate. Former Indian Jhonny Peralta, 3-for-6 with the bases loaded going into the night, flew out to right to end the third inning after his ground ball to third stranded two runners in the first.

As it stood, Brennan Boesch's ninth home run of the year, and fifth in his last 13 games, along with Alex Avila's two-run single, stood as all the runs in a 33-pitch opening inning for Carmona.

Unlike April, though, there was no crushing blow for the Indians. More like death from smaller cuts.

"The momentum is pitching," manager Jim Leyland said. "Last night we pitched better than they did, and tonight they pitched better than we did. We had Carmona on the ropes. We just didn't do anything with the bullpen."

Maybe on a warmer, calmer night, Hannahan's second-inning drive would've carried for a three-run homer, but it died this time, helping Penny strand two runners before escaping more damage in the third. Once the heart of the Indians came up in the fourth, though, Penny never got back around to the top.

Four straight Indians reached base safely, the first three of them with two strikes. All of them hit singles on the ground, though Orlando Cabrera's chopper spent far more time in the air.

The curveball I threw to [Asdrubal Cabrera] wasn't a bad pitch," Penny said. "It was down. Alex was going down to block it in the dirt, and he hit it up the middle for a hit."

Matt LaPorta hit a hanging changeup for a single to drive him in. Orlando Cabrera's chopper, however, seemed to change the course of the inning.

"The one that really stunk was Cabrera," Penny said. "I'm trying to get a double play, and he bounces it over the third baseman's head."

Kelly knew the feeling. He's 6-foot-4, but the ball bounced so high that all he could do was watch. It was the kind of hit the Tigers thought they'd left behind when the Twins moved out of the Metrodome and its hard artificial surface.

"Nothing you can do," Kelly said. "It just took off."

Once Hannahan's sacrifice bunt set up Lou Marson's RBI single, the game was tied, and Penny was gone. Grady Sizemore's sacrifice fly on an 0-2 pitch from Furbush put the Indians ahead briefly before Ramon Santiago singled, broke up a potential double play that ended up with both runners being safe and scored to tie it up again.

Carmona (4-8) gave up four runs on eight hits over five innings, yet survived for the win.

"He gave them a chance to win," Avila said. "There were chances we could've blown it open a little bit and gotten a little bit bigger lead, but he did his job and held us to the three runs there and gave them a chance."

Jason Beck is a reporter for MLB.com. Read Beck's Blog and follow him on Twitter @beckjason. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.

Tigers top Tribe, regain perch atop Central

By Jason Beck / MLB.com | 6/16/2011 6:35 PM ET

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DETROIT -- The American League Central showdown in Motown began with Justin Verlander nearly no-hitting the Indians two days ago. Max Scherzer ended it by avoiding disaster in the first inning on Thursday.

If the Tigers are going to eventually make something out of their one-game lead in the AL Central, which they earned with a 6-2 win over the Indians at Comerica Park, those two right-handers are going to be a big part of it. So, too, will the one right-hander in the bullpen who doesn't have a late-inning role.

After Scherzer turned what was shaping up as a disastrous opening inning into just a short-lived two-run Cleveland lead, he found the form that has earned him his spot among the Major League wins leaders. Once the fireballer slowed down in the sixth inning, Al Alburquerque came out of the bullpen and stranded the bases loaded to leave the potential tying run at the plate.

The result was a one-game advantage for Detroit over Cleveland as both teams headed out of town. The third-place White Sox fell to 5 1/2 games back after their loss at Minnesota.

"Right now, we're playing pretty well. We're coming together," Scherzer said. "But the thing is, we still have another 100. We have to grind it out and get these series wins."

The Tigers have won five straight series, plus a single-game makeup date against Tampa Bay. Scherzer has had victories in the last three series, covering his last three starts, to rebound from a mid-May slump that had cost him his unbeaten start.

While Verlander is swaying minds as possibly the best pitcher in baseball right now, Scherzer has a statistical claim as the winningest. His third straight win -- and ninth of the season -- moved him into a tie with Boston's Jon Lester and Phillies hurlers Roy Halladay and Cole Hamels atop the big leagues.

When manager Jim Leyland talked about Scherzer's adjustments from his last start, he said that the right-hander works as hard between starts as any pitcher he has managed. Scherzer's success Thursday had a lot to do with the work he put in to survive early.

What looked like a routine opening inning for him busted open once Michael Brantley worked the count full and turned on a fastball hard enough to get it past Miguel Cabrera at first and down the right-field line. Brantley made it to third for a triple, but he was awarded home after Ryan Raburn's attempt to throw him out at third ended up in the dugout.

Four pitches later, Asdrubal Cabrera survived an 0-2 count and launched a Scherzer changeup into right-center field for a double. One batter later, Scherzer challenged Shin-Soo Choo with a fastball and paid the price, as Choo drilled the ball off the wall in right-center for another run.

"Stuff like that's going to happen," Scherzer said. "That's baseball. You try to control the things you can control. There's a 3-2 count [to Brantley], and I had to challenge him with a fastball, and he hit it. I thought I made a decent pitch to Cabrera on the 1-2 changeup. It was down, but he went down and got it. He hit it. You tip your hat to him there. And I gave Choo a pitch to hit in a hitter's count. That's where you get hurt.

"But at the same time, that's where you've got to battle and make sure that's it. If you can [do that], that's a good outing. For the most part, even though I wasn't able to work ahead with first-pitch strikes and stuff, I was still able to locate down in the zone and keep them from having any big hits."

The only other hit Scherzer (9-2) allowed was a fifth-inning double to former teammate Adam Everett. A Don Kelly error and a plunking of Grady Sizemore comprised his only other baserunners through the fifth.

"He got into a good groove after that [first inning]," Cleveland manager Manny Acta said. "I've seen him better. Usually he's a guy who can be dominant, too, but after the first inning, we had a couple opportunities there."

Scherzer escaped the first by retiring Matt LaPorta, who fouled out to strand Choo on third. By the time Scherzer took the mound again, he had a new game thanks to two Tigers runs on four straight baserunners.

The Tigers actually could've had a first-inning lead, but a hard-hit Magglio Ordonez liner became an inning-ending double play with a catch and flip from Asdrubal Cabrera. Once former Indian Jhonny Peralta and Raburn hit back-to-back home runs with two outs in the fourth, the issue became moot.

"They hit them at the right time," Leyland said. "The wind was blowing out that way a little bit."

RBI singles from Miguel Cabrera and Victor Martinez built the eventual final margin in the fifth, but it took one more escape once two walks and a hit batsman loaded the bases in the sixth. Up came Everett, and out came Leyland to pull Scherzer, not wanting to take chances with the potential tying run at the plate.

With Joaquin Benoit and Jose Valverde working the late innings, Leyland has had to choose his spots carefully with Alburquerque, who said Thursday he had been rehabbing his way through elbow discomfort last week.

To put Alburquerque into a situation where a walk would bring in a run could have been a risky proposition not long ago, particularly when a groundout is the same as a strikeout. But after Alburquerque located his first-pitch slider for strike one, Everett flew out to right on the next.

"If he throws it over, he has the best chance to get Adam Everett out, unless you're talking about Benoit or Valverde," Leyland said. "He's doing fine."

So are the Tigers, for the way they're playing seems more important than where they happen to reside in the standings. They'll still gladly take first place.

Jason Beck is a reporter for MLB.com. Read Beck's Blog and follow him on Twitter @beckjason. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.

Porcello, Tigers de-clawed in opener

By Nick Kosmider / MLB.com | 6/18/2011 1:09 AM ET

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DENVER -- Tigers manager Jim Leyland thought he was returning to a different Coors Field on Friday, one that is no longer supposed to be a haven for the pitching nightmare it was when he managed the Rockies back in 1999.

But the opener of a three-game Interleague series in front of 41,594 produced the reprisal of bad memories for Leyland, whose pitching staff got hammered by a red-hot Rockies offense in a 13-6 loss.

Starter Rick Porcello retired the Rockies in order in the first, but that would be the lone bright spot in an outing that saw the right-hander yield nine runs -- six earned -- on eight hits, as he exited after just three innings.

But Porcello said his rough start had little to do with pitching at Coors Field -- a venue Leyland said used to make games look like "slow-pitch softball" contests before the so-called humidor was introduced in 2002 -- but was instead the result of poor fastball command.

"The ballpark, or [the fact] that the ball flies here, that didn't have any affect on me," Porcello said. "I'm pretty sure they would have scored nine runs if we were in Comerica [Park], too, so that's just the way it was. I wasn't effective. It was a terrible start, really."

Most of the damage against Porcello (6-5) came during a six-run Rockies second, which was highlighted by Chris Nelson's first Major League home run, a three-run shot to left field.

Porcello had a chance to limit the damage after Carlos Gonzalez's sacrifice fly plated the third run of the inning. But with a pair of runners on, Nelson got ahold of a 2-2 fastball and hooked it inside the left-field foul pole, giving the Rockies a 6-1 lead.

The inning was also fueled by a walk to Rockies starting pitcher Jason Hammel, which accounted for the most frustrating sequence of the night for Porcello.

"I had a stretch there where I kind of lost command of my fastball," the right-hander said. "He's the pitcher for God sakes. I'm trying to throw that ball right down the middle. I'm not afraid to admit that -- I just didn't get it done. That's just the way this night was."

Leyland lamented his team's inability to put up its own crooked number in the first, when they scored just one run despite collecting a leadoff single from Austin Jackson and three walks (one intentional).

"The first inning was critical for us," the Tigers skipper said. "We had an opportunity right away to really get something on the board, and we came away with one. That turned out to be disastrous for us. We had an inning going there, possibly, where we could have got four or five.

"We had the right guys up there early on. You get one run in this ballpark, and that usually spells disaster."

The Tigers' only other offense came in the sixth, when Jhonny Peralta followed singles by Victor Martinez and Magglio Ordonez and a walk to Alex Avila with his third career grand slam, which just cleared the left-field wall beyond the outstretched glove of rookie left fielder Charlie Blackmon.

The newbie Blackmon went 4-for-4 to raise his average to .410 since making his Major League debut on June 7, but he lamented his inability to keep Peralta's long drive in the ballpark.

"I didn't do a very good job," Blackmon said. "I got to the wall, and then I was in the wrong part of the wall. At the time I thought I would have to climb up and get it. But I think I could've just jumped and caught it. I didn't need to push off the fence."

But even with Peralta's ball clearing the fence, the Tigers couldn't keep pace with the Rockies' red-hot bats, which notched double-digit hits (14) for the eighth time in the last nine games.

The Rockies added three unearned runs in the third after an error by third baseman Alex Aliva, who was making his first professional start at the position.

Leyland said Aliva's error had no affect on the outcome of the game, but added that he was unsure whether Aliva would start again at third base during the second game of the series on Saturday.

Colorado tacked on four more runs off of reliever Adam Wilk -- including one on Carlos Gonzalez's one-out homer to right-center in the fifth, his 10th -- during the left-hander's four innings of work, but Leyland credited Wilk with being able to eat up innings, giving Detroit the opportunity to rest a taxed bullpen.

"I thought Adam Wilk did a great job," Leyland said. "We were two relievers short tonight, so we had the double switch [with Ramon Santiago entering the game to play second base], and let him pitch some innings."

Rockies starter Jason Hammel (4-6) pitched better than the six runs he allowed over 6 1/3 innings would indicate. After a 30-pitch first inning, the right-hander faced just one over the minimum until the sixth, when the Tigers singled twice and walked in front of Peralta's grand slam. Hammel walked four and struck out a pair.

Nick Kosmider is an associate reporter for MLB.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.

Tigers can't get over hump against Rockies

By Jack Etkin / Special to MLB.com | 6/19/2011 1:13 AM ET

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DENVER -- One season 12 years ago as the Rockies manager, gave Jim Leyland a simple gauge for measuring the effectiveness of a starting pitcher at Coors Field.

"If you're a starting pitcher here, you want to be ahead of the team when you come out of the game," said Leyland, the Tigers manager. "If you've done that, in most cases you've done a pretty good job."

By that standard, Tigers starter Phil Coke, who issued a career-high seven walks, came up short and was a reason the Tigers lost, 5-4 on Saturday. They will try to avoid being swept in the three-game series Sunday behind ace Justin Verlander.

The Tigers rallied in the ninth against closer Huston Street but left the potential tying run on base. Street got the first two outs of the inning before walking pinch-hitter Alex Avila. He took second on defensive indifference and scored on Brennan Boesh's single. Street worked ahead of Miguel Cabrera, 0-2, and got him to fly to left-center on his next pitch, which was a slider.

"It was a good pitch to hit," said Cabrera, who has 13 homers and 47 RBIs. "I didn't hit it good."

Street is 20-for-22 in save opportunities and has converted six straight chances since his last blown save on May 20. The Tigers made Street squirm a bit before falling to 7-7 in one-run games overall and 1-5 on the road.

"We got the winning run at the plate and the tying run at second and the right guy up there." Leyland said. "He just didn't hit it far enough. I knew it wasn't going. The minute he hit it, I knew it was an out."

Coke issued his first two walks with two out in the second before giving up a two-run single on a first-pitch fastball to pitcher Ubaldo Jimenez in what became a three-run inning. The first walk was to left-handed-hitting rookie Charlie Blackmon, followed by a walk to Chris Iannetta, who has hit nine homers.

"I can see [walking] Iannetta a little bit more," Leyland said. "He's got some power. And you're being a little bit careful. You don't want a two-out, two-run homer to the catcher with the pitcher on deck. You got to bury that inning. You got two quick outs and got a left-handed hitter up, you got to bury that inning."

Jimenez had been hitless in 20 previous at-bats, with 12 strikeouts.

"I said, 'I'm just going to close my eyes and swing and as hard as I can," said Jimenez, who left the game with a right calf cramp after giving up two singles to start the sixth. "I knew he was going to throw a fastball, especially after walking Iannetta. I'm a pitcher, and I don't have a hit on the season, so they're guessing I don't hit at all."

Carlos Gonzalez followed Jimenez's hit with a broken-bat single that scored Iannetta to make it 3-0.

This was the fifth straight losing decision for Coke, who is 1-7 with a 4.68 ERA and has made 10 straight winless starts since his lone victory on April 14 at Oakland.

"I can't say that I was consistent at any given point in time during the game, in release point or fluidity of my mechanics or anything like that," Coke said. "I'm pleased that I was able to keep the damage as low as I was able throughout the game, but at the same time, I've got to be better than that. And I've got to give us a better chance to win a ballgame than I did."

The Tigers also had two runners thrown out at the plate and just after they managed to get within a run of the Rockies by scoring two in the sixth, left-hander Charlie Furbush gave up a deflating homer in the bottom of that inning.

The homer by Chris Nelson was the second of his career and second in two games. Nelson, who drove Furbush's 2-0 fastball into the left-field stands, hit a three-run shot on Friday.

Aftter Jimenez left in the sixth, Matt Lindstrom came on to face Jhonny Peralta. He knocked down Peralta's sharp one-hopper, but the ball bounced to Lindstrom's right, and he had no play, loading the bases with no out. Ryan Raburn, hitting just .153 (15-for-98) with 33 strikeouts in his previous 31 games, lined an 0-2 pitch into the gap in right-center for a two-run double.

Peralta, the potential tying run, tried to score from first but was cut down on the plate as catcher Iannetta took a hit from Peralta but held shortstop Troy Tulowitzki's relay throw.

Referring to his longtime third base coach Gene Lamont, Leyland said, "I think Gene wishes he had that one back. Now with two outs, no. But with no outs ... he'd probably like to have that one back."

Peralta doubled home the Tigers' first run in the fourth, when they had their first runner thrown out at the plate. Cabrera led off the inning with a walk and reached third when Victor Martinez followed with a single. Andy Dirks grounded to Todd Helton, who stepped on first base and threw to Tulowitzki. Cabrera waited until Helton threw and then broke for home, but Tulowitzki rifled the ball there, just ahead of the sliding Cabrera.

"Cabrera was between a rock and a hard place," Leyland said. "If he goes right away, he's out. It's a double play no matter what. If Miguel doesn't go, [Helton] steps on the bag and he throws to second and they tag the guy. Now if he gets in a rundown something else might have happened."

No such luck for the Tigers, who will look to Verlander but who, as Cabrera said, can only do so much.

"We got to score anyway," Cabrera said. "We got to play better. We got to do little things."

Jack Etkin is a contributor to MLB.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.

Ad-Justin to a higher altitude

By Jack Etkin / Special to MLB.com | 6/19/2011 8:55 PM ET

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DENVER -- Still in search of his first major league hit, Tigers ace Justin Verlander lined a ball to right field in the fourth inning Sunday. For an instant, the drought appeared over, and the keepsake ball for Verlander was going to be tossed to the Tigers' dugout.

But Rockies right fielder Seth Smith backpedaled and reached up to make the catch, much to the relief of Tigers manager Jim Leyland.

After Verlander threw a complete game four-hitter, tied his career-high with his seventh straight win and dominated the Rockies in a 9-1 rout, Leyland said of his ace, "I was glad it wasn't a hit, to be honest with you, because if it got over his head, it would've been a triple and he'd have been out of gas."

Instead, Verlander never appeared winded in his first start at Coors Field. He finished with 110 pitches, 71 strikes for his fourth complete game of the season and second in succession.

The victory enabled the Tigers to avoid being swept in the three-game series. In losses by scores of 13-6 and 5-4, starters Rick Porcello and Phil Coke combined to pitch just eight innings. Enter Verlander, who is 9-3 with a 2.54 ERA and won for the sixth time after a Tigers loss.

"I think he just had a chip on his shoulder." Leyland said. "Everyone talks about how tough it is to pitch here, and I think he had his mind set that he was going to pitch a shutout."

The complete game was the first by an opposing pitcher at Coors Field this season. The Rockies were held to four hits -- Ty Wigginton's homer in the fifth and three singles -- which is their second-lowest hit total at home this year. They were held to three hits on April 19 by Giants starter Jonathan Sanchez and three relievers.

"We certainly got beat today by as good a pitcher as we've seen all year," Rockies manager Jim Tracy said.

Verlander, who last lost April 27, struck out five and didn't walk anyone. During his seven-game winning streak, which spans nine starts dating back to May 7, Verlander has a 1.73 ERA (72 2/3 innings, 14 earned runs).

"You just don't find stuff like that," Leyland said of Verlander. "You don't find a combination of fastball, curve, changeup and slider. Three of them are well above average and one of them's average [the slider]. That's pretty tough. When he locates his fastball, he can be unhittable."

Asked about Leyland's comment that Verlander was bound and determined to pitch well at Coors Field, Verlander said, "I'd never pitched here. So I wouldn't say there was anything in overcoming the park. You can maybe say that if I had pitched here and struggled in the past. It was a big game for us, after a couple tough losses. So I was excited to get out there and try to turn the tides."

The Tigers gave Verlander a 1-0 lead in the second when Alex Avila and Jhonny Peralta singled against Aaron Cook. Avila moved to third when Andy Dirks grounded into a fielder's choice and scored on Ryan Rayburn's single.

Brennan Boesch, who went 3-for-4 with a home run, was hit with a pitch to open the third. Miguel Cabrera followed with a double, and Avila made it 2-0 with a sacrifice fly. With two outs, Dirks singled, scoring Cabrera.

Don Kelly tripled home a run in the fourth, and the Tigers made it 7-1 with three runs in the seventh, aided by errors by right fielder Seth Smith and pitcher Rex Brothers and a passed ball by Matt Pagnozzi, who made his Rockies debut. Boesch and Miguel Cabrera hit back-to-back homers in the ninth off Clayton Mortensen, giving Verlander a 9-1 cushion. He wrapped up his 14th career complete game by striking out pinch hitter Ryan Spilborghs and retiring Todd Helton and Troy Tulowitzki on fly outs.

With a 1-0 lead in the second, Verlander gave up a leadoff single to Tulowitzki, who reached second on Verlander's throwing error on a pickoff attempt. Smith's grounder to first base moved Tulowitzki, but Verlander struck out Wigginton and got Charlie Blackmon to ground out. Those three at-bats in the second were the Rockies only three with a runner in scoring position against Verlander.

The Tigers' ace entered the game hitless in 16 career at-bats with 10 strikeouts. Verlander struck out swinging in the second and eighth, and on a foul bunt in the sixth.

But leading off the fourth, after Cook knocked him down with a high-and-tight pitch, Verlander got up and there was that sweet moment of hard contact. For an instant the ball looked like it was going to sail over Smith's head. And if it had, might Verlander have ended up with a triple for his first big league hit?

"I got out of the box pretty good," Verlander said. "I got some wheels, so..."

When told afterward that Leyland was glad his ace didn't break his career hitless drought with that drive to right field in the fourth, Verlander smiled and said, "I'm pretty upset with him right now. First I've heard about that. I'm probably going to have a word with him on the plane."

Namely, the plane to Los Angeles where the Tigers will play a three-game series and finish Interleague Play on the road. That means Verlander, now 0-for-20 with 13 strikeouts lifetime, if he thinks about hitting, will have only that line drive to right in Coors Field to remember.

"All for naught." Verlander said. "Just another 0-for in the book for another year."

Jack Etkin is a contributor to MLB.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.

Tigers cut down by Kershaw's shutout in LA

By Jason Beck / MLB.com | 6/21/2011 2:47 AM ET

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LOS ANGELES -- Sometimes, Tigers manager Jim Leyland said more than once this year, contending teams have to beat good pitchers.

Good teams can beat good pitchers, Leyland is apt to say, if their own pitcher pitches well, and they can run into a big hit for a run or two.

He said none of that Monday night. Instead, his remarks after Detroit's 4-0 loss to the Dodgers could be summed up in four words.

"We had no shot," he said at one point.

For Leyland to say that means a lot. He didn't even say that after Matt Garza no-hit the Tigers last July. He said more than that Monday about Dodgers left-hander Clayton Kershaw and his two-hitter.

"We just ran into a buzzsaw, ran into an opposing pitcher that's really good and had a great night," Leyland said. "When the good ones are really on like he was tonight, he was lights-out. ... That's as fine an opposing pitcher as I've seen all year."

The loss kept Detroit one game behind Cleveland in the American League Central standings. The Indians lost to the Rockies earlier Monday evening.

Leyland could've talked about the other issues that furthered the Tigers' downfall. He pounded home the point that lefty reliever Daniel Schlereth needs to throw strikes with his fastball, the lack of which helped set up two add-on runs in the eighth inning. He could've also mentioned the Tigers' struggles to retire opposing pitchers, centered around the fact that Kershaw singled in those two add-on runs and outscored the Tigers on his own. Having Ryan Raburn picked off of third base for the third out after a leadoff double also couldn't have helped.

Those were contributing factors, but not the cause.

"There's nothing to talk about this game," Leyland said. "He just overmatched us. I mean, he was brilliant, and that's all you can say."

Until Monday, Garza was the only pitcher to throw a shutout against the Tigers since 2006, when Jon Garland and Jose Contreras did it. Garza, Leyland said that July night at Tropicana Field, threw high fastballs and dared Tigers hitters to chase them, which they did.

What Kershaw did, Leyland and other Tigers said, was different. It was vastly different than the other left-handers this year that have crossed paths with Detroit, a team that has shown it can hit left-handed pitchers with its lineup of right-handed hitters in the middle of the order. Detroit was 14-6 against lefty starters this year, but none of them pitched like this.

"Throwing hard, good off-speed, good command," Leyland said. "You can't pitch any better than that. That's as fine a pitcher as I've seen pitch against us all year. ... We didn't play bad. We just didn't hit a real good pitcher that had an extraordinarily good night.

"We had a good report on him. He pitched exactly like I thought he would. He was overpowering. He mixed enough of his other stuff to keep you honest, but he was overpowering. He was tremendous. That's all you can say."

Casper Wells' role is to hit left-handed pitchers. He had half of Detroit's hits when he connected on a fourth-inning curveball and lined it back through the middle. It was the only time he put a ball in play all night amidst three of Kershaw's 11 strikeouts.

"I've never seen anything like it in my life," Wells said. "He was dominant. He had this little slider thing. It didn't even move that much. It just dropped right in front of the plate. He's primarily a guy who throws a lot of fastballs, and really, it just seemed like he could throw five pitches for a strike. He had a curveball, slider, changeup, fastball. He could throw any pitch at any time. That's tough."

That's about as close as the Tigers have seen to their own ace, Justin Verlander, and his variety of pitches. But Kershaw is left-handed.

"He would have liked to pitch against Verlander today," Dodgers manager Don Mattingly said, "because he's one of the best in the other league. He loves the challenge."

Brad Penny could've given them a report. He was a Dodger during Kershaw's rookie year, part of Penny's five-year stint in Los Angeles that included back-to-back 16-win seasons. He won here with quite a few starts like he had Monday, with two runs over six innings.

Instead, he trailed three batters into his outing and stayed behind the rest of the night.

"He's good," Penny said. "He's really good. I'd like to tell you I taught him everything."

Penny had several hard-hit drives that seemingly died in the Southern California evening air. But Juan Uribe's launch to left field in the first wasn't one of them, going for a solo homer that gave Los Angeles a lead that Kershaw would not relinquish.

Sixth-inning doubles from James Loney and Dioner Navarro accounted for the other Dodgers run off Penny, who allowed seven hits and three walks.

Kershaw took his runs and went with them, allowing just two Tigers to reach scoring position over eight innings. Ryan Raburn's leadoff double in the third inning represented Detroit's best shot, but after Danny Worth's groundout moved Raburn to third, Kershaw struck out Penny for the second out. With Austin Jackson at bat, Navarro ended the inning by catching Raburn too far off third base and picking him off.

When asked about the missed opportunity, Leyland shrugged.

"Doesn't matter what part of the order was up tonight. We got two hits," he said. "I mean, it's that simple. There's really nothing to say. You can't be mad about a game like this. I thought Penny pitched well. He certainly gave us a chance against a really good pitcher to win the game. But the guy was just dominant."

Jason Beck is a reporter for MLB.com. Read Beck's Blog and follow him on Twitter @beckjason. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.

Tigers fall as Scherzer denied bid for 10th win

By Jason Beck / MLB.com | 6/22/2011 3:11 AM ET

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DETROIT -- Max Scherzer hasn't been as dominant as his record would suggest, even though he was trying to become the Majors' first 10-game winner Tuesday night. He probably isn't as far off as Tuesday's 6-1 Tigers loss to the Dodgers might suggest, either.

There's a middle ground in there, and Scherzer has arguably been spending a good portion of his season in it. He had won his previous three starts before Tuesday's loss, yet it was the third time in his last six outings that he gave up six runs or more.

No other pitcher in baseball with at least eight wins has a higher ERA than Scherzer's 4.61 mark, and his 13 home runs over 95 2/3 innings mark one of the highest ratios among that same group. Yet he has also has three gems of at least seven innings without an earned run this year.

He gave up a no-doubt two-run home run to Andre Ethier on a 3-0 pitch that helped break open a close game in the fifth inning. Yet it was a 25-foot dribbler that Tony Gwynn beat out with two outs that gave the Dodgers the lead in the fourth after Victor Martinez's RBI single had briefly tied the game.

Try to sum up his season right now, and it's difficult for most anyone, including him.

"It's a combination of everything," Scherzer said. "Some of those hits, that's baseball. You live with it. You turn the page and move on. Sometimes, they're going to hit the ball right at people. But for me, it's all about what happens the next start."

What he means to the Tigers and their chances to contend, though, is pretty simple.

"We think if Scherzer gets to the top of his game -- he's good, but he's not at the top of his game just yet -- if he gets to the top of his game ... I like the one-two punch of [Justin] Verlander and Scherzer pretty much [as much] as anybody in baseball when they're both right," manager Jim Leyland said on Monday. "Now, are they both going to be right? I can't tell you what's going to happen. But that's pretty good."

Verlander is as good or better than any pitcher in baseball right now, and he has been for more than a month. His painstaking attention to detail helps keep him that way. Scherzer has a similar perfectionist streak in him.

During the Tigers' last homestand, Leyland said Scherzer works as hard as any pitcher he has managed. He worked like crazy to try to keep his team and himself in the game Tuesday. But his fate might best have been summed up in three situations.

Gwynn's go-ahead single came after Scherzer used two ground balls -- and an acrobatic effort from Alex Avila to stay on home plate -- to get out of a bases-loaded jam two innings earlier. It seemed like Gwynn's squibber would be another key to an escape, but the ball was hit just soft enough that Scherzer had to scramble off the mound for it, allowing Gwynn to fly down the first-base line and beat the throw.

"That was a situation I needed to execute in, and I executed," Scherzer said. "You can't beat yourself up over that AB. Sometimes the hitters will find a way to do just enough. What made it frustrating tonight was not finishing the game off through six innings."

He had three two-strike hits in the sixth inning to blame for that, as he struggled to finish off hitters. But he also had Ethier's home run in the fifth in a no-win situation.

Juan Uribe's one-out single provided the runner, and three straight pitches off the outside corner provided the count. Ethier was 5-for-12 lifetime off Scherzer heading into the game, while Matt Kemp was 0-for-13. Kemp, however, has 20 home runs.

Scherzer challenged Ethier with a fastball. Either sent it halfway up the right-field bleachers for his seventh home run on the year and 4-1 lead.

"The key wasn't the 3-0 home run," Leyland said. "The key was getting 3-0."

Despite that, the Tigers put the potential tying run on base in the next inning. And with Miguel Cabrera out of the starting lineup for the first time all year, Leyland gave him the chance to slug them back into the game.

Cabrera was 0-for-12 off Dodgers starter Chad Billingsley, which gave Leyland a good reason to give his slugger a rest. Once Dodgers manager Don Mattingly pulled Billingsley with the bases loaded and one out, having yielded a walk to Avila on top of singles to Brennan Boesch and Martinez, Leyland had a very good reason to bring in his All-Star slugger.

"That's one thing I learned in the National League: When you get your chance, you've got to take it," Leyland said.

Cabrera knew he was resting, but he said before the game he knew he had to be ready for a pinch-hit opportunity. With former American League Central foe Mike MacDougal on the mound, he was eager.

McDougal, however, had a 97 mph sinker. He spotted the first for a called strike, then got Cabrera to swing at the second.

"He got it right on the barrel," Leyland said. "He just couldn't get it on the air."

Instead, he got it right to shortstop Dee Gordon, who started the inning-ending double play.

"It was sinking," Cabrera said. "It was a great pitch."

It was one of three times Detroit stranded runners on first and second with nobody out, but that one hurt the most.

"Billingsley tonight was really good," Mattingly said. "He used his breaking ball. He changed speeds and stayed calm out there."

Jason Beck is a reporter for MLB.com. Read Beck's Blog and follow him on Twitter @beckjason. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.

Jackson's dazzling grab seals win for Tigers
Center fielder saves day in ninth after Detroit belts four homers

By Jason Beck / MLB.com | 6/22/2011 9:51 PM ET

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LOS ANGELES -- Tigers manager Jim Leyland talks about the final outs of a game as entirely different to try to earn. He was talking about the job of a reliever, not a center fielder.

But on a warm Wednesday afternoon with fly balls soaring at Dodger Stadium, Austin Jackson was the Tigers' closer. It just won't show up on the stats sheet of Wednesday's 7-5 Tigers win.

"That last at-bat, when the ball left the bat I thought for sure it was at least a base hit," said the Dodgers' Matt Kemp, who was headed home with the would-be tying run when Jackson ran down Dioner Navarro's drive in right-center field. "We fought back, but Jackson made a heck of a play."

Kemp, a Gold Glove center fielder, saw Jackson rob him of an extra-base hit with a leaping catch in front of the fence Monday night. That leap might have been more of a highlight. But that was in the first inning of the series' first game.

Jackson has had better catches. His mad dash to left-center field for an over-the-shoulder catch in Armando Galarraga's perfect game bid last year comes to mind. But he arguably hasn't had a game-saver like this.

"He made a heck of a play," Leyland said, "and he made it look pretty easy, really."

Jackson had the game off to rest his legs, effectively giving him a two-day rest before the Tigers' upcoming stretch of 17 games in 17 days leading into the All-Star break next month. But like a closer, Jackson got the call in the ninth, coming in from the dugout to take his usual spot in center field while Jose Valverde took the mound. They were the last of Leyland's eight moves as the longtime National League manager summoned his old Senior Circuit self with a slew of double-switches and situational moves to try to avoid a series sweep and a 1-5 Interleague road trip.

That was fine for Jackson, who said he'd rather enter a game on defense than try to step off the bench and pinch-hit late in a game like that.

"It's definitely a lot easier," Jackson said.

He had seen balls fly out all afternoon, from Casper Wells' first career leadoff home run batting in Jackson's place to two-run homers from Magglio Ordonez in the second inning and Miguel Cabrera in the third to build Detroit's lead against Dodgers starter Ted Lilly (5-7). Another home run in the eighth from Don Kelly provided what turned out to be a critical insurance run.

On a day when the Tigers and Dodgers wore throwback jerseys from 1944, the Tigers had a glimpse of a younger form from Ordonez, who has his own big defensive play when James Loney tried to score on Jamey Carroll's fourth-inning fly ball to right. Ordonez fired an accurate throw on one hop to catcher Victor Martinez, who used his left foot to block Loney from sliding into home plate. The out ended a threat in which the Dodgers brought the potential tying run to the plate.

Once Jackson entered, he watched from another angle while two singles and a walk loaded the bases with one out, bringing Los Angeles within a base hit of a tie game and extra bases of a walk-off victory.

He saw Valverde strike out a longtime Tiger killer, former Cleveland Indian Casey Blake, for the second out, then put Navarro in a two-strike count. Then he saw the ball jump off Navarro's bat and soar toward the gap in right-center field.

He wasn't thinking about the chances of getting there at that point. He was just trying to get going in that direction as quickly as possible.

"In those situations, you just see a ball hit in the gap," Jackson said, "and you just do your best to get the best jump and react."

Leyland has learned to expect Jackson to run down a lot of fly balls. There are few plays that surprise him anymore. This was one.

"I thought when [Navarro] hit it, it was going to be in the gap for sure, over his head," Leyland said.

So, of course, did Kemp.

Dodgers manager Don Mattingly knew Jackson from his days in the Yankees organization, when Mattingly was a coach under Joe Torre. He knew what kind of defense he can play. Even he didn't sound completely sure.

"Austin can fly," Mattingly said. "He can play some center field. It looked like he just kind of outran it at the end. That ball just kind of ran out of steam at the end, and he just kept going."

Jackson has made a habit of those.

"I got a pretty good jump on it, a good read on it," Jackson said. "I kept my eye on it the whole time and I felt the warning track, so I knew how much room I had and I was able to make a play on it."

The catch made a winner out of Al Alburquerque (4-1), whose 2 1/3 scoreless innings bridged the gap between Rick Porcello's fifth-inning jam and setup man Joaquin Benoit. It also allowed Valverde to keep his perfect closing mark intact, now 17-for-17 in save opportunities.

But in effect, Jackson was the closer. He didn't get to face his childhood friend Javy Guerra, who has been closing games for the Dodgers, but he might have robbed him of a victory.

"It's one of those things where you see a ball hit and you do your best to get there, no matter what the situation is," Jackson said. "And I think, since the situation was what it was today, it was probably a better catch than what it really was."

Jason Beck is a reporter for MLB.com. Read Beck's Blog and follow him on Twitter @beckjason. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.

Coke struggles in loss to Arizona

By Chris Vannini / MLB.com | 6/25/2011 12:43 AM ET

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DETROIT -- Phil Coke takes losses hard like he's still a late-inning reliever. In that sense, he has not made it an easy slide into the Tigers rotation.

It's tough enough that the no-decisions now hit him hard. When they involve a four-run lead blown into a 7-6 loss to the D-backs Friday night, they hit him particularly tough.

"I'm ashamed of myself for letting that get away the way I did," Coke said.

Wily Mo Pena's go-ahead homer traveled an estimated 454 feet to left field off a David Purcey offspeed pitch, but it might as well have hit Coke in the gut as he watched from the clubhouse. He was long gone from the game, pulled with two outs in the fifth and the Tigers clutching for dear life onto what was a three-run lead going into the inning.

His emotions aren't tough to read when he's on the mound, and given his interviews, they're pretty evident off of it. While fireworks went off on the field in the minutes after Friday's game, Coke's frustration sparked.

"Of course I'm frustrated, man," he said. "I got out there, they give me a lead and I let it slip away. Of course I'm frustrated. I feel terrible. The best way I can describe it right now."

He has not had many leads, which partly explains the emotions. His 11-start winless streak since April 14 includes two outings of more than six scoreless innings, a 3 1/3-inning start shortened by a foot injury in a Tigers victory, and another Tigers win after a blown lead from the bullpen.

He came into Friday's outing with an average of 2.63 runs of support per nine innings, which would rank third-lowest among American League starters if he had enough innings to qualify. He was second to Justin Verlander in earned-run average, opponents' batting average and WHIP ratio on the team, yet last in the rotation in wins.

Friday was just the fourth time all season the Tigers had scored six runs for him, and they scored quickly. He was an out away from qualifying for the victory when three singles and a walk set up his demise.

Pena's eighth-inning homer was actually Arizona's lone extra-base hit of the night, and it was an exclamation point on the comeback. It marked the longest home run ever hit by an opposing player at Comerica Park, topping Chipper Jones' 453-foot drive off the brick wall beyond left-center field in 2004, and the longest by a right-handed hitter in the park's 12-year history.

"I didn't move too much," left fielder Casper Wells said. "I've seen him hit balls like that. ... He's a big guy. You can't leave a ball up to a guy like that. He's a football player out there."

Said Pena: "I don't know how far that one went, but I hit the ball real good. As soon as I hit the ball, I knew it was out."

The only deeper drives at Comerica Park were Carlos Pena's 461-foot launch over the brick wall in right-center near the end of the 2005 season, and Eric Munson's 457-foot walkoff shot off the center-field camera well in 2004. Munson's shot beat the D-backs, so maybe it was fitting that Pena finally enacted some revenge.

To Coke, though, it should've never gotten to that point, not after Jhonny Peralta's two-run double in the opening inning and Wells' two-run homer in the fourth gave him room to pitch.

"I'm very proud of the way we go out there and go about our business," Coke said. "We go out there and we do a good job and I blew a golden opportunity for our team."

Coke retired nine of his first 10 batters before three straight baserunners led off the fourth inning. All of them scored, but Coke managed to escape a jam to leave it at that.

Back to the mound with a 6-3 lead in the fifth, Coke retired Ryan Roberts and Kelly Johnson before Justin Upton got him for his third single in as many at-bats. After he stole second, Coke walked Chris Young.

"Phil just didn't pitch good tonight," manager Jim Leyland said. "He left a lot of balls up."

His demise, though, might well have been on the ground ball he couldn't covert. Miguel Cabrera's dive stopped Stephen Drew's grounder, but Coke seemed to fumble with his footwork as he tried to cover the bag.

"That was huge," Leyland said. "That was a bang-bang play. ... He didn't get over there. You have to get over there. Cabrera made a good play. As it turned out, the way the play developed, the way Coke took the throw was probably a little bit of the difference. He reached back a little bit."

That loaded the bases for Xavier Nady, whose two-run single knocked Coke out of the game. Ryan Perry, just recalled from Triple-A Toledo, put Pena in an 0-2 count before he tried to bury a slider in the dirt. The ball skipped off Alex Avila's forearm and rolled to the Tigers dugout, scoring Drew with the tying run.

"That was my plan, 0-2, but maybe just a little too much [in the dirt]," said Perry, who went on for 2 1/3 solid innings.

The Tigers committed to Coke as a starter before the season started, and they've kept to it. And while Leyland said before the game that he can now foresee long reliever Charlie Furbush as a potential starter someday, he wasn't talking about the near future.

But Leyland and others have also said Coke has to corral his emotions to make it work. Friday didn't help him on that cause.

"I think it absolutely played against me tonight for sure," Coke said. "I'm a very emotional guy on the field. It bothers me that I let it get to me the way that I did because I cost us that."

Chris Vannini is an associate reporter for MLB.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.

Hang 10: Dominant Verlander drives Detroit
Ace fans career-high 14 D-backs, pulls Tigers into first-place tie

By Jason Beck / MLB.com | 6/26/2011 12:45 AM ET

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DETROIT -- The pitch came from Justin Verlander. Justin Upton swung and missed, as so many have recently. Verlander struck out the side after allowing the first two batters to reach second and third in the eighth inning.

The crowd of 43,163 -- the first sellout since the home opener at Comerica Park -- roared both for what Verlander did and what he has done.

The Tigers' ace had a career-high 14 strikeouts in Saturday's 6-0 win over the D-backs, continuing an unbelievable run that is complicating the question of who is the best in the game.

Verlander is 6-0 with a 0.72 ERA in six starts since May 29, giving up 26 hits, five walks and striking out 51 in 49 2/3 innings over that span. Since his no-hitter on May 7, Verlander is 8-0 with a 1.56 ERA.

He has hurled a quality start in 16 of his 17 outings and passed Roy Halladay for the Major League lead in strikeouts. The Tigers' ace has not lost since April 27, winning eight consecutive decisions over that span -- including his past six starts.

Verlander has had dominant streaks before, but never like this.

"I feel like I'm throwing the ball really well," Verlander said. "I feel like my fastball control has been outstanding, for the most part, during this stretch. Most of the good games I have are built off of that, being able to locate that, and mixing the offspeed off of that.

"I feel like I was able to do that tonight pretty well, keep guys off-balance and start to get them guessing."

Verlander gave up four hits over eight scoreless innings against the D-backs.

"He was everything we heard he was, and I saw him when he came up for his first game and we knew he had electric stuff," said Arizona manager Kirk Gibson. "We watched him on TV, so you have to tip your hat to him."

Verlander had his top three pitches working well for him -- the fastball, curveball and changeup. He finished with 119 pitches, 84 for strikes. He spotted the curveball for a strike 19 of 25 times (76 percent), which was better compared to the fastball (33-for-50, 66 percent). He also threw nine sliders, eight of them for strikes, according to MLB.com Gameday data.

"You just don't see stuff like that," said Tigers manager Jim Leyland. "I think one of their guys remarked to [third-base coach Gene Lamont], if you get a pitch from him to hit, you'd better hit it."

The career-high eighth consecutive win for Verlander not only made him the second 10-win pitcher in baseball this season, it moved the Tigers back into a first-place tie in the American League Central with the Indians -- who lost to the Giants, 1-0.

"Obviously, I was kind of the poster boy for this game, but you look around and there's many guys, and that's the way we've been winning," Verlander said. "It's easy for those guys to get overshadowed, everybody kind of battled tonight, it was a team effort. Everybody went out there and did a fantastic job, top to bottom in the lineup."

Verlander's counterpart, catcher Alex Avila, backed up the pitcher with an offensive outpouring.

One day after Verlander started a Twitter campaign to get Avila into the All-Star Game, the catcher helped his pitcher with a 3-for-4, four-RBI game, which included a three-run home run in the fourth inning that put the Tigers up, 5-0.

Despite the early lead, Verlander didn't feel in rhythm until the fifth, when he worked out of a 2-0 count to strike out Wily Mo Pena.

"I went 2-0, and was able to really spot up two fastballs down and away to get myself back in the count, and that was kind of the turning point for me," Verlander said. "I know that was a little bit deep in the game, but that's really when I felt like I could establish a rhythm and locate pretty well."

From then on, Verlander allowed just three baserunners -- two of which came in the eighth, when a leadoff walk and double put runners on second and third with no outs.

But Verlander struck out Ryan Roberts, Kelly Johnson and Upton to end the threat and his night. The final at-bat included a 100-mph fastball, as Verlander didn't expect to be coming out for the ninth.

"Once second and third happened with nobody out, I kind of said, 'Well, no point in saving anything,'" Verlander said. "Let's go after these guys and see if we can strike some guys out."

Verlander became the third Tigers pitcher since 1972 to strike out 14 batters in a game, joining teammate Max Scherzer -- who did it on May 30 of last year -- and former teammate Jeremy Bonderman -- who did it in 2004. The franchise record for strikeouts in a game is 16, set by Mickey Lolich, who did so twice in 1969.

During the eighth inning, Verlander let himself soak in the moment. The fans roared, not only hoping Verlander would get out of the jam, but do it with style. A swing and a miss by Upton and a small fist pump gave the fans what they wanted.

"I kind of took a minute and took it all in after I struck out the second guy," Verlander said. "I just stepped off the mound because it's easy to let your adrenaline get to you in that situation. Just take a step back and kind of soak it up a little bit, because it's not often you hear a roar like that.

"I've heard it a few times in this stadium -- I've been through some pretty special moments here -- but that was one of the most vocal performances that these fans have put on."

Jason Beck is a reporter for MLB.com. Read Beck's Blog and follow him on Twitter @beckjason. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.

Tigers' bats 'Spark' late in finale

By Jason Beck / MLB.com | 6/26/2011 7:05 PM ET

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DETROIT -- On the day the Tigers celebrated the life and career of Sparky Anderson before a sellout crowd, Detroit and Arizona combined for 11 runs. Sparky's old team scored seven of them with two outs in the bottom of the eighth, against two of the legendary manager's favorite players, Kirk Gibson and Alan Trammell.

"It was just one of those things today," said D-backs starter Joe Saunders, whose seven innings of one-run ball went for naught in the 8-3 Tigers win. "I think Sparky had a little to do with it."

It's hard to make that case when it was Gibson who had to make the trips to the mound to change relievers in the eighth inning, and Trammell who had to watch the rally unfold from the visiting dugout, arms crossed at the bottom of the steps.

Still, the combination of timely hitting and quality at-bats was something that the Tigers will gladly take, and something Anderson probably would have enjoyed watching from the dugout in his day.

"Quite a tribute to Sparky, deservedly so," Tigers manager Jim Leyland said before the game. "Hopefully we put the frosting on the cake with a nice win in front of a wonderful crowd."

The eighth-inning rally began with Don Kelly delivering a pinch-hit, one-out single with the Tigers down, 2-1. By the time it ended, Kelly was on base for a second time after his ground ball led to Ryan Roberts' error and the Tigers' final run.

In between were more baserunners in one inning than Saunders had allowed the Tigers over the first seven frames. Back-to-back two-out walks continued the rally before five straight hits.

"Miguel [Cabrera] got a big two-out hit," Leyland said. "That's golden. That's what he's good at. And the other guys just kind of picked up on it and we added some insurance. We had a good win after it looked like it could be a potentially tough day."

The win ensured that the Tigers will enter the week with at least a share of the American League Central lead. The Indians, who were in a virtual tie with Detroit atop the division, were scheduled to play the Giants on Sunday night.

For a lineup that has had its share of success against left-handers, the Tigers had some of the same struggles against Saunders that they did against harder-throwing Dodgers southpaw Clayton Kershaw last Monday. Jhonny Peralta's second-inning solo homer accounted for the lone run off him, and Peralta's fourth-inning single accounted for the last hit.

Saunders retired the last 10 batters he faced, and Aaron Heilman retired his first before walking Kelly on five pitches. Heilman (4-1) struck out Austin Jackson before missing on a full-count sinker to Casper Wells for another walk.

That brought up Magglio Ordonez, which brought in hard-throwing setup man David Hernandez.

"He was going to try to overpower him, obviously, and I thought it was a great move by Gibby to bring him in," Leyland said. "He wanted to hardball him. He just didn't throw strikes."

He didn't throw any strikes, sailing three straight fastballs at shoulder level or higher following a first-pitch curve. It loaded the bases for Cabrera.

You can guess the rest -- not just with Cabrera, but Victor Martinez and Peralta after him. It put the Tigers at 5-for-8 with runners in scoring position on the day.

"Everybody did a great job, making him throw strikes and swinging at good pitches," Cabrera said. "Everybody isn't trying to hit a home run or trying to be a hero, just trying to make contact with the ball and put the ball in play."

And everybody did until Brian Shaw finally struck out Jackson for the third out.

"Wherever we hit them, they fell in the gap or fell in the hole," Leyland said.

The victory didn't get a win for Tigers starter Brad Penny, who took a 1-0 lead into the seventh before four singles put Arizona ahead. Instead, it made a winner again out of Al Alburquerque (5-1), who stranded the bases loaded in the seventh and left two more runners on in the eighth for his second victory in as many outings.

"Thank God they took Saunders out," Penny said. "He threw a great game. He was making pitches with everything, pitching in and out, up and down, locating his offspeed stuff. So it was nice [to win]."

Jason Beck is a reporter for MLB.com. Read Beck's Blog and follow him on Twitter @beckjason. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.

Game of inches: Peralta's triple lifts Tigers
Sinking liner eludes Bautista's glove as Detroit takes third straight

By Jason Beck / MLB.com | 6/27/2011 11:37 PM ET

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DETROIT -- Jim Leyland doesn't get ejected to fire up his club. If he needs that to motivate his team, he likes to say, he should go home.

Instead, he went to his office once he earned his dismissal from first-base umpire Ed Rapuano. The sight of Leyland's arms waving, his head bobbing as he shouted, made a memory for the 25,181 in attendance and the players in the dugout.

The sight of Jhonny Peralta's sinking line drive bouncing past Jose Bautista in right field proved bigger, providing the Tigers with a go-ahead rally in the eighth inning for the second straight game in a 4-2 win over the Blue Jays.

It wasn't a seven-run surge, like Detroit enjoyed while dispatching Arizona on Sunday, but it was enough to help the Tigers stay atop the American League Central. It also moved Detroit back to their high point of seven games over .500 and five games up on the idle White Sox.

"It was a good win for us," said manager Jim Leyland. "It's tough. We're playing a lot of games right up until the [All-Star break]. I'm proud of the guys. They battled."

Much of that battling took place with Leyland back in the clubhouse, something he wasn't proud of and wasn't discussing afterwards. When a reversed call turned what was briefly an Andy Dirks bunt single into an out, Leyland erupted in an animated tirade on Rapuano for turning to home-plate umpire Alfonso Marquez for a second opinion. Detroit's skipper clearly knew Dirks was out, but the problem was the reversal when Rapuano's view wasn't blocked.

Suddenly, there was the sight of Leyland along the first-base line, giving his best impression of Rapuano's indecision -- his tepid, delayed safe call, then out. Rapuano's gesture to eject him was a lot quicker.

It was a rare argument and first ejection of the season for Leyland. His players seemed to appreciate it.

"We all had a nice little chuckle in the dugout," said Tigers starter Max Scherzer. "Good old Skip, giving his best to the umpires."

Even with the reversed call, the Tigers had put the go-ahead run into scoring position in the seventh inning, only to watch former Tigers draft pick Jason Frasor retire Miguel Cabrera to strand two and keep the game tied.

Once Magglio Ordonez's one-out single the next inning, his second hit of the night, put the go-ahead run back on base, the Tigers took advantage.

Austin Jackson was part of the big eighth inning Sunday night, but not a part of the rally. He made two of the three outs that inning, striking out both times he came up, and his three-strikeout night preceded Leyland's decision to give him a night off for the second time in six days.

Once Ordonez reached base against Jays lefty Marc Rzepczynski (2-2), acting manager and hitting coach Lloyd McClendon didn't hesitate to put Jackson in the game -- and he didn't want Jackson hesitating once he reached first base to pinch-run.

"It's fun for me and exciting for me to try to get in there and face that challenge to get into scoring position," Jackson said.

After a first-pitch foul ball, Jackson took off on the next offering from right-hander Shawn Camp, swiping his 13th base of the year. Two pitches later, he had to hesitate and watch as Bautista closed in on Peralta's sinking liner.

"In that situation, as a baserunner, I think the best thing you can do is just read his reaction," Jackson said. "He kind of had to dive a little bit, so you try to stay close enough to where maybe you can get back and tag, but if it does drop in that situation, be off and able to score."

All the while, Bautista's reaction was one of an outfielder tracking the ball and expecting to make the catch. Bautista said later, however, he was searching for the ball against the glare of the lights.

"Right off the bat, I knew I had a shot standing up," Bautista said. "And halfway through the flight of the line drive, the ball got into the lights and I took about six or seven steps hoping it would come out -- that's when I decided to slide for it, because I lost it for the last six or seven steps."

Said Jackson: "I thought he had a good chance to catch it, and he did [have a shot]. It just went under his glove."

Jackson scored easily as the ball kept rolling in right field. Peralta took off and reached third base standing up, having driven in his 46th run of the year. He's tied for second on the team with Victor Martinez, even though he's been batting seventh in the order more often than not.

Add together this half-season in 2011 with his two months in Detroit after his trade from Cleveland last year, and Peralta has 20 home runs and 83 RBIs in 126 games. Whether it earns him an All-Star nod next weekend remains to be seen, but it has stretched out the run-production portion of Detroit's lineup.

"Big hit after big hit," Leyland said, "and that's why we got him last year."

The rally made a winner out of Joaquin Benoit (2-3), who registered a scoreless eighth inning. Max Scherzer wasn't able to join Justin Verlander among 10-game winners, but his seven innings of two-run ball kept the Tigers in the game, and he equaled his season high with nine strikeouts.

Jason Beck is a reporter for MLB.com. Read Beck's Blog and follow him on Twitter @beckjason. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.

Porcello can't contain Mets in Tigers' loss
Starter's rough patch grows against National League visitor

By Jason Beck / MLB.com | 6/29/2011 1:00 AM ET

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DETROIT -- Rick Porcello doesn't feel lost right now, not the way he did last year. That's good, because there's a good chance they need him here if they're going to go places this season. But they need him better than his results Tuesday.

As big as Tuesday's 14-3 loss to the Mets loomed on the scoreboard, like a result that somehow crossed the street from Ford Field next door, the pitcher who gave up half of those runs is a much bigger concern. If the Tigers are going to contend, it's a huge concern.

It's not the same concern as last year, and they aren't quite the same numbers. But they're not nearly the numbers the Tigers need from him, either.

"As stuff goes, I feel like it was as good tonight as it's been all year," Porcello said. "I feel like it's just a matter of pitch-making, leaving balls up, making some mistakes to some guys."

As good as Justin Verlander and Max Scherzer have been, manager Jim Leyland pointed out last week, the Tigers need results from their other three starters. Get good outings from one of those other three, and there's a chance to win three out of five, play .600 ball, if not better.

Porcello is the Tigers' best chance at that formidable third guy. After two tough starts to open the season, Porcello was that guy for a six-week stretch. But after three straight ugly losses to National League teams, his midseason rough patch is looming large.

Porcello learned from last year. He's in study mode now. After seven runs on 11 hits over 3 2/3 innings Tuesday, he spent the rest of the game watching video, trying to figure out how the Mets could attack him so aggressively.

"A year ago, I felt lost. That was then," Porcello said later. "Right now, it's a bump in the road, there's no doubt about that. But I mean, I don't have time to sit here and be worried about it. I have to figure it out and fix it.

"We're trying to win a division. I can't go out there and have performances like that, especially [three] games in a row."

Add Tuesday's damage to his defeat at Dodger Stadium last week and poor showing to the Rockies before that, and Porcello has given up 18 earned runs on 28 hits over 11 1/3 innings. His ERA, in turn, has risen from 3.58 on June 7 to 5.06 after Tuesday's start.

"Actually, his start in L.A. really wasn't that bad," Leyland said. "He kind of got blooped to death in L.A. But the start in Colorado and this one certainly were not good."

The final half-run of that ERA jump came Tuesday, and all of it came with two outs. Daniel Murphy and Angel Pagan hit back-to-back RBI doubles with two outs in the first. Porcello had three straight batters in two-strike, two-out situations before Miguel Cabrera finally snagged a hard-hit liner from Willie Harris to strand runners on in the second inning.

Porcello's demise in the fourth came after retiring the first two batters of the inning. He left a fastball up to ninth hitter Josh Thole for the catcher's first home run of the year. He threw back-to-back offspeed pitches to Jose Reyes, who lined the second into the right-field corner for a triple.

His first-pitch sinker to Willie Harris ended up hitting the right-field fence. Had Harris gotten an extra base out of it, it would've set up Porcello to give up the cycle in a four-batter, five-pitch span, because Carlos Beltran lined his next pitch to center for another single.

After challenging Daniel Murphy on a 2-0 pitch and giving up an RBI single, Leyland brought the hook.

"Tonight, he threw some bad pitches that they hit," Leyland said, "and he threw some decent pitches that they hit. It just wasn't his night. He got some balls up, and he threw some decent pitches that they hit. They were real aggressive, kind of charging him."

Porcello has never been a big strikeout pitcher, and doesn't get many swings and misses even when he gets strikeouts. But even by his standards, his total of two swing-and-miss strikes Tuesday was low. He had three swings and misses out of 81 pitches at Dodger Stadium, and two swinging strikes out of 55 pitches at Colorado. He had nine against Seattle before that.

No matter which pitch Porcello threw Tuesday -- 24 sinkers, 18 four-seam fastballs, 15 changeups and 12 sliders out of 71 pitches, according to brooksbaseball.net and MLB.com Gameday -- they seemed to track it well. But if the secondary pitches aren't executed well, they won't keep opponents from sitting on sinkers.

"I definitely felt like today and in previous bad outings, I think guys have been all over my fastball, especially left-handed hitters," Porcello said. "That's been kind of an ongoing thing for me that I've got to make sure I shut down lefties in the lineup. Almost all the lineups I'm going to face are stacked with left-handed hitters. That's just an ongoing challenge."

The Mets' left-handed hitters went 5-for-9 against Porcello. Opponents are now batting .326 from the left side off him.

"For Rick, his safety zone is the sinker down and away to lefties," pitching coach Rick Knapp said. "If you execute one out of four, it's difficult. If you execute two out of four, it's different. That's what we're working for, to try to get his sinker. That, in a nutshell, is it."

If he's tipping pitches, the Tigers either don't know or aren't telling. It would certainly have to be on their minds as they look at the video. But opponents aren't missing.

Porcello has one more NL opponent left when the Giants face him Sunday. He'll no doubt be studying.

Jason Beck is a reporter for MLB.com. Read Beck's Blog and follow him on Twitter @beckjason. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.

Despite five homers, Tigers overwhelmed
Cabrera goes deep twice, but Coke falters again in starting role

By Jason Beck / MLB.com | 6/30/2011 1:17 AM ET

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DETROIT -- Phil Coke's wild pitch that bounced off home plate and cleared the backstop and the screen was a pretty bad sign of things to come. Don Kelly's curveball to get the last out was a pretty good capper. The wrong relief pitcher coming out of the bullpen for the Mets was a decent interlude in between.

Those were among the oddities Wednesday night at Comerica Park. Another winless outing for Coke, however, wasn't among them, continuing a streak that has been going on since April. And unlike some low-scoring games he has pitched, Wednesday's 16-9 Tigers loss to the Mets was relentless.

"I'm sick to my stomach right now," Coke said.

While three American League pitchers have suffered more losses than Coke (1-8) this year, they've all won more recently. Coke's lone victory came April 14, and his stretch of 12 winless starts is the longest by a Tigers starter since the Tigers' 119-loss team of 2003. Adam Bernero went 0-10 over a 17-start stretch that began June 15, 2002, and ended May 31, 2003. Just days before that, Mike Maroth ended his own 12-start winless streak.

Those two had bad numbers on bad teams, including a 6.39 ERA for Bernero in his winless stretch. Coke has had his share of decent starts that have gone unrewarded. His past three starts don't fall into that category.

Coke hasn't pitched into the sixth inning in any of those three outings, but the latest was the statistical apex of his struggles this year. By the time Tigers manager Jim Leyland went to the bullpen with nobody out in the fifth, constituting Coke's quickest non-injury exit this year, he had allowed a season-high eight runs, seven earned, on 10 hits, not counting several hard-hit drives that sent Tigers outfielders to the depths of Comerica Park.

"I was throwing strikes and they were hitting them," Coke said. "That pretty much sums it up. ... I was going back and forth, and they were just hitting anything that was over the white thing [home plate]."

Leyland accounted for the hot team they're facing, which also put up 14 runs on Rick Porcello and the Tigers' bullpen Tuesday. But he also accounted for the pitches being thrown.

"When you pitch the way we have the last couple days, you leave a lot of hittable pitches there that get hit all the time, and every once in a while you throw a pretty good pitch that gets hit when somebody's that hot," Leyland said. "That's just the way it happens.

"But we've just made some miserable pitches the last couple nights. That's simple. That's without any criticism or anything else. That's just not acceptable."

Not since May 18-19, 1996, had the Tigers allowed 14 or more runs in back-to-back games. That pitching staff finished with a team ERA over 6.00 on a ballclub that lost 109 games. This is a contending team, fronted by a Cy Young favorite in Justin Verlander, but its staff has been shredded the past two nights.

Add Wednesday's damage to outings against the D-backs and Rockies, and Coke has allowed 18 runs, 16 earned, on 22 hits over his last 13 2/3 innings. Unlike Porcello, Coke has not had a corresponding stretch where everything has gone right for him. Though he tossed 6 1/3 scoreless innings against Tampa Bay before this streak, he gave up 10 hits and six runs, four earned, in five innings to the Rangers before that.

The Tigers have supported Coke as a starter ever since announcing his move last fall from the bullpen, where he was an effective setup man last year. When Leyland was asked about Coke after Wednesday's loss, his response hinted that change could be in the works.

"We're tossing some things around," Leyland said. "We're not ready to make any decisions at this particular time. We'll leave it at that."

Coke was asked about his preference later.

"I'm at the team's disposal," Coke said, "and I'll do whatever I'm asked to do. And they're asking me to go out there and start, and I'm going out there and giving everything I have, every time I take the ball. Boos, no boos, happy people, not happy people, it doesn't matter. I'm doing the best I can. If they wanted to do something like that, that's their prerogative. I'm at their beck and call."

Leyland has had to change course before. In fact, he had to do it Wednesday with Kelly, after saying for years he would never use a position player to pitch. Simply put, the damage the Mets put up against Tigers relievers -- including 42 pitches from Al Alburquerque, and 47 from David Purcey -- forced the change.

"They got behind in the count and had to throw a pitch down the middle, and we took advantage of it," Pagan said.

Leyland went heavy with his bullpen to try to keep the deficit at two runs. The Mets just kept driving in runs.

"We really battled our tails off to get within two," Leyland said.

With the deficit at seven runs, Kelly retired Scott Hairston to become the first Tigers position player to pitch in a game since Shane Halter played all nine spots in a game to close out the 2000 season. The Tigers, meanwhile, sent down Daniel Schlereth after the game and called up Brayan Villarreal to have a fresh arm.

They hope they won't need it with Verlander going Thursday. With the oddities of this series, they can't be sure.

Jason Beck is a reporter for MLB.com. Read Beck's Blog and follow him on Twitter @beckjason. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.

Verlander gives gritty effort to beat Mets
Ace settles after early homer, rides offense in finale in Detroit

By Chris Vannini / MLB.com | 6/30/2011 7:16 PM ET

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DETROIT -- Justin Verlander was a little disappointed with himself after Thursday's 5-2 win over the Mets.

Verlander's line showed he gave up only one run over seven innings -- a great game for most pitchers -- but for a guy who has been close to unhittable over the past month-plus, Verlander didn't feel like he was able to get into a rhythm. He was able to battle throughout the day and help the team win, though, which did give him some solace.

"I was a little down on myself after the game -- down that I wasn't able to find my rhythm, but happy that I was able to battle and keep us in the game and allow our guys to do what they do best, which is go out there and score some runs," Verlander said.

Verlander moved to 11-3 on the season and won his ninth straight decision, becoming the first Tigers pitcher to win 11 games by the end of June since Jack Morris in 1987.

In June, Verlander went 6-0 with a 0.92 ERA, 54 strikeouts and six walks.

"I've been on a pretty good run here," Verlander said. "I've had pretty good stuff for a period of time here. You've got to know it's not going to last an entire season. But when you don't have your best stuff and you don't have your best control, it's just a matter of going out there and really grinding through it."

After the Mets scored 30 runs in the first two games, it looked like it could be another long day for the Tigers when Jose Reyes blooped a mishandled double into center field to lead off the game.

But Jason Pridie lined out to Ramon Santiago, and a throw to second base caught Reyes for a double play.

"It kind of got lucky there, because the ball that was kind of mishandled in right allowed him to go to second, but then if he's on first -- that's assuming he hasn't stolen second base yet -- we're playing double-play depth and that ball off the end of the bat is a base hit," Verlander said. "Then you're sitting at first and third with nobody out, so we got a little bit of a break there."

Verlander allowed a leadoff homer to Daniel Murphy in the second inning, but the Tigers tied the game on an RBI single from Austin Jackson in the bottom half of the inning.

After the leadoff home run, Verlander didn't allow another run and scattered five hits the rest of the way. But even when he found some rhythm, he would lose it. He didn't locate a type of pitch for a strike more than 72 percent of the time, according to BrooksBaseball.net.

"I just know that everything wasn't quite probably as sharp, but I mean, to me, that's even higher praise for me for Justin Verlander," Tigers manager Jim Leyland said. "I would even have higher praise for him today than I would some other days, because to me, to go out there where you're not maybe quite as sharp as you've been and hold a team that got that many hits and scored that many runs in the last two nights is pretty unbelievable, really."

With a day game after a night game, Leyland started Santiago and outfielder Andy Dirks. Both contributed to give the Tigers a lead they would not lose.

In the third inning, Detroit loaded the bases with one out after a double by Victor Martinez, a single by Dirks and a walk to Jhonny Peralta. After a sacrifice fly by Avila, Santiago singled to center to score another run. The throw from Angel Pagan to Murphy at third base went into the Tigers dugout, giving Detroit a 4-1 lead.

Dirks homered in the fifth inning -- his third in as many games -- to extend the lead to 5-1.

"It was nice to see Dirksy and Santiago come up with a big hit," Leyland said. "Everybody playing, everybody participating, that's good tonic."

With the Tigers' bullpen expended after the previous two nights, it was even more important for Verlander to have a strong outing. With Verlander nearing 100 pitches after five innings and Leyland being "scared to death" about the bullpen situation, Verlander had a 1-2-3 sixth and got three outs in three batters in the seventh -- thanks to an outfield assist to home from Brennan Boesch.

Verlander finished with 120 pitches. Joaquin Benoit came in for the eighth inning and gave up a solo home run, making Jose Valverde's appearance a save opportunity, which he converted for his 19th of the season.

"There's no doubt we had a very good approach against [Verlander]," Reyes said. "He threw a lot of pitches. He was working hard there. But when we got on base, he looked like he made some quality pitches to get out of the innings. That's what good pitchers do. He's one of the best in the game, so you have to give some credit to him."

Verlander's 11 wins are tied for the Major League lead with the Yankees' CC Sabathia. Even an off game for Verlander has become much more than a quality start. With the Tigers' rotation getting a new member in Charlie Furbush, it's nice for them to know that the ace of the rotation will always give the club a chance to win.

"He clearly didn't have his best stuff," Avila said. "The thing is, it's funny, because he still pitched a really good ballgame. He didn't have his best stuff, but 99 percent of the pitches, we'll take that."

Chris Vannini is an associate reporter for MLB.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.

Tigers fall short of picking up Valverde

By Jason Beck / MLB.com | 7/2/2011 12:53 AM ET

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DETROIT -- Brad Penny gave up a run in seven innings and never pitched with a lead. His former teammate Brian Wilson retired just two of the seven Tigers he faced, saved his lone punchout for the dugout water jug and ended up with the win.

"I'd rather give up five [runs] and win," Penny lamented as he tried to take some responsibility for a game that went crazy in the ninth.

It was that kind of game for the Tigers on Friday night, knocking them out of first place. And yet, their 4-3 loss to the Giants had plenty more than that.

For the Tigers, it nearly ended with one dramatic walk-off hit, had Brennan Boesch's line drive with the bases loaded and one out in the ninth just stayed a little more towards the middle.

"We just didn't come up with that final one," manager Jim Leyland said, "and I thought for sure Boesch was going to do it."

If his slicing liner goes somewhere else, he potentially has the winner. Instead, it went to the same player, Giants shortstop Brandon Crawford, whose 10-pitch, bases-loaded walk drove in the eventual deciding run.

If it doesn't make him a Tiger killer, it certainly made him a presence.

"It's kind of funny how the game goes sometimes," Leyland said. "The [ground-rule] double that [Pablo] Sandoval hit ended up where it didn't kill us. The two walks were the thing that killed us. Both starters pitched very well, very good ballgames. Probably neither closer was at their best tonight, two great closers."

That last part would be an understatement. It was a rare game in which both closers were pulled in the ninth after both starters, Madison Bumgarner and Penny, pitched at least seven innings of one-run ball.

While Wilson leads the Majors in saves this season, Jose Valverde has yet to blow a chance. Valverde didn't have one Friday, but after Magglio Ordonez's two-out single off Wilson tied the game in the eighth, the Tigers went into the ninth with no lead to save. Enter Valverde, whose numbers -- like those of many closers -- differ greatly in save situations. Still, at 1-1, the situation demanded the closer.

Valverde gave up hits to three of the first four Giants he faced, including Sandoval's drive to deep left-center field to put San Francisco ahead. But after an intentional walk loaded the bases and a Cody Ross popup brought the second out, the next two batters did him in without putting the ball in play.

Nate Schierholtz worked Valverde (2-3) for eight pitches to escape an 0-2 count, walk in Aaron Rowand and bring out Leyland with a hook. Rookie Brayan Villarreal made his return to the Majors after control woes helped end his previous stint, but he and Crawford battled for 10 pitches, including four straight full-count foul balls.

Finally, Villarreal's slider just missed the outside corner, and Sandoval walked in.

With Wilson on the mound, that seemed like enough to ensure victory for the defending World Series champions. Four baserunners in a five-pitch span of the ninth quickly changed that outlook.

None of Detroit's three hits went for extra bases, and none were particularly well hit. Yet after Victor Martinez and Jhonny Peralta singled, the Tigers sensed an opportunity. Ryan Raburn broke down the first-base line on a grounder to short to help prevent a double play. Alex Avila declined to chase sliders off the plate from Wilson, who then left one over the plate for Brandon Inge to pull into left field for his third hit in 23 at-bats since coming off the disabled list, producing a 4-2 game.

Exit Wilson, who took out his frustrations on the dugout cooler -- first with his right hand, then with a bat. But with Jeremy Affeldt on, the biggest gaffe came from second baseman Emmanuel Burriss, who watched a potential double-play ground ball from Andy Dirks jump up his arm and off his chest for a run-scoring error.

Instead of a win salvaged, the Giants were a fly ball away from losing the lead and a hit away from losing a game that they never trailed. With the bases loaded, there stood Boesch, who had raised his average against left-handers to .362 (25-for-69) an inning earlier against sidearming Javier Lopez.

Affeldt, best known in Detroit for being the unexpected target of Kyle Farnsworth's flying tackle during a Tigers-Royals fracas in 2005, had allowed a .179 average to left-handed batters. After Boesch swung and missed at a pitch to go to two strikes, however, he tracked a curveball and sliced it seemingly up the middle.

"When he hit it," Leyland said, "I thought it was through."

Then he saw it keep slicing towards the shortstop side of second base, while Crawford closed in.

"He hit it," Affeldt said, "and I turned and looked and went, 'Please no -- I mean, yes.'"

Crawford knew he had at least one out from it.

"I knew he didn't hit it that well," Crawford said. "I thought he got jammed a little bit. Then I saw Inge come off the bag and I knew we had a shot."

From where Crawford caught it, he was close enough to second base that he could step on it himself for the final out. It was one of the rare times in the game where the final few steps really ended up feeling that easy.

"That's just one of those freaky ones," Leyland said. "For us, it was hit in exactly the wrong spot, and for them it was hit in exactly the right spot. That's a tough one.

"... They fought their tails off right to the end. That's all you can ask for."

Jason Beck is a reporter for MLB.com. Read Beck's Blog and follow him on Twitter @beckjason. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.

Giants rain all over Tigers' parade in rout
Scherzer, Villarreal yield 10 runs around delay in first three frames

By Chris Vannini / MLB.com | 7/3/2011 2:35 AM ET

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DETROIT -- The Tigers' bullpen is running thin.

For the third time in five games, a starter didn't pitch past the fourth and the bullpen was called upon to complete several innings, this time in a 15-3 loss at the hands of the Giants on Saturday.

"It was ugly, to be honest with you," said Tigers manager Jim Leyland. "You can't say much more than that. It was pretty ugly, obviously."

It was the third time in five games the Tigers gave up at least 14 runs, and Detroit had to make another roster move to have enough ready arms in the bullpen for Sunday's Interleague finale.

Four days after sending Daniel Schlereth down and calling up Brayan Villarreal, Villarreal is being replaced by Adam Wilk.

"You're stretching them out where you shouldn't be stretching them out, and it all starts with starting pitching," Leyland said. "It's that simple. That's what the game's all about -- starting pitching."

Max Scherzer lasted two-plus innings before a thunderstorm delayed the game for 2 hours, 36 minutes, and mercifully ended his night.

Scherzer struggled right from the get-go. He allowed a two-run home run to Pablo Sandoval and a three-run home run to Brandon Crawford in the opening frame as the Giants jumped to an early 5-0 lead.

He was able to strand a runner in the second inning, but found himself in trouble again in the third. Back-to-back doubles by Aubrey Huff and Cody Ross extended the lead to 6-0, and that was followed with a walk.

"His control was not good," Leyland said. "His control was just not good at all. He was all over the place, really, and didn't get in a groove it all. He just didn't have any command, which obviously was not good."

Scherzer got to a 3-1 count on Crawford before the game was delayed. Since starting the season 6-0 and running his ERA as low as 2.81, Scherzer is 3-4 in his past nine starts and his ERA has risen to 4.90.

"Three of our last five starting performances have just been not good, really not acceptable," Leyland said. "We're in a stretch of 37 [games] out of 38 [days] and we just can't just get behind the 8-ball like we've been behind the 8-ball. In three of those five games, we're just four, five, six, seven runs behind. That just can't happen."

The rain came quickly and heavily before lightening up. But it continually came and went, causing a restart time of 10:15 p.m. ET to be pushed back to 10:40.

After the game finally resumed, Villarreal came in to pitch for the Tigers and walked Crawford, although it was charged to Scherzer. Miguel Tejada sent the first pitch he saw into the left-field seats, as the Tigers gave up their third grand slam in five games and the Giants extended the lead to 10 runs. San Francisco added two more runs in the third off Ryan Perry and David Purcey allowed three in the sixth inning.

"What we had to do is get people out of their comfort zones," Leyland said. "We're asking Purcey to do too much. We're asking Perry to pitch the third inning, that's not good. That just won't work."

Detroit's bats finally woke up when Saturday turned into Sunday. Jhonny Peralta and Brennan Boesch hit back-to-back home runs in the seventh inning and Ryan Raburn added an RBI double in the ninth, but it was far too little, too late.

The 51 runs allowed over the past five games are the most for the franchise since 2004. The Tigers' rotation only has one starter, Justin Verlander, with an ERA under 4.40, and rookie Charlie Furbush will make his first start Monday.

The Tigers fell to 1 1/2 games back of the Indians in the American League Central, and although the standings might not mean much in early July, a pitching staff that came into Saturday with the fifth-worst ERA in the Majors is going to need to turn things around if the Tigers are to be successful in the second half of the season.

"I'm not concerned about anything," Leyland said. "It's very simple -- this is not acceptable. And somebody needs to step it up."

Chris Vannini is an associate reporter for MLB.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.

Tigers reward Porcello's solid outing

By Jason Beck / MLB.com | 7/3/2011 4:17 PM ET

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DETROIT -- Rick Porcello said after his last start that he needed to mix things up, that he had become too predictable in his pitching. What followed Sunday, few would've predicted, and not just from him.

It wasn't just the 6-3 win over the Giants to salvage a game from the series and stop the bleeding from a pitching staff that yielded 51 runs over a five-game stretch for the first time in seven years.

Not many would've foreseen a sinkerball, contact pitcher like Porcello hitting three batters, throwing three wild pitches and earning a quality start as well as his first victory since June 7. Just four other Major League pitchers since 1901 had done it, regardless of result, according to research on baseball-reference.com, and only Victor Zambrano in 2003 had gotten the win and the quality start out of it.

"He had some innings where he was effectively wild," catcher Alex Avila said.

Fewer would've predicted the game hinging on a diving attempt at a catch from Ryan Raburn, the left fielder turned second baseman who was moved back out to left field for defense just before Aaron Rowand's sinking line drive in the eighth inning. With two on and two out in what was then a 4-3 game, any ball past him would've surely cost them.

Instead, the denial earned Raburn a standing ovation from a crowd that has been less than sympathetic to struggles over the last few weeks.

"He hit it," Raburn said, "and I took off for it."

Though Magglio Ordonez's go-ahead single an inning earlier might've been predictable, ringing true to his track record as a run producer, the fact that it came off a mid-90s fastball from Santiago Casilla might have seemed a little tougher for someone who had to regain his bat speed after an injury-slowed start.

The insurance runs that followed in the ninth inning, when Brandon Inge defied his sub-.200 average with a two-run triple into the gap, might've been the most unexpected -- even though Inge has been feeling good about his swing for several days since coming back from mononucleosis.

"I've felt unbelievable at the plate," Inge said. "I've felt like my old self at the plate. But it's hard to block out [the struggles]. I've probably strung together probably four or five at-bats back to back, great at-bats in my book, but no results. It is good every once in a while to get rewarded."

The resulting win was a reward for a brutal week of lopsided losses and close wins, and an end to an Interleague Play stretch that the Tigers would probably like to forget. Detroit 's 7-11 record against the National League marked the first losing Interleague record in manager Jim Leyland's six-year stretch as Tigers manager.

At the same time, the combination of a Tigers win and an Indians loss crept Detroit back to within a half-game of first-place Cleveland in the American League Central. It also reclaimed a game of breathing space for the Tigers over the third-place White Sox, now three games back of Detroit and 3 1/2 games out of first place.

"It wasn't an easy game by any means," Porcello said. "But it was definitely a game that we needed, especially going on the road here to finish up this first half. We had to go out there and get it done any way possible."

Porcello's early command made that possibility seem a little dim. After a three-game losing streak in which opponents seemingly were on his sinker, Porcello entered Sunday on a mission to find a better mix, and he spent a lot of time trying to find the secondary pitches to keep hitters honest.

He battled the Giants, but he also battled himself. He hit batters in the third, fourth and fifth innings, starting with a pitch off Miguel Tejada that nearly set up San Francisco to blow open its lead after Aubrey Huff walked and scored in the third.

Emmanuel Burriss reached base on a hit-by-pitch in the fifth and scored on a wild pitch, with Pablo Sandoval's double in between. Another wild pitch advanced Sandoval to score on Cody Ross' RBI single.

That was the last hit Porcello (7-6) allowed. He retired eight of the final nine batters he faced, with a Miguel Cabrera errant drop accounting for the lone runner. Porcello's six strikeouts, many on sliders, marked his highest total since mid-April, and his eight swings and misses from Giants hitters was his highest total in four starts.

"I think the main thing was I was able to locate my fastball down in the zone more, especially early on," Porcello said. "That was a big difference. Also, we were throwing some off-speed stuff for strikes and getting some good swing and misses. I think that definitely helped."

As Leyland put it, Porcello stepped up. If the Tigers are going places this summer, they desperately need that. If they were going to go into this coming week with a fresh bullpen, they had to have it.

"Rick was what the doctor ordered today," Leyland said. "He came up big with us."

So did Inge, Raburn and Ordonez. But nobody could've fit that so easily into a prescription for a Tigers victory.

Jason Beck is a reporter for MLB.com. Read Beck's Blog and follow him on Twitter @beckjason. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.

Furbush shows promise in loss to Angels
By Jason Beck / MLB.com | 7/4/2011 11:50 PM ET

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ANAHEIM -- Charlie Furbush had to challenge Torii Hunter on a first-inning fastball and lost it over the center-field fence. He just about lost his balance mid-delivery in the third inning and had to hold onto the ball for a run-scoring balk. Both were rookie moments.

As the worst moments of Furbush's first Major League start Monday night, though, it wasn't bad. He didn't end up with a victory, not with seven innings of one-run ball from Joel Pineiro for a 5-1 Tigers loss to the Angels. But for a rotation in need of some stability after three rough starts last week and a pitching coach change Sunday, Furbush left with fewer questions than he had entering the day.

He did nothing to indicate he couldn't be a Major League starter, which was the question manager Jim Leyland wrestled for quite a while before making the rotation change.

Furbush moved from lefty reliever to big league starter after Phil Coke struggled mightily last Wednesday against the Mets. Leyland made the move more because he knew Phil Coke wasn't the answer than any conviction he had that Furbush was.

"Usually the other team tells you," Leyland said before the game. "But he's got the pitches to be a starter. That's a leg up."

The repertoire was on display -- at least a dozen each of four-seam fastballs, two-seamers, curveballs and changeups over 65 pitches. He racked up six strikeouts over his 4 2/3 innings, and didn't allow consecutive base hits at any point. His downfall came down as much to the Tigers' own offensive struggles with runners on base as his own.

Furbush's aforementioned balk completed Angels speedster Peter Bourjos' trip around the bases in the third inning. After a leadoff single, he stole second and third base with room to spare. Furbush's misstep allowed him to trot home for a 2-0 Angels lead.

Jhonny Peralta's two-out single halved the Halos' advantage, but the Tigers struggled to convert any other chances off Pineiro (4-3), who improved to 8-3 in his career against Detroit. A leadoff double from Alex Avila went unrewarded in the third inning after Ryan Raburn and Brandon Inge failed to advance him.

One of those halted rallies was squarely to the credit of Bourjos after Brennan Boesch's leadoff single and Magglio Ordonez's four-pitch walk put two on with nobody out. Miguel Cabrera followed with a line drive to deep center field, but Bourjos made a leaping catch as he crashed into the fence. Pineiro escaped from there with a double-play ground ball from Victor Martinez.

Another double play, this one off Inge's bat, halted a rally that began with a Peralta double. Added together, the Tigers went 2-for-11 with runners in scoring position.

Erick Aybar's two-out blooper for an RBI single ended Furbush's night in the fifth. He threw 45 of his 65 pitches for strikes.

Jason Beck is a reporter for MLB.com. Read Beck's Blog and follow him on Twitter @beckjason. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.

Frustrated Verlander drops duel with Haren

By Jason Beck / MLB.com | 7/6/2011 3:00 AM ET

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ANAHEIM -- The last time Justin Verlander pitched at Angel Stadium, he needed 125 pitches to throw five innings of four-run ball early last season, and he won. He said that game that he didn't feel like he deserved it, the way he pitched.

His return Tuesday night might well have been karma.

Verlander's win streak was going to end at some point, so perhaps it was fitting that it ended in a 1-0 duel with the Angels and fellow right-hander Dan Haren. He didn't fall without a fight, or at least an argument.

He wasn't the only one.

"He was terrific. I mean, he was absolutely terrific," Tigers manager Jim Leyland said of Verlander. "And Dan Haren was terrific. You saw two very, very good pitchers pitch a terrific game. They got one run. We got none.

"But it's a shame. If you guys are right about what you saw, then it should've been a scoreless game."

Considering Leyland had just written a check to Major League Baseball earlier in the day to pay the fine from his ejection last week, he didn't want to say too much about the call in question that put Howard Kendrick on base to score the lone run in the second inning. The way Haren was pitching, he could've kept the Tigers scoreless well into the night, having pitched a two-hit shutout.

The Angels had their opportunities to add on runs, including a bases-loaded, no-out jam in the fifth, but Verlander shut them down from there.

"In this game, I know that if I give up anything more than one right there, it's probably game over," Verlander said. "I try to do anything I can to not let them cross the plate there, especially the way Dan was throwing. I know from the flip side of it, a one-run game is a little bit different than a two-run game, especially the way he was pounding the strike zone and keeping guys off balance. With a one-run game, somebody can run into one and it's a tie game."

Verlander kept it there. But the longer he did, the bigger the call loomed, and the higher the emotions on the Tigers' side. By the end of the night, there were more guys run from the game than runs scored. Leyland, Verlander and even Rick Porcello -- who was never in the game -- were all ejected, along with Angels DH Bobby Abreu.

The loss dropped the Tigers (45-42) to three games over .500 for the first time since June 4. Detroit has lost six of its last eight games and 11 of 18 since taking two out of three from the first-place Cleveland Indians in mid-June.

Three of their seven victories in that stretch came from Verlander (11-4), who had won seven consecutive starts and nine straight decisions since his April 27 loss to the Mariners.

Verlander retired his first four batters he faced until Kendrick hit a ground ball to short that forced Jhonny Peralta to range. Peralta lobbed a throw to All-Star Final Vote candidate Victor Martinez, getting a night at first base.

First-base umpire Joe West ruled that Kendrick beat the throw. Replays showed that Martinez had the ball before Kendrick's foot hit the bag, but Kendrick nonetheless had the infield single.

"I obviously went out [to argue] about the play at first base," Leyland said, "but I don't need to tell you guys. You saw the play, so you write what you saw."

That hit put the runner on base, but it was an aggressive play from the Angels that brought him in. Once Verlander fell behind on a 2-0 count and had to challenge him with a fastball, Kendrick took off on a hit-and-run. Aybar turned on it, sending it past Martinez and toward the right-field corner. Once right fielder Magglio Ordonez whirled and fired to second base, Kendrick was waved home.

"It was a great ball by the third-base coach [Dino Ebel], good baserunning by Kendrick on a great call," Leyland said. "He saw [Ordonez] coming up to throw to second and he continued waving him. It was a great call. Too bad that's how they got their run."

It was no doubt still on Leyland's mind when he and West got into another argument after the fifth inning, one that brought West to the dugout railing to eject Leyland from the game.

It was not quite on Verlander's mind by then, mainly because he had to work like crazy to prevent the Angels from adding on once two soft singles and a four-pitch walk loaded the bases with one out in the fifth.

What followed was some of the best pitching in the tightest situation Verlander has faced all year. Verlander fell behind on another 2-0 count to Jeff Mathis, then powered up three straight fastballs at 98-99 mph. His finishing pitch was a curveball off the outside corner that sent down Mathis swinging.

Maicer Izturis popped out on a first-pitch, 99-mph fastball.

From there, Verlander tried to overpower Torii Hunter, 12-for-36 off Verlander entering the night. He hit 100 mph twice out of seven fastballs, and clocked another at 99, but Hunter connected on a 96-mph heater on the final pitch for a sinking liner that Austin Jackson caught near his shoestrings.

"I've had similar situations in the past," Verlander said. "The difference with that one was, once I got to 3-2, I didn't try to overthrow it. I tried to hit my spot. Made my pitch. He hit it hard, luckily to Austin."

Verlander scattered seven hits with eight strikeouts before acting manager Lloyd McClendon pulled him with two out in the eighth. Verlander didn't say anything to McClendon, but he had plenty for West, who ejected him. It was an odd end to a memorable stretch of pitching.

Jason Beck is a reporter for MLB.com. Read Beck's Blog and follow him on Twitter @beckjason. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.

Miggy's blast puts Tigers over the top

By Jason Beck / MLB.com | 7/6/2011 9:07 PM ET

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ANAHEIM -- Brad Penny was staring at a three-run deficit in the first inning as new pitching coach Jeff Jones ambled out to the mound to give the right-hander a chance to catch his breath. The Tigers were staring at a potential series sweep in Anaheim, having scored one run in the first two games before missing a chance at some first-inning offense with two on and nobody out on Wednesday.

Give the Tigers credit: As maddening as their play can be for stretches, as discouraging as things can look during the bad times, they pick themselves up pretty well. After Miguel Cabrera's go-ahead two-run homer in the seventh inning helped power the Tigers back for a 5-4 win over the Angels, they had the feel of a team that had just gathered itself.

It was far from the first time. In fact, it has been a habit lately. But with everything that has happened over the past week and a half, everyone agreed it was big.

"It was a heckuva win," manager Jim Leyland said. "It really was. To me, that's one of the better wins of the season. Our team, rough night last night, real quick turnaround, against a team that's hot, to go down 3-0 and come back, that showed me something."

The stats seem to bear it out. The Tigers have played six three-game series and a makeup game since taking two out of three against Cleveland to vault into first place. They're 1-11 over the first two games of those series. Yet they've won all six finales.

Detroit does damage control pretty well. The club will have a hard time surviving that way with four games coming up in Kansas City this weekend before the All-Star break, but the state of affairs could easily be worse.

"I don't think things are so bad," Leyland said. "We just have to get ourselves straightened out a little bit and keep going."

Things could've been far worse Wednesday.

"We stay together and battle," said Ramon Santiago, who scored the tying run on Andy Dirks' RBI single ahead of Cabrera's homer. "We keep steady and fight."

Said Brandon Inge: "Some teams are going to come in and they're going to have a day and they're just going pound the ball for runs and there's nothing you can about it. The good teams, once you get beat like that, they bounce back.

"When we're down three runs, we didn't go back and think, 'Poor me.' We battled back against them. That's what winning teams do."

The top of the first was a missed opportunity for the middle of the Tigers lineup against Angels rookie Tyler Chatwood, who walked Austin Jackson to lead off the game and allowed a single to Santiago. However, both were stranded as Chatwood fanned Dirks and Cabrera before inducing a Victor Martinez popout. The bottom of the inning was what Brad Penny called an "absolutely terrible" assortment of hittable strikes that led to four straight hits, and Jones' visit.

Penny caught himself in a veteran moment.

"When I was younger, I probably wouldn't have lasted three innings," Penny said. "Less is more. I'm trying to mix it up and mess their timing up. When I was younger, I would've been out there trying to throw 100. With this team, we can win a game with three runs [allowed]. We've got eight innings to play. Anything can happen."

Plenty did. It was all on the Tigers' side.

Penny allowed as many baserunners over the rest of his outing -- six innings' worth -- as he did in that five-batter stretch. Half of his four baserunners were erased on double-play ground balls from Angels cleanup hitter Vernon Wells, who had grounded into just four double plays all year but was just 1-for-12 off Penny entering the day.

"I think after that first inning, my focus got better," Penny said.

When Wells drove in the Angels' first run, he made Penny pay for a 2-0 fastball that was overthrown. Next time up, with one out in the third and Torii Hunter on first, he took something off the fastball and induced a ground ball to third. Inge nearly threw the ball into the dirt trying to start the double play, but Santiago picked it.

Another double-play grounder to third from Wells erased a Bobby Abreu walk in the sixth.

"Penny's stuff picked up after the first inning," Angels manager Mike Scioscia said. "He was up a little bit [in the zone], and we took advantage of some opportunities and got three on the board. As the game went on, he definitely hit better spots and brought his breaking stuff into the game and kept us off-balance."

By settling down, Penny (6-6) eventually put himself in line for his first win since June 5. The veteran had four quality starts over the course of his five-game winless streak, but he lost the quality distinction once Mark Trumbo chased him with a one-out solo homer in the seventh.

By then, Cabrera's shot had pulled the Tigers ahead. The slugger came up after Jackson drew his third walk of the game and Dirks singled in the tying run. Scioscia lifted lefty Hisanori Takahashi in favor of rookie Michael Kohn to face Cabrera, who fouled off a 1-0 fastball on the outside corner, but didn't miss the next one spotted on the inner half.

Cabrera's 18th home run of the year was his first since he was left out of next week's Home Run Derby as part of All-Star festivities. He'll gladly take the homers that count.

"Yeah," Cabrera said. "I hope I hit a lot more."

Once All-Star closer Jose Valverde worked the ninth for his 21st save in as many chances, the Tigers could finally relax. Again, they had ended a series on a better note than they had started.

"We could've called it in and gone to Kansas City," Leyland said, "but we didn't."

Jason Beck is a reporter for MLB.com. Read Beck's Blog and follow him on Twitter @beckjason. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.

Homers help Scherzer hang 10 against KC

By Adam Holt / MLB.com | 7/8/2011 12:50 AM ET

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KANSAS CITY -- Max Scherzer needed just one more out to end the seventh inning. Sure, there were two men on, with Jeff Francoeur reaching on a dribbler to third base and beating out the throw. But the Tigers starter had allowed just one run to this point on six scattered hits. He had only thrown 88 pitches and held a one-run lead. "Nope," Scherzer said.

Leyland brought in Phil Coke, who got the out and combined with Joaquin Benoit and Jose Valverde to preserve the lead en route to a 3-1 win over the Royals on Thursday at Kauffman Stadium.

Scherzer picked up his 10th victory in 14 decisions and limited the Royals to the one run -- an RBI groundout by Mike Moustakas in the fifth inning -- with zero walks. But Leyland didn't want to see his young pitcher's night unravel in the seventh.

"It's pretty simple. I wasn't going to let him get hurt," Leyland said. "The guy had hit a foul ball before, the guy before that had hit one long. He was only at about 88 pitches, but I wasn't going to let him -- after pitching that good -- I wasn't going to let him make one mistake, somebody hit a three-run homer."

Kansas City starter Danny Duffy made the one mistake in the pitching duel, giving up a two-run home run in the second inning to Ryan Raburn. The 393-foot shot into the Royals' bullpen gave the Tigers a 2-0 lead.

"It wasn't a bad pitch, it was down but he went and got it," Duffy said. "It just must have been the exact coordinates on a map that he was thinking it was going to be."

Duffy was a rock from that point on, finishing six innings while allowing just the two runs on four hits, while striking out six.

But Scherzer was better. He only struck two out, but got big ground ball outs and didn't run into any jams until he was finally taken out of the game. The Royals got just one extra-base hit off of Scherzer, a double by Eric Hosmer in the fifth inning.

"I thought he got the ball down better than he had been," Leyland said. "That's the one thing we're concentrating on, we're really trying to emphasize, and I thought he did that better tonight."

It was the first start where Scherzer allowed one or fewer runs since June 11, when he went seven innings and gave up one run in a win over the Mariners. It also helped take some of the sting off his last start, a nine-run (six earned), two-inning performance against the Giants where he gave up two home runs.

Royals manager Ned Yost had praise for the right-hander as well.

"I thought he threw the ball well," Yost said. "I thought he was effectively wild. He changed speeds well. He threw a lot of balls that were hittable, but changed speed on 'em and disrupted our timing to the point where we got a lot of fly-ball outs."

Don Kelly, who came into the game in the seventh inning as a defensive replacement for Magglio Ordonez, hit a solo home run off of Aaron Crow in the ninth inning to push the Tigers' lead to two runs.

Valverde made things interesting in the ninth, cruising through his first two batters before running into trouble. He walked Hosmer, and Francoeur beat out an infield grounder to short, to put men at first and third. Moustakas flew out to left to end the game. Valverde is now 22-for-22 in save opportunities.

Center fielder Austin Jackson came out of the game in the third inning with a sore left wrist. Leyland said Jackson had been battling a bit of an issue with his wrist earlier, but that it wasn't anything to worry about.

Adam Holt is an associate reporter for MLB.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.

Tigers gain on Tribe by beating Royals

By Adam Holt / MLB.com | 7/9/2011 1:30 AM ET

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KANSAS CITY -- If Thursday's game between the Tigers and Royals was a pitching duel, then Friday's starting pitching matchup started out as a battle of endurance.

Namely, which pitcher could absorb more runs and hits before being pulled from the game. Instead, both Detroit's Rick Porcello and Kansas City's Kyle Davies settled down, turning what looked initially to be a slugfest into a grind-it-out battle.

The Tigers nailed Davies for five early runs en route to a 6-4 win on Friday at Kauffman Stadium.

The win, combined with Cleveland's loss to Toronto, moved the Tigers to one-half game back of first place in the American League Central.

Detroit got a two-run home run from Magglio Ordonez in the first inning, and added runs in the second and third frames to take a 5-2 lead.

Despite the early leads, the Royals battled back, getting runs on Alex Gordon's single and Jeff Francoeur's sacrifice fly in the first to tie the game at 2.

"We did a great job of putting a two-spot early, the last thing I want to do is go out there and give up some runs, but that's the way it worked out," Porcello said. "It was definitely a battle, it wasn't an easy game, but we were able to squeak one out."

The Royals clawed back to within one run in the seventh inning. Reliever David Purcey walked Wilson Betemit and then gave up an RBI double to Melky Cabrera to make it 5-4. He struck out Gordon before Lester Oliveros came in and got Billy Butler to ground out and end the inning.

Detroit added an insurance run to push the lead back to two runs in the ninth. With runners at first and third and one out, Brennan Boesch hit a double-play ball to second base, but Andy Dirks' takeout slide kept Royals shortstop Alcides Escobar from making a throw, allowing Ryan Raburn to score from third and make it 6-4.

Dirks turned out to be the key player in the inning, reaching on a ball hit to first baseman Eric Hosmer and moving Raburn to third without losing an out. Royals reliever Tim Collins didn't cover first, setting up the rest of the inning.

"I froze," Collins said. "Maybe it just didn't click or register right away. That's something I take pride in and I'm more ticked off about that than anything. I hate losing, but your job as a pitcher is not only pitching, but you've got to field your position and I didn't do it."

Jose Valverde stayed perfect in save opportunities, converting his 23rd, but made things interesting for the second night in a row. Brayan Pena singled to start the ninth, and Valverde issued two-out walks to Cabrera and Gordon that filled the bases for Butler.

"I had full confidence in him," Porcello said with a laugh. "He'll make it interesting sometimes, but he gets the job done. There's nobody else I'd rather have out there. He's doing a great job."

Butler flew out to right to end the game, and Valverde never seemed rattled during the inning. The extra breathing room afforded by the ninth-inning run turned out to be a mental boost for the Tigers.

"Huge. That club over there battled their [butt] off. So did we," Tigers manager Jim Leyland said. "You saw they were still battling right up to the end, they're not going to give you anything."

The last six innings of the game came in stark contrast to the first three. Detroit collected five runs in the first three innings off Davies, while Porcello gave up three. Both starters had been laboring: Davies needed 69 pitches to finish three innings, while Porcello threw 70.

But Davies gave up just three more hits from then on, completing six innings. He allowed the five runs on nine hits and three walks, while striking out four.

"He changed. He did a hell of a job making an adjustment," Leyland said of Davies. "He started going to his curveball more and that threw us off. I give him a lot of credit -- what really could have been a rough night for him, he ended up actually pitching pretty good."

Porcello finished 5 1/3 innings, giving up three runs, although just one was earned, on six hits with one walk and five strikeouts.

In addition to his ninth-inning play, Dirks was able to put on a good show for family and friends in attendance. The native of nearby Hutchinson, Kan., started the game with a double and scored on Ordonez's home run. He finished 3-for-5 with a run scored.

Adam Holt is an associate reporter for MLB.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.

Tigers' early struggles costly against KC

By Adam Holt / MLB.com | 7/10/2011 12:45 AM ET

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KANSAS CITY -- Major League start No. 2 was not kind to Charlie Furbush.

The rookie starter gave up nine runs in just 2 2/3 innings, and although Royals starter Luke Hochevar seemed intent on keeping the visitors in the game, the Tigers fell, 13-6, on Saturday at Kauffman Stadium.

Just four of the runs Furbush allowed were earned, as two Detroit errors led to eight unearned runs in the game. The seventh inning was the first in which both teams failed to score a run.

For Tigers manager Jim Leyland, the final score said everything about the game.

"Really, at any level, when you score six, seven runs, you're supposed to win," Leyland said. "And when you don't, that means probably a combination of two things: You didn't pitch very well and you didn't play very good defense."

Despite being down seven runs after three innings, the Tigers roared back to cut the deficit to 9-6, chasing Hochevar from the game in the fourth inning. Down 9-2, Detroit loaded the bases with none out and scored runs on a throwing error, singles by Ramon Santiago and Brennan Boesch and a bases-loaded walk by Victor Martinez.

"I shouldn't say we felt good, but we felt like we had a shot, it was in reach," Leyland said.

The Royals kept hitting though, getting a run off Adam Wilk in the fifth and adding three more unearned runs in the sixth. Jeff Francoeur reached base on an error by Ryan Raburn and later scored, along with Wilson Betemit, on Alcides Escobar's triple.

Furbush struggled with his command and saw a lot of balls get hit through holes in the defense. The left-hander gave up nine hits and walked two, throwing 79 pitches before being pulled.

The lefty managed to escape the first inning with just one run allowed on a fielder's choice, despite having the bases loaded with one out. He loaded the bases again in the second, having already given up one run, and allowed a two-run single to Billy Butler to give the Royals a 4-0 lead.

"You've just got to tip their cap," Furbush said. "They were getting some hits, finding holes and playing some good baseball. Can't do much about it."

Detroit got two runs off the bats of Boesch and Miguel Cabrera in the third inning to cut the deficit in half.

But in the third inning, the Royals plated five two-out runs. Furbush walked Matt Treanor after retiring the first two Royals that inning, then Escobar reached on a throwing error by shortstop Santiago. The Royals followed with two RBI singles and a 412-foot home run by Alex Gordon to center field.

"The three-run home run by Gordon was probably the touch-off," Leyland said. "But really, before that, he just wasn't good. He was behind too many hitters early. And then when he did get ahead, he made some bad pitches. So, he just had a bad night."

Hochevar's night wasn't exceptional either. He was pulled after the Tigers scored four in the fourth, lasting 3 2/3 while giving up nine hits and six runs, along with three walks.

However, chasing Hochevar from the game didn't work out well for Detroit. Relievers Greg Holland and Everett Teaford combined to throw 5 1/3 scoreless innings, holding the Tigers to three hits from the fifth inning on.

"I don't like using Holland in the fourth inning, but they were coming, they were on the attack, and we had to bring in one of our better guys right there to shut it down and get us through the fifth and the sixth, and then get the other guys involved," Royals manager Ned Yost said.

Furbush fell to 0-2 with an 8.59 ERA in his two starts and was optioned to Triple-A Toledo after the game.

"I don't think he had his command of his fastball today," said Boesch who went 3-for-5 with two RBIs. "And in the big leagues, that'll usually spell some problems. He's a good pitcher, he's got good stuff, so as long he keeps working, I think he'll be fine."

The Tigers also missed out a chance to take the lead in the American League Central, as the division-leading Indians lost, 5-4, to the Blue Jays. Detroit remains one-half game back.

"Tonight's over with," Boesch said. "But it's definitely a little bit frustrating."

Adam Holt is an associate reporter for MLB.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.