2012 DETROIT TIGER SCHEDULE AND RESULTS

Berry nice: Tigers walk off in 10th, win series
Outfielder savors first game-winner; Turner solid in season debut

By Anthony Odoardi / MLB.com | 6/21/2012 6:49 PM ET

BOX>

DETROIT -- It was supposed to be all about Jacob Turner, one of Major League Baseball's top prospects who made his 2012 debut for the Tigers against the defending World Series champion Cardinals. But Quintin Berry found a way to steal the show again.

With the bases loaded in the 10th inning, Berry came to the plate and slapped a walk-off single up the middle to give Detroit a 2-1 victory over St. Louis and its fourth straight series win for the first time since the playoff drive last September.

"This is my first one ever," Berry said. "I've never had a walk-off before. ... I think that's why I was so excited about it. That's probably the best feeling. I always wondered what it felt like."

Ramon Santiago and Jhonny Peralta hit back-to-back singles off Cardinals reliever Victor Marte, who then hit Austin Jackson to load the bases with one out.

Berry, whose speed drew the Cardinals infield in rather than staying back for a double play, didn't want to wait to experience the thrill of a walk-off hit. He swung at the first pitch to drive the winning run home, and the celebration began.

"I showed it out there jumping around and acting crazy," said Berry. "You don't know what to do with yourself. I was just flailing around, everything I got. It's amazing."

The 27-year-old outfielder has been with four different organizations, and now he's the team leader in stolen bases, the only Tiger with a five-hit game, and owns a walk-off hit against the World Series champs.

His track record indicates he won't be able to keep up the pace -- he's hitting .315 and has never hit higher than .284 above A ball. But Berry isn't too concerned about track records.

"I'm just glad that things are rolling and going the way that they normally don't in those situations," Berry said.

Turner's path is quite different. He is regarded as one of the top prospects in baseball, ranked No. 10 in the league and No. 1 in the Tigers' system by MLB.com.

On Thursday, he made his fourth career start in front of a sold-out crowd of 40,776 at Comerica Park against the team he grew up rooting for.

"That was kind of just a crazy coincidence, knowing it had to be in Interleague Play and we don't play them every year," Turner said. "So that was exciting for me."

Turner fired five innings and yielded only one run on four hits. However, he uncharacteristically allowed five walks, which helped keep him from his first Major League win.

He entered the fifth inning having only allowed three hits and two walks, but the Cardinals earned three free passes in the inning, one of which came around to score the game-tying run on Matt Holliday's sacrifice fly. Right fielder Don Kelly made the catch on Holliday's ball in foul territory and hit his left knee on the railing while falling into the stands. He's day to day with a bruise.

"Obviously they're big league hitters, so they have a real good approach at the plate," Turner said. "But it just comes back to getting ahead early, getting 0-1, 0-2 and not 2-0."

Manager Jim Leyland said he wasn't sure if the outing earned Turner another start. It likely depends on the availability of Drew Smyly the next time the rotation comes around on Tuesday.

Regardless, catcher Alex Avila believes the 21-year-old has a promising career ahead of him.

"One of the reasons why I think he's going to be a great pitcher is everybody always talks about when Ricky [Porcello] came up real young, how composed he is," Avila said. "Jacob's the same way. He really puts everything he has into his pitching. It's great to work with him."

Cardinals starter Kyle Lohse held the Tigers to one run on four hits in seven innings. He made only one costly mistake.

In the fourth inning, Lohse left a 3-2 curveball hanging to Prince Fielder, and the Tigers slugger powered a solo shot 425 feet into the right-field seats. It was Detroit's only run until its extra-inning rally.

"It was one pitch you wish you could have back," Lohse said. "I was trying to bounce it, and I was about four feet away from bouncing it."

Leyland talked again about his team finding an edge and playing with grit. He told the media to take Thursday's game as an example. A rookie fought through five innings against one of baseball's best teams, Berry gutted out another huge hit, and the bullpen worked five scoreless innings to help move the Tigers within 2 1/2 games of the division lead and within a game of .500.

"The way we're playing, we're fighting for everything we get," Phil Coke said. "But instead of coming up short, it's kind of swinging in our favor now. We're winning multiple series now. Every game we go out, strap up and rock and roll."

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

Fister, defense falter in series-opening loss to Bucs

By Mark Emery / MLB.com | 6/22/2012 11:29 PM ET

BOX>

PITTSBURGH -- The hole that Doug Fister burrowed into on Friday night turned out to be too deep.

The right-hander allowed two runs in each of the first two innings, and the offense never bailed him out. Seeking to gain some momentum and string together a little winning streak, Fister instead picked up his fourth loss of the year after the Tigers fell to the Pirates, 4-1.

Fister went six innings, surrendering eight hits and four runs, only two of which were earned. He struck out seven, issued one intentional walk and threw one wild pitch.

"It comes down to executing, and I did a poor job of that tonight," Fister said. "I just wasn't together today. I need to do a better job."

Pirates left fielder Alex Presley led off with a double, which was followed by a run-scoring single from Neil Walker. Fister induced a double play two batters later, but Walker scored from third.

After limiting the damage to those two first-inning runs, Fister did himself no favors in the second. Pirates starter A.J. Burnett went to the plate with one out and men on first and second, looking to bunt them over. Fister fielded the bunt and threw it to third. Actually, near third is probably more accurate.

Fister's throw sailed past the outstretched glove of Miguel Cabrera, allowing Pedro Alvarez to score from second. Pirates catcher Rod Barajas, running from first base, soon followed when Delmon Young misplayed the ball in foul territory.

Two errors by the Tigers. Two runs for the Pirates.

"The throwing error, that's unacceptable," Fister said. "That's going to be addressed."

Added manager Jim Leyland: "They jumped on us right away, and then we gave them a couple of cookies to add on to it. That pretty much spells the game."

All this came on a night when Fister (1-4, 2.72 ERA) needed to be at his best in order to put Detroit in a position to win. His counterpart, Burnett, pitched well enough to win his seventh straight start, something no Pirate had done since Dock Ellis in 1974.

Burnett (8-2, 3.24 ERA) didn't surrender a hit until the fourth inning, when Young laced a single into center field with two outs. Burnett gave up only one more, a leadoff single to Austin Jackson in the sixth.

Burnett lasted six innings and picked up the victory. He struck out four and walked three.

"He was able to slow things down and rely on his experience and his catcher," Pirates manager Clint Hurdle said. "He found a way to make pitches when he had to."

Jackson's single in the sixth could have spelled big things for the Tigers. The next batter, Quintin Berry, walked, setting up Cabrera with two on and none out, but Cabrera hit a ground ball to shortstop for a rally-killing double play.

"I felt like I was beating [Cabrera] here and there with the fastball, so I stuck with it," Burnett said. "I was throwing two- and four-seamers and had him leaning over the plate, so I was able to get one in on him [for the double-play ball]. Bottom line, I was able to make a pitch when I needed to."

Even so, that put Prince Fielder at the dish with a runner on third. But Fielder, the former Brewer who was booed incessantly by the PNC Park crowd during every plate appearance, hit an inning-ending popup to shallow left field.

Detroit's two biggest boppers finished the game a combined 0-for-8. Overall, the Tigers stranded six runners.

"You get spoiled. You expect those big guys to do it every night," Leyland said. "That's not going to happen. That's not fair."

The Tigers scored their lone run in the seventh inning, when Ramon Santiago doubled in Jhonny Peralta, who had hit a double of his own in the previous at-bat. But it wasn't enough for Detroit, which is 4-3 over the last seven games. Pittsburgh, on the other hand, is 5-2 during that same stretch.

"We just didn't muster much offense tonight," Leyland said. "And that's been the case in several games this year."

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

Tigers drop game, set to Bucs after bats quieted

By Mark Emery / MLB.com | 6/23/2012 9:14 PM ET

BOX>

PITTSBURGH -- Three runs doesn't exactly seem like an insurmountable deficit, but with the way Detroit's hitters have performed lately, it might has well have been 30.

For the fourth game in a row, the Tigers could not muster more than two runs, and they made Pirates starter Brad Lincoln -- who had gone 0-2 with a 10.03 ERA in his last three starts -- look downright extraordinary. Detroit didn't even register a hit until the sixth inning, losing in Pittsburgh for the second day in a row, 4-1, on Saturday.

"You've got to give them credit. Their pitching has been stellar," catcher Alex Avila said. "Their guy, Lincoln, today was unbelievable. Their bullpen has been great all season. Definitely hard to get some runs."

Thanks to a strong start from Max Scherzer (6-5), the Tigers had a fighting chance right up until the fourth inning. That's when Scherzer faltered, serving up an 0-2 pitch to Pirates center fielder Andrew McCutchen, who belted the ball into the left-field seats for a three-run homer.

"I thought Max did a heck of a job," manager Jim Leyland said. "I'm sure he'd like to have one pitch back. He was trying to go down and away on Andrew, and he got it in -- up a little bit, and in, obviously -- for the three-run homer. Other than that I thought he did a terrific job.

"The story line, basically, is no runs. We haven't been scoring any runs lately -- very few runs in the last four or five ballgames, really."

Scherzer made the start after spending time away from the Tigers earlier this week following the death of his brother, Alex, who passed away on Thursday. He was unavailable for comment.

"It's hard to imagine. It's hard to put into words what he's feeling right now," Avila said. "He's a tough guy. We're all here for him."

Detroit's only run came in the top of the seventh, when Miguel Cabrera led off with a laser over the fence in right-center. That led to the removal of Lincoln (4-2) by Pirates manager Clint Hurdle, who turned over the game to Juan Cruz and a Pirates bullpen that is among the best in the National League.

Prince Fielder followed Cabrera's bomb with an opposite-field double but would advance no farther than third base. Delmon Young and Avila grounded out, and Jhonny Peralta ended the inning with a deep shot to center that died on the warning track.

Though he acknowledged Lincoln's effectiveness, Leyland said, "You can't keep crediting opposing pitchers every night."

Detroit had a fine scoring chance in the sixth, as well. Ramon Santiago led off with a sharply hit single through the right side, breaking up Lincoln's no-no. The next batter, Scherzer, did his part by advancing Santiago with a bunt, but neither Austin Jackson nor Brennan Boesch could drive in Santiago from second.

It wasn't just that the Tigers didn't hit in timely situations. They barely hit at all. Saturday's game marked the 19th time this year that they scored two runs or fewer.

"We have to get some more consistency throughout the lineup, one through nine," Leyland said. "We just have to have a little more depth throughout the lineup, and if we do that, we'll put runs on the board like we're supposed to, but we haven't done that very consistently this year."

Pittsburgh pushed its lead back to three runs in the bottom of the seventh, with Phil Coke in to replace Scherzer. Coke gave up a double and two singles before making way for Octavio Dotel. The damage might have been worse for Detroit had the Pirates not botched a suicide-squeeze attempt with men on the corners and one out.

Still, the home team entered the ninth with a three-run lead, and Pirates closer Joel Hanrahan locked down his 19th save after setting down Avila on strikes for the final out.

"There's no place like home. Our pitchers have pitched well here," Pirates manager Clint Hurdle said. "They have a comfort zone here, [are] able to aggressively attack the strike zone."

In no way should the loss fall entirely on Scherzer's shoulders. He made the mistake against McCutchen in the fourth inning, but overall his start was more than serviceable. He left the game after six innings, having allowed three runs on three hits. He struck out seven and walked just one.

Lincoln gave up two hits and one run in six-plus innings. He also struck out seven and walked one. As with Scherzer, the runs he allowed scored via the long ball.

The loss ends Detroit's streak of series wins at four. The Tigers' record against the Pirates this year is 2-3.

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

Verlander goes distance to continue NL mastery

By Mark Emery / MLB.com | 6/24/2012 6:14 PM ET

BOX>

PITTSBURGH -- Justin Verlander couldn't have hoped for much run support as he prepared to pitch Sunday, not after the five total runs he had seen Detroit's offense produce over the previous four games from his spot on the bench.

But as it turned out, the ace right-hander would toe the slab at PNC Park against the Pirates backed by an early two-run lead, thanks to a first-inning homer from Quintin Berry. That went a long way in supporting No. 35, who went the distance at PNC Park, allowing five hits and striking out seven in the Tigers' 3-2 victory.

With the win, Verlander moved to 4-0 in five starts against the National League this season. The right-hander's career record against the NL is 19-2.

"We had the horse going, and he pitched like the horse is supposed to pitch," Tigers manager Jim Leyland said. "Guys that throw it 98-100 [mph], they're usually more mentally tough than guys that throw it 88."

Verlander (8-4) never actually dialed up the velocity that high Sunday, topping out in the ninth inning at 97 mph. When he reached back for extra heat, he said it didn't come as easily as he's used to.

"I actually didn't feel particularly great, but at least my location was there," Verlander said. "I got a lot of weak contact because of that. I didn't have the flashy fastball or anything, but I was able to pitch and go nine innings."

After Verlander nearly no-hit the Pirates in May, any no-no watch evaporated practically instantly in this one, as Alex Presley led off the bottom of the first inning with a bunt single. Verlander retired the next six batters, though, not allowing another baserunner until the third, when catcher Michael McKenry reached on an infield hit.

"I wasn't too happy about the first two hits they had," Verlander said. "It's kind of like [Presley] was trying to make a statement: 'Here's our first hit.' But it was a bunt. Heck of a statement.

"But, it's early in the game, and that's part of his game plan ... It worked out, didn't it? I'm just glad he didn't score."

Through six, those two hits were it for Pittsburgh, and neither of them came close to reaching the outfield grass. For the majority of the afternoon, the Pirates looked as lost at the plate as they did at the season's start. It seems that Verlander tends to have that effect on opposing lineups.

Everything changed in the seventh inning, however. After retiring Casey McGehee for the first out, Verlander yielded a line-drive single to Pedro Alvarez. It was the first hit by the home team that left the infield, and it was followed by a game-tying, two-run blast when Garrett Jones took advantage of an ill-advised changeup.

"Stupid pitch," Verlander said, "Bad location. Stupid pitch. All of the above."

"He seemed to be throwing a lot more offspeed stuff," Jones said. "I was geared up for the fastball, and he gave me the good changeup that hung a little bit. I was able to stay through it and get the barrel on it."

Just like that, Detroit was back at square one.

The Tigers wouldn't wait very long to regain the lead, though. Berry reached on a walk in the eighth inning and promptly stole second. He scored when Delmon Young singled through the right side two batters later.

Berry, a rookie, was the offensive catalyst for the Tigers on Sunday. After Austin Jackson led off the game with a sharply-hit single, Berry hit the third pitch he saw into the right-field seats. The big fly was the first of Berry's Major League career, and it came on a day when the 27-year-old was instrumental to a Tigers victory.

"I willed that thing out, ever since it went up in the air," Berry said. "I was trying to push it out with everything I had. I was excited when I finally saw some fans grab it and stuff like that, because I knew it was official."

The home run came as a surprise to Verlander, who was watching the game from the tunnel and thought Berry popped up. He was shocked to learn that the ball landed over the fence.

Still, he was happy to have it, especially on a day when Detroit's offense underwhelmed -- again. The Tigers finished with seven hits on the afternoon. Berry's homer was the only one that went for extra bases. Prince Fielder, Alex Avila and Jhonny Peralta went a combined 0-for-11.

But because of Verlander, three runs were enough to win, as the Tigers finished Interleague Play with an 11-7 record.

"This was a big one for us. You can't afford to come in here and get swept," Verlander said. "We won today. Hopefully, we win tomorrow."

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

Buoyed by bats, Porcello sinks Rangers
After Tigers plate five in first, starter steps up big to earn win

By Jason Beck / MLB.com | 6/26/2012 1:17 AM ET

BOX>

ARLINGTON -- Argue all you want about whether there's such a thing as a big pitch with an eight-run lead. When it involves Rick Porcello, the Texas Rangers and triple-digit temperatures in the cozy confines of The Ballpark in Arlington, there is such a thing.

If Porcello believes in it, it is a huge pitch, even though the Rangers eventually broke up his scoreless outing in an 8-2 Tigers win Monday night.

"I know for myself, I needed to get out of one of those jams and just come out of this outing feeling pretty good," Porcello said. "I think it was a big pitch in more than one way."

The Tigers certainly hope so.

It was a bases-loaded jam in the sixth inning, and it was a full-count pitch to Mike Napoli. It was also the same maddening pattern that had flustered the Tigers more than once this year with Porcello, who followed a strikeout of Nelson Cruz for the second out with a four-pitch walk to David Murphy.

Even a grand slam would merely cut Detroit's lead in half, but it wasn't the point. Porcello had Napoli in an 0-2 hole before missing on three consecutive pitches to run the count full.

Porcello had missed with a fastball inside for Ball 2, then high with a fastball for Ball 3. Napoli was going to make him throw a strike. Porcello and catcher Gerald Laird went back to the fastball, this time over the plate. If he was going down in this outing, he was at least going to challenge the likely All-Star catcher.

When Napoli swung and missed at the 92-mph fastball, Laird had a bigger fist pump than did Porcello.

"I was pumped up, too," Porcello said. "It was a big pitch in more than one way, not only as far as the game goes. If they get a big hit there, if he hits a home run or something like that, then the game's changed and they're back in it. It was a big pitch in that regard, and I think for myself, to get out of that jam."

His manager's was a more muted reaction, but it wasn't for failure to grasp the importance.

"He threw him a good one, boy," Jim Leyland said. "That was a big situation. Things happen fast, particularly in this ballpark. I mean, look how fast we got five."

If not for Porcello's performance, that outburst would have been the story of the game. The Tigers hadn't scored more than three runs in a game since last Tuesday, totaling eight runs over their past five contests. They had scored more than five runs in a game once since June 13.

The Tigers had a favorable matchup Monday with Justin Grimm, making his second Major League start, filling in on the injury-depleted Rangers rotation, but Detroit had struggled to hit similar pitchers before. Brad Lincoln's six innings of one-run ball against the Tigers on Saturday seemed to fit the profile.

Detroit never allowed Grimm to fall into the rhythm that Lincoln found. Austin Jackson's double leading off the game was the first of seven Tigers hits in a 20-minute top half of the first that took 40 pitches out of Grimm. None of them went for more than a double -- Miguel Cabrera hit a two-run two bagger in the inning and finished 3-for-4 with three RBIs in the game -- but the cumulative effect put Detroit in command from the outset.

Just as important, they put Porcello -- who lost a 3-1 decision to the Cardinals his last time out despite throwing seven innings of two-run ball -- in a position of leverage.

"We came out swinging early, put some runs on the board and let Ricky relax," Leyland said.

Yet that relaxation has a limit. Forget the Tigers' last visit here during the ALCS, when the Rangers showed how easily they could manufacture runs late. This is the same team that put up an eight-run first inning against Porcello two months ago on a chilly afternoon at Comerica Park.

Porcello had given up three runs over 14 2/3 innings in his previous two starts before that disaster. Opponents had been batting .337 off him since.

"I was trying to keep the mindset that it was a 0-0 game," Porcello said. "For me, if I start thinking otherwise, start thinking that I have a cushion to work with, you tend to get complacent, maybe not be as aggressive in the strike zone, execute the pitches that I need to execute. I've fallen into that trap before."

Between six hits and three walks, he had that opportunity again. Porcello pitched with runners on in all but one of his first six innings. However, he avoided the big hit that has plagued him on other nights, continuing a trend he established in his previous start. His two extra-base hits allowed were doubles down the left-field line, and they both came with nobody on base.

With his name being mentioned in rumors as a possible trading piece for other clubs at the July 31 Trade Deadline, Porcello (5-5) held the Rangers to 1-for-8 with runners in scoring position, including three of his seven strikeouts. The last of them was to Napoli.

"They had that big first inning, and at that point he was commanding his sinker," Rangers first baseman Michael Young said. "He worked ahead, threw strikes and forced us to make contact. He did a good job."


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 again unable to get back to .500 mark

By Jason Beck / MLB.com | 6/27/2012 1:57 AM ET

BOX>

ARLINGTON -- It's not a hump, that .500 mark for the Tigers. It's more like a road bump, the way they see it.

Still, as many times as they've come close, it's growing in stature. On Tuesday, depending on your view of Miguel Cabrera's eighth-inning drive, they came within feet of potentially breaking it. The fact that his potential game-tying shot fell short merely adds to the stature.

"We'll get there eventually," Alex Avila said after Tuesday night's 7-5 loss to the Rangers scuttled the latest chance.

The Tigers have stood within a game of .500 seven times since they were last at the break-even point on May 15. Tuesday was the seventh time they've lost.

Quintin Berry wasn't even on the team the last time the Tigers were at the .500 mark. He has been with the team for five weeks.

"It's frustrating," Berry said. "You know you're getting closer and closer, then you foul one back. Then you get a couple steps up, and you foul one back."

Avila not only expects the Tigers to get there, he expects it to happen by the time Detroit gets back home. That's the goal, at least.

"I think we all have a pretty good feeling," Avila said. "I think our goal is to get to .500 or above .500 by the end of the road trip. That's what we want to do. We're in a good position to do that."

The Tigers began this three-city, 10-game road trip at a game under .500, so they would have to win four of their next five to finish at 6-4. That would give them a winning record for the first time since May 10, when they were in their stretch of alternating wins and losses.

They were two games in back of the division lead on May 10. Even with Tuesday's loss, the fact that they remain three games in back of the first-place White Sox through all this says volumes about the American League Central.

"It's just a matter of winning games," manager Jim Leyland said. "We're all floundering around a little bit, and we're floundering around a little worse than the two teams in front of us. It looks like there's a good chance that this thing's going to turn out somewhat like it did last year. Somebody's going to get real hot and reel off 12 out of 15 or 16, and they'll probably have a five- or six-game lead."

The Tigers will have Doug Fister going in Wednesday's series finale, then Max Scherzer and Justin Verlander starting off the four-game set at the Rays. If they're going to have a chance, that's their shot.

They're better matchups than Tuesday, which is why Monday's series opener was a game the Tigers felt they had to win. They still had a chance on Tuesday.

They had Drew Smyly pitching in his hometown before nearly two dozen family and friends, but they had Yu Darvish pitching for the home team on a roll. He was effectively wild when he held Detroit to a run over 6 1/3 innings at Comerica Park on April 19. He has been much more composed in his last three outings, racking up 29 strikeouts against five walks over 23 innings.

Ten of those strikeouts came over seven innings on Tuesday.

"Detroit's lineup is one of the top, high-level lineups in the league," Darvish said. "I was really looking forward to facing them. I really enjoyed facing them and the challenge."

The challenge seemed more on the Tigers' side.

"He's got a good fastball, sneaky in his delivery, so you have to be ready for it," Berry said. "Then he has a plethora of different pitches he can use. He's got good stuff. They paid the guy for a reason."

Said Avila: "He definitely made some adjustments after the first couple innings, throwing more strikes. The thing is, when he's throwing that curveball over for a strike, it's really hard, because it's a huge speed difference. You go from 70 to 94 mph. That's a big speed difference. Then he has all of his other pitches, and he made the adjustments to be able to throw strikes with everything he had after his first couple innings."

The one guy who seemed to hit him was Prince Fielder, who followed his two-run double in the opening inning with a fourth-inning solo homer. All it took was a little comebacker for the Rangers to put together their big inning to sink Smyly.

The way the Rangers picked apart Smyly in their four-run fourth inning suggested Smyly might have run out of gas in his first start in 16 days after a stint on the disabled list. The 103-degree first-pitch temperature might have contributed. However, Smyly maintained his velocity on his fastball.

What he lost was his grip on the ball as he whirled to throw in front of the mound on an infield single by Adrian Beltre. Michael Young tripled on Smyly's next pitch and scored on Nelson Cruz's bloop single. Two more singles from Yorvit Torrealba and Brandon Snyder put Texas, which was trailing 3-1 heading into the inning, ahead for good.

Smyly (2-3) hadn't given up more than four runs in a game in his first 12 Major League starts. He allowed six runs on eight hits over 4 2/3 innings on Tuesday, walking two and striking out three.

"You could see he got frustrated after the bloop hits," Leyland said.

Detroit, though, had Cabrera and Fielder up as the potential tying run in the eighth against Mike Adams. Cabrera's shot sent Josh Hamilton to the fence in straightaway center before it stayed in the park. Two batters later, Delmon Young sent David Murphy to the warning track in left for the inning-ending out.

They were that close to .500. They expect to get back there again.

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 can't overcome Fister's rough night

By Jason Beck / MLB.com | 6/28/2012 1:30 AM ET

BOX>

ARLINGTON -- This was the kind of crazy performance the Tigers have come to expect over the years of hot nights in Texas. It wasn't anything like what they've come to expect from Doug Fister.

Take your pick of sights in Wednesday's 13-9 loss to the Rangers, from the potential tying run on base in the eighth inning of a game Detroit trailed by five runs two different times, to Prince Fielder getting out of a rundown in one inning and tackling Rangers pitching prospect Martin Perez covering first base in another.

They had a popup to second base fall just where Ryan Raburn should have been, only he was in shallow center field before the wind blew it in. They had Quintin Berry speeding around second base as Miguel Cabrera's fly ball was falling into center fielder Leonys Martin's glove to start an inning-ending double play.

They had Brennan Boesch put a solid swing on a breaking ball for an RBI single in the fourth inning, then reach base swinging and missing at a breaking ball in the dirt in the ninth.

It was a midsummer game in Texas. It was interesting, but it wasn't pretty.

"There's some bright signs, but just an ugly game," manager Jim Leyland said. "We just pitched really bad. We just didn't play good."

The one constant is how difficult it is for the Tigers to overcome a rough start. Though two add-on runs off Duane Below in the fifth and sixth innings and a defensive mess of an eighth frame were the deciding tallies, the nine runs off Fister provided the obstacle the Tigers couldn't overcome.

There's no reason to believe Fister was injured, as he was during his previously roughest outing a month ago. He lasted 96 pitches, albeit over just 4 1/3 innings, and showed no sign of discomfort, and he said he had none afterwards. Even though he wasn't hurt, he was hit, to the point where it was obvious he was off.

"He just wasn't real sharp," Leyland said. "That pretty much sums up his outing."

The three home runs Wednesday nearly matched his total from his other eight outings, not to mention the 11 outings he made last season after coming over from Seattle. The nine runs he allowed set a new high for his Major League career, not just in Detroit.

"He was doing the same things that he always does," Ian Kinsler said. "He was throwing sinkers and cutters and working the strike zone. I think we were able to work him a little bit more, as far as laying off some pitches that maybe we normally don't."

More important than the numbers, though, was the feel of the game. Fister threw nearly 70 percent strikes and got ahead of hitters, but he struggled to get the outs he needed. He didn't have a lot of help, but he didn't recover well, either.

"I threw a lot of strikes. I did a poor job of commanding the zone," Fister said. "I threw strikes, but I didn't throw them where I needed to at the right times. They obviously made me pay for that and it's going to be a focus in the bullpen [session between starts]."

He needed those strikes down. Three that didn't get there ended up going out.

One three-batter stretch of the second inning summed up his night. Fister put up consecutive two-strike counts against Michael Young, Nelson Cruz and David Murphy. Young got a curveball up and lined it into center field to put two runners on with nobody out. Cruz hit a ground ball to third that Miguel Cabrera tried to throw on the run and fired wide of Prince Fielder at first, allowing Adrian Beltre to score and setting the tone for the Tigers' sloppy defensive game.

"We didn't pitch very well, and we gave them too many outs," Leyland said. "You can't give a good team like that that many outs, and that's what we did."

Murphy provided the crushing blow on his 0-2 pitch, sending a three-run shot to right field for the first of his two homers and four hits on the night.

"I was working away from him a little bit, tried to get in on him a little bit and left it over the plate," Fister said. "He's a good hitter and he made me pay for my mistake."

With that, the Rangers had built a 4-0 lead and were seemingly on their way to an easy win. The Tigers pummeled former free-agent target Roy Oswalt for 13 hits over six innings, yet he left with a 10-5 lead thanks to two timely double plays and some big outs at the plate. Once Texas turned to highly touted pitching prospect Martin Perez for the eighth, however, Detroit mounted its comeback with RBI singles from Austin Jackson, Delmon Young and Alex Avila, plus a throwing error from second baseman Kinsler that left Fielder colliding with Perez at first base.

Nonetheless, Oswalt became the second pitcher in the last 30 years to give up 13 hits and earn a win for the Rangers, according to research on baseball-reference.com. The Tigers, meanwhile, put up 17 hits and lost for just the second time since 1998, and the first time ever in Texas.

Even here, this was something.

"I think what you do is turn the page," Leyland said. "This is an ugly one. You turn the page and go to the next town."

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.

With help, Scherzer digs deep to beat Rays

By Jason Beck / MLB.com | 6/29/2012 12:07 AM ET

BOX>

ST. PETERSBURG -- For the second consecutive night, the Tigers put up more than a dozen hits and set a career high against their opposing starter. Unlike the previous night, however, the resulting 5-2 win over the Rays was far from a slugfest.

That's where Max Scherzer came in Thursday. That's where Scherzer wanted to be.

When he took the mound last weekend in Pittsburgh, he was there for his family, helping them -- and himself -- cope with the death of his younger brother. Thursday was a little closer to normalcy or at least as close as he can hope for these days. He wanted to be there for his team.

When he fell behind in counts early, he thought about the fastball he wanted at the knees to get back into the count. When the Rays threatened to put together a potential game-tying rally in the fifth inning, he thought about the out he needed against Carlos Pena.

He was his typical self-critic, calling himself "effectively wild" over his six-plus innings of two-run ball, but the effectiveness part was the difference for the Tigers. He was able to enjoy that a little bit.

"Today, I'm in a better emotional spot than I was five days ago," Scherzer said. "I've had a chance to grieve with my family. I'm emotionally stronger at this point in time, to the point where obviously I'm not over what happened, but I'm able to go out there and compete in the game and think about winning a ballgame."

It was Scherzer's fifth win in his past seven decisions, and his fourth straight quality start with at least seven strikeouts. It was yet another sign that the Tigers might have their clear-cut second starter emerging behind Justin Verlander.

In terms of strikeouts, Scherzer actually has emerged ahead of Verlander for the American League strikeout lead, albeit temporarily since Verlander will start on Friday night. When he fanned Pena on his full-count delivery in the in the fifth inning to strand Elliot Johnson on second, he not only preserved Detroit's 3-1 lead, he moved ahead of Verlander with his 114th strikeout.

Scherzer came back from a 3-1 count in that at-bat with back-to-back fastballs -- one at 96 mph that Pena fouled off, the other at 97 that Pena swung through. It was one of several hitters' counts where Scherzer put the effective in effectively wild.

"I really wasn't hitting my spots the way I typically want to," Scherzer said. "I thought I made some big 3-2 pitches throughout the game to keep from having a walk, and getting an outing in that situation. I know I can hit my spots better, but to have good results is a good thing."

Scherzer fell behind on 2-0 and 3-0 counts seven times out of the 24 batters he faced. He had three other 3-1 counts. He gave up two walks and an infield single out of the bunch, while coming back to rack up two strikeouts.

"I was able to keep my fastball down," Scherzer said. "I know I wasn't quite hitting the spot where I wanted to, but I think I got some contact in those counts when they were being aggressive and the ball went at some people."

Said catcher Alex Avila: "That just shows you how good his stuff is, that he can be behind in the count and still get outs. When he's ahead in the count, that's how difficult he is to hit."

That was arguably the difference between a well-pitched game and a frustrating no-decision. Moreover, that's the difference between Scherzer's pitching now and Scherzer's pitching earlier this season.

"One [factor], I think he's using his fastball a little more," Avila said. "The other is his slider has been more consistent. He's always had the great changeup, but being able to throw that slider to lefties has been important to him, and being able to throw it for strikes."

The last time the Tigers visited St. Pete, they won three out of four last August in what arguably loomed as their biggest series of the season, giving them the infusion of confidence needed to take over the American League Central from there. It's too early to put the same weight on this four-game set, with the season not even at its halfway point. However, it could be the catalyst Detroit needs for a surge into the All-Star break.

The first two games arguably stand as the toughest of the series, with Shields and David Price trying to hold down Detroit. Shields entered the night with a 5-0 career record in eight meetings with the Tigers, including eight innings of six-hit, two-run ball in April at Comerica Park.

The Tigers made the All-Star look hittable, thanks in large part to the top third of their order. Austin Jackson and Miguel Cabrera accounted for half of the 14 hits off Shields. Both ended up with four-hit nights, capped by Jackson's eighth-inning triple and Cabrera's ninth-inning solo homer, his 16th of the year.

The one at-bat in which Cabrera didn't hit Shields, ironically, was the inning in which they took command. Jeff Keppinger's lunging grab doubled off Austin Jackson for an unassisted third-inning double play, but Prince Fielder, Delmon Young and Avila chipped in with consecutive base hits to help the Tigers build a 2-0 lead.

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 burned by trio of solo blasts in loss

By Jason Beck / MLB.com | 6/30/2012 12:54 AM ET

BOX>

ST. PETERSBURG -- The Tigers took three out of four games from the Rays at Tropicana Field last August in part because Brad Penny outpitched David Price on a crazy night. Friday night's showdown with Justin Verlander might have been the payback.

"Two outstanding pitchers, two of the best in the league obviously, went at it," Tigers manager Jim Leyland said after the Tigers' 4-2 loss. "Tonight, their guy got the best of it, and our guy's command just wasn't what he wanted it to be. We knew runs would be hard to come by, but that's all part of it."

The showdown wasn't exactly a knockout, considering it took a perfect ninth inning from former Tigers closer Fernando Rodney to keep Miguel Cabrera from stepping to the plate as the potential tying run. Still, three shots out of the park killed Verlander's chances of pulling this out. It took a stiff back to knock Price out, but his seven innings of two-run ball had already made his point.

So had two home runs from Rays leadoff man Desmond Jennings.

"The old saying that solo homers don't hurt you does not apply to tonight, not when you give up three of them," Verlander said. "Just fell behind some guys and put them in fastball counts, and they were able to take advantage of it."

It's not just that Verlander hadn't allowed a three-homer game in nearly a year and a half since the White Sox did it at Comerica Park on April 22, 2011. He had allowed seven home runs all season going into Friday, and four of them came in a pair of starts against the Yankees. He had allowed just two home runs in four previous starts at Tropicana Field, covering 28 innings.

Verlander allowed a home run in three straight innings Friday. If the Tigers were facing a different pitcher, he might have gotten credit for limiting the damage and keeping them solo shots. But he knew coming in that he wouldn't have that margin.

His fastball command wouldn't allow it.

"It was kind of like walking a tightrope, because against a guy like Price, you know you're not going to get many runs," Verlander said. "But at the same time, I was trying to be economical so that I could at least go six, seven innings. It was tough."

Tampa Bay milked 29 pitches out of Verlander in an opening inning that featured two singles, a walk and a run, and 20 more pitches when he struck out the side in order in the second. Nine of those pitches went to ninth batter and former Tiger Will Rhymes.

Verlander still got his strikeouts, eight of them over six innings, but even those at-bats took a toll on him. At one point, he had nearly as many strikeouts (seven) as balls put in play (eight), but two balls left the park.

The first came from Jennings moments after he ran down Quintin Berry's foul ball with a tumbling catch into the seats down the left-field line. He led off the third with Verlander looking for a quick inning, having started the frame with 49 pitches.

Verlander looked to get ahead with an easy fastball at 91 mph and missed on his location.

"That's what I was talking about trying to be economical, trying to get some quick outs," Verlander said. "And that was not a quick out. It was a quick something, but not a quick out."

It was a quick reaction from Jennings.

"Verlander throws his fastball a lot, and you know he's going to throw it," Jennings said. "I got into fastball counts and put a good swing on a couple balls."

Verlander actually threw more offspeed pitches, especially once he found his changeup was moving better than it had been in a couple months. When Jennings had a 3-1 count in the fifth, right after an 11-pitch battle from Rhymes, he readied for the fastball and got it at 96 mph. It was lower than the first, Verlander said, but still over the plate.

"He's just dead-red fastball, and I split the plate with it," Verlander said. "So he's probably going to hit it hard somewhere."

Add a Ben Zobrist home run leading off the fourth, and Verlander (8-5) had a 4-1 deficit.

"He just seemed out of sync," Tigers catcher Gerald Laird said. "Usually he's really good with command, and his ball just kind of leaked back to the middle of the plate. Usually his four-seamer away stays away, and they just kept coming back to the plate. When that happens, it tends to find the barrel."

Price (11-4) held the lead there as long as his back allowed, becoming the American League's first 11-game winner in the process. Former Ray Delmon Young had two of Detroit's five hits, including a solo homer in the fifth. Ramon Santiago doubled and came around on back-to-back groundouts in the seventh.

"He was using the strike zone to his advantage and making pitches," Laird said of Price. "He's got tremendous stuff. He had electric stuff and he mixed it up pretty good tonight."

Left-hander Jake McGee replaced Price to start the eighth and retired the Tigers in order to hand the lead to Rodney, who earned his 22nd save.

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 hurls gem to carry Tigers past Rays
Righty needs just 87 pitches to complete seven scoreless innings

By Jason Beck / MLB.com | 7/1/2012 12:37 AM ET

BOX>

ST. PETERSBURG -- The Rays held a throwback night to 1979, nearly a decade before Rick Porcello was born. Porcello threw back to his May 2011 outing, the last time he looked this good on the mound.

It was a changeup for the Rays. Actually, Porcello had a lot of changeups for them. But to him, his seven scoreless innings while throwing 87 pitches should be more of the expected, to some extent. In Saturday's case, it was the difference in the Tigers' 6-2 win at Tropicana Field.

"I mean, I think being a contact pitcher and throwing strikes and keeping the ball down in the zone, I should be able to have these types of outings where I can go deep into the game without throwing too many pitches," he said. "As long as everything's sinking down and I'm locating my pitches, at least I feel like that's where I should be. Obviously, some games are going to be different."

That's what sinkerball pitchers do when they're on. Yet as good as his sinker was working Saturday, his mixing of pitches might have been his best job changing speeds in his four-year Major League career.

Considering he was pitching in a 1-0 game for most of the night, every one of those pitches meant something.

"That's obviously what we needed," manager Jim Leyland said. "He did more than you could ask for."

The only other thing the Tigers could want from the 23-year-old is consistency, and he's showing strong signs of building that.

It was the third win in Porcello's last four outings, but it was his best single performance since he one-hit the Pirates for eight innings on May 22, 2011. Fittingly, that's also the last stretch in which he pitched this effectively.

Add up Saturday's performance with Porcello's previous two outings, and the 23-year-old has allowed three runs over his last 20 innings, lowering his ERA from 5.18 to 4.35. He might well have strengthened his rotation spot in the process on a team rumored to be in the market for pitching help as the non-waiver Trade Deadline nears.

"This is probably one of his better outings," catcher Alex Avila said. "And he's shown he can be that consistent. For him, it's all about making sure he's getting that sinker down in the zone, getting ground balls like he was doing today. He's going to have games like that. There's going to be games where those ground balls get through the hole, but that comes with being a sinkerball pitcher."

Porcello had his sinker working on his way to nine ground-ball outs. It worked in part because his offspeed pitches -- specifically, his ability to locate them where he wanted and when he needed them -- kept Rays hitters off-balance.

He threw a combination of 31 changeups and sliders, according to data from MLB.com's Gameday application and brooksbaseball.net, and 29 sinkers. The result was a mix that never allowed hitters to get comfortable, something that had become a problem when Porcello fired sinkers all the time earlier in the year.

It's something that was in the game plan specifically for this team and its left-handed hitters like Carlos Pena and Luke Scott.

"They're a very aggressive team, and everybody knows that Rick has a great sinker, and you have to be able to throw your other pitches to keep them off that pitch," Avila said. "Ricky did a really nice job today being able to mix that in there, throw the slider in there, especially to lefties -- back them off the plate a little bit. Just threw a ton of strikes today."

Porcello (6-5) retired 16 of Tampa Bay's first 17 batters. The only baserunner for the first 5 1/3 innings was Elliot Johnson, and he reached with a bunt single on an 0-2 pitch. Six Rays grounded out in that stretch, and three struck out.

His former Tigers teammate, Will Rhymes, broke up Porcello's groove with a one-out single in the sixth that sparked the only rally the Rays put together against him. Even then, the ensuing hits -- a Desmond Jennings ground ball through the left side, and a Pena chopper that seemingly died on the turf in front of home plate as Porcello charged -- weren't all that damaging.

Nonetheless, they left Porcello staring at a bases-loaded, sixth-inning jam for the second straight outing. He wasn't facing the same lineup he did in Texas, but he had only one out and the heart of the Rays' lineup due up.

He needed just two pitches to escape it. B.J. Upton popped up the first to deep shortstop to take away the sacrifice fly opportunity. Luke Scott grounded out to second on the next one as Porcello bounced into the dugout.

"Obviously, when I got into trouble, I went to my sinker against Upton and Scott," Porcello said. "We were able to get two balls that weren't hit very hard. That's a plus for sure."

At that point, Porcello was protecting a 1-0 lead built when Prince Fielder smacked a third-inning, bases-loaded comebacker off the right shin of Rays starter Jeremy Hellickson, scoring Austin Jackson. Hellickson had to leave the game, but the Rays' bullpen held down Detroit for the next four frames.

Not until a Joel Peralta pitch off Ramon Santiago's shoulder could the Tigers capitalize. Santiago's fifth hit-by-pitch this season extended the eighth inning for Jackson, who sent a Peralta fastball deep to left field for his eighth home run.

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 take three of four from Rays

By Jason Beck / MLB.com | 7/1/2012 8:03 PM ET

BOX>

ST. PETERSBURG -- The Tigers didn't get back to .500 for the season, as they had hoped by the end of their three-city, 10-game road trip, but they did get closer.

Considering the way the journey started, getting back to .500 for the trip itself was a minor feat.

"This series is over. Whether it helps us continue to play good baseball, I don't know," catcher Alex Avila said after Sunday's 5-3 victory over the Rays earned them three out of four at Tropicana Field for the second time in as many years. "I know we want to finish strong going into the break and at least be over .500 by the time we get to the break. Obviously, [that means] we have to win the next two series."

Time will tell whether this year's series victory over the Rays has that impact like their four-game series here last year, which they later said gave them the confidence for their late-season run. However, the close, low-scoring games they played once again showed the kind of baseball they haven't played often this season.

Three of the four games were decided by three runs or less, and the four-run win they posted Saturday night was a 1-0 game until the eighth inning. Detroit's starting pitchers combined to allow nine runs over 24 innings, with four of the runs coming off of ace Justin Verlander. The lone runs off of Detroit's bullpen were two solo homers off of Joaquin Benoit on Saturday night.

The combined effort salvaged a 5-5 record for the trip, their best mark out of a three-city trek since last September's division-clinching trip to Chicago, Oakland and Kansas City, when they went 6-3, though this year's trip may be more impressive considering all of their opponents had winning records.

"To be on the road and play Pittsburgh, Texas and the Rays, it was big to come out .500," said rookie left-hander Drew Smyly (3-3), whose five innings carried the finale to the bullpen. "This was a good series for us. Going home for seven games, hopefully we can get on a roll and finish strong before the All-Star break."

With the Twins and Royals coming up, they have an excellent opportunity to get on a roll if they can continue playing like this.

"It's not a time to back off, just because we're headed towards that break," said Austin Jackson. "I think this is the time to really push and try to come out on top for the first half."

Smyly arguably pitched better than his numbers would indicate, as he retired 12 straight batters after Desmond Jennings led off the game with a walk that set up B.J. Upton's sacrifice fly.

He had a 1-1 game with a no-hitter going through four innings before back-to-back sacrifice flies from Delmon Young and Avila pulled Detroit ahead in the top of the fifth. Three fifth-inning hits, capped by Jose Molina's game-tying RBI double, gave Tampa Bay a new game.

Jackson, snubbed earlier in the day when All-Star rosters were announced, fueled the go-ahead rally in the sixth by driving in Don Kelly, and he scored on Prince Fielder's two-out RBI single up the middle.

Detroit's bullpen took it from there, as four relievers fired four scoreless innings and struck out six, starting with Brayan Villarreal fanning the side in the sixth, and ending with a perfect ninth from Jose Valverde for his 15th save.

"I think the whole bullpen is doing what they want us to do," Benoit said. "I think we are basically set. I don't think there's any open space from the sixth on."

Phil Coke, Benoit and Valverde excelled in their roles. Villarreal is arguably forging his. When he first came up, he was essentially an injury replacement. When they promoted him to shorter, close-game situations, he was filling in as well. His improved control has turned him into a piece that fills out the group.

"What [Quintin] Berry's been for us as far as the offense, Villarreal's been like that pitching," Avila said. "He kind of brings a different dynamic. When he went down to the Minor Leagues, he made the adjustments he needed to make, knowing that his stuff is electric. He was lights-out being able to bridge that gap between Smyly going five today and that sixth and seventh, knowing you have Benoit and Valverde and also [Octavio] Dotel."

If he can stay that way, the Tigers bullpen has the chance to go six deep in late-inning arms when Al Alburquerque returns sometime after the break. If the Tigers keep playing this way, they'll have plenty of chances to use them, probably in a playoff race.

They're three games back, the same spot where they stood a week ago. They're a game under .500, the same spot they stood six days ago, and six other times since they last owned a break-even record in mid-May. More important, they're confident, perhaps more than they've been in weeks.

"We battled on this road trip," Jackson said. "And that just says a lot about the team, just coming out of the funk a little bit."

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.

A third of the way, Fister strong, but then fades

By Jason Beck / MLB.com | 7/3/2012 12:48 AM ET

BOX>

DETROIT -- Doug Fister had no-hit stuff for 3 1/3 innings and seemingly had the foundation to flirt with history. Then he went from potential no-hitter to eminently hittable.

The resulting 6-4 loss to the Twins on a hot summer evening at Comerica Park was a fitting one-night microcosm for the Tigers' fortunes over the last month and a half.

Minnesota was the team that pushed the Tigers under .500 by winning a two-game series here in mid-May. Eight times since, the Tigers have crept to within a game of the break-even point. Eight times, they've lost. Monday was the latest.

With the Twins and Royals in town this week, the Tigers have a solid opportunity to head into the break with a winning record. But as Minnesota showed Tuesday -- really, as Minnesota showed in May -- it's not automatic.

Now, the Tigers will need to win four of their next six to head into the All-Star break at .500. Five out of six will send them to the break with a winning record and a wave of momentum.

They'll have to play very good baseball to get there. For three innings or so Monday, they did. Once the pitches rose on Fister, or once the shadows fell across the entire infield, the bottom dropped out on his outing.

Which fits better is a difference of opinion on both sides.

"I really just didn't execute there in the fourth inning," Fister said. "I felt good the first three, and then the ball got up on me a little bit and they capitalized on it."

Fister (1-6) faced the minimum 10 batters through 3 1/3 innings. The only Twin to reach base safely was Ryan Doumit on a hit-by-pitch, but Brian Dozier's double-play grounder erased him. Before that, Fister struck out four of Minnesota's first five hitters, including the top three in order on called third strikes in the opening inning.

Once the top of the order came back around for the fourth, the results practically flipped. Leadoff man Denard Span worked the count full before lining out to third baseman Miguel Cabrera, then six of Minnesota's next seven batters singled.

None of them were hit particularly hard, but all of them found holes through the Tigers' infield, leading to four fourth-inning runs. Trevor Plouffe drove in two with a ground ball through the left side to put Minnesota on top for good.

Twins manager Ron Gardenhire and his players said they started seeing the ball better after the first few innings, once the sun was lower in the sky.

"I don't want to blame it on a backdrop, but it's tough to see here the first couple of innings," Doumit said. "The last couple of times we've played here, the first three innings, with the way everything's shining back there, [it's tough].

"That's not taking anything away from him. He had good stuff the first three innings, we just made adjustments."

Fister put more of the blame on himself.

"I'm sure that they made adjustments," he said, "but it's a lack of execution on my part. It's a big difference between just below the knee and just above the knee, and I left the ball up a little bit and they made me pay for it."

Fister's struggles in his previous start last Wednesday support his point. He went from retiring the top third of the Rangers' order in the opening inning to giving up two singles and a three-run homer in a four-run second. He retired six straight Rangers to get through the third before serving up two homers in the fourth.

Fister made adjustments between starts, he said, but they clearly didn't stick.

"I think it's just a matter of fine-tuning it, just focusing on getting on top of the ball and driving through it," he said, "instead of trying to get on the side of it and trying to make it do too much."

The Tigers buy what he's saying, but they also point out that he missed about a month and a half over two different stints on the disabled list. He hasn't had a rhythm to get consistent yet, they argue.

"To be honest with you, Doug's doing his best out there," catcher Alex Avila said. "It's something that you have to be patient with him about, because he came off the DL and just started pitching. This is like Spring Training for him. ... These last couple of starts, it's almost like his rehab starts."

Add in a walk and two more singles to begin the fifth inning, and Fister allowed nine of the last 11 Twins he faced to reach base safely. Yet none of the eight hits he allowed over four-plus innings went for extra bases, making him just the third Tigers pitcher to do that in such a short outing since 2000. Brad Penny did it last June 15, while Nate Cornejo did it on July 4, 2003.

All 13 hits for the Twins on the night, in fact, were singles. The only extra-base hit for either side was Cabrera's two-run double in a three-run fifth inning to chase Twins starter Liam Hendriks, who watched his 6-1 lead nearly unravel.

"We're only down two runs," Avila said. "That's a bloop and a blast right there."

That's where it stayed. Anthony Swarzak (2-4) tossed 2 2/3 innings to pace five scoreless innings of Twins relief, keeping the Tigers under .500 for at least another couple of days.

"It's just a number right now," Austin Jackson said. "I think we're really focusing on just going out there and putting up the effort. If we keep doing that, we'll be all right."

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.

Power display unable to bail out Below, Tigers
Boesch, Jackson go yard, but Twins come on strong in Detroit

By Anthony Odoardi / MLB.com | 7/4/2012 2:31 AM ET

BOX>

DETROIT -- The last time Duane Below was scheduled to make a spot start -- on April 30 against the Royals -- the Tigers had what still stands as their only rainout of the season. On Tuesday, Mother Nature nearly washed away another one.

After an hour and a half delay before the start of the game, Below finally took the mound for his 2012 debut as a starter. It didn't go quite as planned, as the Tigers lost, 8-6, to the Twins.

"It's not really the start I wanted to have," said Below, who lasted only 2 2/3 innings in place of an injured Max Scherzer. "I wanted to pick up the team and help Max out."

The Twins pegged the lefty for five runs on five hits, although only a first-inning run was earned. Ben Revere and Joe Mauer hit back-to-back singles, and manager Ron Gardenhire called for the double steal, which put both runners in scoring position. Left fielder Josh Willingham hit a sacrifice fly to left to score the game's first run.

Revere went 2-for-2 with two runs and a stolen base against Below, and he also forced a balk that started a rally in the third inning. Revere's speed appeared to get in Below's head and certainly made a difference in the game.

"I faced [Revere] in Double-A," Below said. "Even last year, he's ready to go any time. He always continues to go and I knew he was going to go at some point. ... I needed to do a better job of holding him on."

The Tigers' offense backed their starter with a three-run second inning off Twins starter Nick Blackburn. Prince Fielder and Alex Avila singled before Ryan Raburn hit a game-tying RBI double.

Brennan Boesch, who recorded only one RBI in his previous 13 games, followed with a two-run single.

"I definitely was consciously trying to get a good pitch," Boesch said. "I just wanted to make sure today that I wasn't going to give any at-bats away. ... I'm fighting and doing everything I can to try to hit the ball."

The two-run lead proved to be temporary as the wheels fell off Below's outing in the third. He recorded two quick outs before a single by Revere, a balk and an error by Ramon Santiago put runners at the corners. A two-run shot off the bat of Willingham made it a 4-3 game.

Santiago came into the day with only two errors on the season, but his total doubled in the game. Although it was marked as Santiago's fault, Below blamed himself.

"I should've made that play. That was a one-hopper over my head," he said. "That's a tough play for Santiago to make having to cover that hole."

Jose Ortega, recalled from Triple-A Toledo for Tuesday's game, took over and served Trevor Plouffe's 19th homer of the season, handing Minnesota a three-run lead.

The Tigers battled back off Blackburn in the bottom of the fourth with a pair of their own homers. Boesch hit an opposite-field solo shot, his first since June 13, and two batters later, Austin Jackson went deep to tie the game.

"I can't do anything right right now," Blackburn said. "The fourth inning I go out and give up the home runs; that's been the story of the season for me so far."

While Blackburn will try to forget Tuesday's game, Boesch will try repeating his success. In his last 52 at-bats, Boesch had only seven hits. He busted out of his slump, finishing 3-for-4 with three RBIs.

"Anytime you get three hits and a home run, it's momentum to build," he said. "Can't really enjoy it for too long, but you can bring it into the next day and use it as momentum to try to get some consistency."

Brayan Villarreal replaced Ortega following 2 1/3 innings of one-hit, one-run ball. He loaded the bases in the seventh inning on two doubles and an intentional walk. Ryan Doumit hit the go-ahead sacrifice fly to center field with one out.

Mauer tacked on an insurance run with his fifth home run of the year off Joaquin Benoit in the ninth inning.

The Tigers are back to three games under .500, and they'll need to win their next five games to finish above .500 at the All-Star break. And with tonight marking game No. 81, the Tigers own sub-.500 record at the halfway point for the first time under manager Jim Leyland.

"We all want it. We're all want to win," Below said. "It's not like we're showing up and just going through the motions. Everyone comes here every day and wants to play hard and win. Yeah, it's halfway point, but we're only 4 1/2 [games] back [in the American League Central], so that's the good thing about it. As soon as we get hot, we're a team that is going to be scary."

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

Miggy hits two HRs as Verlander goes distance
Right-hander hurls fifth complete game of the season

By Jason Beck / MLB.com | 7/5/2012 2:04 AM ET

BOX>

DETROIT -- Justin Verlander doesn't want to be awarded an All-Star start next week based on last season.

"You're not owed anything in this game," he said. "Whoever's the best pitcher at this point is owed that."

As auditions go, his closing argument that he's still the best option for the American League in Tuesday's Midsummer Classic went pretty well.

As Tigers remedies go, Verlander's latest streak-stopper, a complete-game four-hitter in a 5-1 win over the Twins on Wednesday night at Comerica Park, might have been as meaningful as any start he made over the first half.

Detroit needed a win over Minnesota after back-to-back losses to start the series, not to mention a two-game series sweep at home against the Twins in May. At the same time, the Tigers needed to rest a bullpen taxed by 15 1/3 innings of relief over the previous three games.

The way Verlander put up one quick inning after another, the only work the Tigers' bullpen saw was a handful of warmup tosses from closer Jose Valverde in the ninth once Verlander's pitch count crossed over 110 with his longtime nemesis, Joe Mauer, up to the plate.

Mauer, whose 20 hits in 55 at-bats against Verlander are the most of anyone in the game, flew out to left to complete an 0-for-4 night. Once Ryan Raburn completed a basket catch, Verlander had his fifth complete game of the season.

And on a stormy night when Verlander's first pitch didn't come until 9:30 p.m. ET, he finished off the game in barely more time (two hours, 33 minutes) than the rain delayed it (two hours, 26 minutes).

"That's just what we needed," Tigers manager Jim Leyland said. "We needed a lot of innings, and we got nine of them. I didn't expect that many, but that's a blessing for us."

It wasn't a masterpiece, not by Verlander's standards. His changeup isn't where he wants it to be; it really wasn't where he wanted on the 402-foot drive by Chris Parmelee for Minnesota's lone run. His curveball required a mid-game adjustment, he said, leading to all three of his called strikeouts and a swinging strikeout from Josh Willingham.

Yet it was quiet, cool -- demeanor, not temperature -- efficiency.

"It ended up being a good game," Verlander said. "It's not where I want to be. ... still need to make some adjustments, but it's still nice to have some balls hit right at people sometimes."

On a normal turn, he'd start going about those tweaks on Thursday or Friday, preparing for a start in five days. This isn't a normal turn. Verlander will take a couple days off, then start his routine for an inning or two in the All-Star Game, something he couldn't do last year because he had pitched the Tigers' final game before the break.

Whether he's preparing for a start is another question. He'll have to wait until AL manager Ron Washington selects his starter. Washington will somehow have to choose from a field that includes AL ERA leader Jered Weaver and Chris Sale, who owns a 10-2 record and 2.19 ERA, as well as 11-game winners David Price and Matt Harrison, plus equally dominant lefty C.J. Wilson.

Verlander (9-5) can't match them in wins or ERA, but he owns the AL strikeout lead, having retaken it from another All-Star, Felix Hernandez. And with a curveball he was spotting in any count, to go with a fastball that consistently hit the mid-90s on the ballpark radar before hitting 99 in the ninth inning, he again showed arguably the nastiest stuff in the league.

"Yeah, it would be nice. It would be fantastic," Verlander said. "But I know there are some other guys out there having exceptional years. In my opinion, the All-Star Game is year-to-year. This is the halfway point of 2012, not the end of 2011."

In other words, he doesn't expect to be awarded anything on past accomplishments.

"Yeah, I had a good year last year, but I shouldn't be warranted for that," he continued. "If I get to start in the All-Star Game, I want to know it's because I've been the best pitcher up to this point."

The way he pitched Wednesday, his opposing manager Wednesday was putting him in another category.

"You've got to have the great arm and you've got to have the mentality to get there. It's a Jack Morris-type thing -- finish the game, nine innings," Twins manager Ron Gardenhire said. "That's a Verlander, and that's putting him in a lofty status as far as I'm concerned. Jack Morris belongs in the Hall of Fame and he was one of the grittiest pitchers I've ever been on the field with."

Seven years to the day after Verlander made his Major League debut, he retired the Twins lineup in order through the first three innings before Denard Span singled leading off the fourth. Verlander escaped the inning on a double play from Mauer, and he had faced the minimum through 4 1/3 innings until Parmelee's homer.

That was it for the damage. Trevor Plouffe singled after Parmelee's homer, before Ryan Doumit grounded into an inning-ending play. Span bunted his way on in the sixth, and a Jamey Carroll walk gave Minnesota one more baserunner before Verlander spotted a breaking ball on Alexi Castilla to end the eighth.

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.

Prince's power caps Tigers' rally in win over Twins
Three-run shot seals eighth-inning comeback to help Detroit split series

By Jason Beck / MLB.com | 7/5/2012 7:30 PM ET

BOX>

DETROIT -- The Twins had their 12th hit Thursday afternoon before the Tigers had their first. The Tigers made the most of their last hits.

"We dodged some bullets," manager Jim Leyland said.

Then Prince Fielder launched a crushing shot.

"What happened to them is kind of what's happened to us this year," Leyland said of the Twins after Fielder's three-run homer powered a five-run eighth inning that capped off seven unanswered Tigers runs in a 7-3 win. "They got a bunch of hits and couldn't get that killer one, and in the end, they paid for it."

Not since at least 1918, as far back as the records go, had the Tigers given up 15 hits in a game and escaped with just three runs allowed. Not in that same span, according to baseball-reference.com, had a Major League pitcher given up 12 hits in less than four innings and allowed just three runs, as happened to Rick Porcello on Thursday.

All but one of those hits were singles, including the Ryan Doumit comebacker that hit Porcello on his right biceps and prompted Leyland to pull him from the game with two outs and the bases loaded in the fourth. Three of those hits in the fourth stayed in the infield.

By contrast, Fielder's 13th home run of the year was a no-doubt shot off the bat that landed well into the right-field seats as Twins lefty reliever Tyler Robertson asked for a new ball. It was just the second multi-run homer of the year for Fielder, and the first to put the Tigers in front in the fifth inning or later.

That's the kind of instant impact the Tigers were hoping from their lineup. It took a lot of damage control, three innings of shutout relief from Darin Downs, and a little rally to get there.

Fielder didn't want to think about the struggles of the first half, or what's coming up ahead, as he talked after the game. He wanted to stay in the moment.

"I think we should just enjoy right now," he said. "Just enjoy this feeling, because tomorrow's not here yet. So let's enjoy this."

Among those enjoying it was Porcello, who had the kind of day that allows sinkerballers to give managers gray hairs and give box scores that crowded look.

"At this point in my career, I don't really pay attention to my box score after a game," Porcello said, allowing himself a slight chuckle. "The type of pitcher I am, I'm going to give up hits. That doesn't always look great, but the bottom line is we went out there and won the game. That's the most important thing. To split this series and keep us within range of the teams ahead of us."

Only one Tigers pitcher in the last 50 years had allowed that many hits without getting out of the fourth, that being Wil Ledezma during the infamous 2003 season. He gave up seven runs that game, thanks in no small part to three White Sox homers.

Porcello left some sinkers up in the strike zone, but didn't get the ball up in kind except for Doumit's double to the fence with nobody on and two out in the third inning. Add in two runners thrown out at the plate on back-to-back pitches, the second on a Ryan Raburn strike from left field to give Gerald Laird a chance to tag Brian Dozier on the head, and a three-man collision on a popup bunt, and even Leyland called it a "weird game."

Said Porcello: "I'm not going to say it was a bad start. I threw some good pitches that found some holes, that sort of thing. There's not a lot you can do about that. The biggest thing was not getting the bottom half of the order out. Four right-handed hitters in the bottom half of the order should be consistent outs for me."

Meanwhile, Twins starter Scott Diamond held the Tigers hitless the first time through the order, erasing his second-inning walk with a double play. Austin Jackson doubled and scored to open Detroit's offense in the fourth inning before Brennan Boesch doubled in Jhonny Peralta in the fifth.

At that point, the Tigers had less than a third of Minnesota's hit total, but stood within a big hit of tying it. Diamond wouldn't give it to them, retiring nine of his final 10 batters to last seven innings and hand the lead to what had been a surprisingly effective Twins bullpen this series.

Once Jackson snuck a ground ball inside the right-field line for a one-out triple in the eighth off setup man Alex Burnett (2-1), however, the bullpen fell apart. Burnett played to the game plan and tried to get Quintin Berry to chase a breaking balls, throwing five of them in a six-pitch at-bat, but Berry took them all for a walk that put the go-ahead run on base

It also brought up Miguel Cabrera, whom the Twins couldn't contain all series.

"I knew he was the one under pressure, not me," Berry said. "He had to try to make some good pitches to me. He came out flipping stuff up there that luckily was out of the zone, and I was able to lay off it."

Cabrera sent a ground ball through the middle for his seventh hit of the series (and second RBI of the day) to tie the game and bring up Fielder. Twins manager Ron Gardenhire lifted Burnett to bring in the left-handed Robertson, whose second slider hung up, allowing Fielder to drive it into the right-field seats.

"I just hung a slider to him and he did with it what he's supposed to," Robertson said.

Delmon Young added a solo shot -- ruled so after replay overturned the original call of a double -- two pitches later for an insurance run.

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.

Smyly fans career-high 10 as Tigers top KC
Young's go-ahead homer helps Detroit climb back to .500 mark

By Jason Beck / MLB.com | 7/7/2012 12:02 AM ET

BOX>

DETROIT -- For this Tigers team with lofty expectations, .500 is a milepost, not a goal.

For rookie left-hander Drew Smyly, so is the outing that got Detroit back to the break-even mark for the first time in seven weeks.

"I'm learning a crazy amount every time out," he said after his career-high 10 strikeouts over six innings in a 4-2 win over the Royals Friday night at Comerica Park.

The Tigers, in turn, are learning quite a bit about him.

"At some point, this guy's got a chance to really be good," manager Jim Leyland said. "He's left-handed, he's got good control and he's got a feel for the hitters, a little better feel for how to pitch hitters. He's got a chance to be a good one."

Smyly isn't going to get there this year, Leyland emphasizes, not as a rookie in his second pro season. But considering where he was a week and a half ago, with his spot in the rotation seemingly getting shaky with his escalating ERA, Smyly has shown a lot of fight trying to get out of a midseason slump.

His win over the Rays was a good step for him. Friday's outing was bigger.

"It's a lot to take in from trying to get Major League hitters out and just little mechanical things, what pitches to throw in certain situations," Smyly said. "I've gotten myself in trouble a good amount of times, got out of it some. I've had my good games, had my bad games.

"Tonight, my curveball was better than it's been all year. When you have your pitches going, it makes it easy."

When your curveball used to act more like a slider, it makes a big difference. It's a different pitch than the Royals saw from him in mid-April, and it showed in each swing and miss they took at his breaking ball as it dove for the dirt.

"It's a sharp-breaker that was dipping down," Royals manager Ned Yost said. "It was hard to see in the first few innings, but he mixes his pitches well."

It took the Royals five innings to catch up to Smyly, who hadn't struck out more than seven in a game in his brief Major League career -- and his three seven-strikeout efforts all came in his first five starts. The lefty reached that mark 11 batters into the game, then breezed past it on his way to fanning nine of Kansas City's first 13 hitters.

Smyly struck out Alex Gordon in each of his first two at-bats, the second time starting a stretch of four consecutive strikeouts that also claimed Eric Hosmer and Billy Butler.

Eight of Smyly's 10 strikeouts came on the slurve, or curve, or whatever you want to call it.

"That's the best I've seen him," Leyland said of his 22-year-old lefty. "That's the best I've seen his breaking stuff."

Combine the fact that his control was as good as usual, and the result was historic. Not since 1918 had a Tiger rookie struck out 10 batters without allowing a walk in an outing. However, Eric Erickson had 16 innings to do it, fanning 12 Washington Senators.

Leyland doesn't expect more of that, obviously.

"I just want him to keep making progress and keep us in games," Leyland said. "If he can keep us in games on a consistent basis for six innings, I would absolutely be thrilled. That's all I need him to do this year."

That's precisely what he did Friday, to the point that Leyland stretched him for a sixth inning to give him a test after the Royals tied it in the fifth.

The only Royals that didn't strike out were the bottom two hitters in the order, and they powered Kansas City's game-tying rally. Brayan Pena doubled in Mike Moustakas, then scored on Jason Bourgeois' ground ball through the middle.

Smyly (4-3) retired Gordon on a ground ball to first to hold it there, then stranded runners at second and third with a seven-pitch battle against Moustakas, who grounded out on Smyly's career-high 106th and final pitch of the night to end the top of the sixth.

It was another breaking ball, but it wasn't his best.

"He made a bad pitch to Moustakas that he grounded to Prince [Fielder]," Leyland said. "He was lucky it didn't go in the seats. It was a hanger, maybe too bad of a hanger."

At that point, the Tigers were struggling to handle Royals starter Jonathan Sanchez, who kept his walk total down and induced seven groundouts over the first five innings. However, he paid in the sixth for falling behind on Fielder and Young.

Fielder lined a single through the middle of Kansas City's infield shift for a single. Once Sanchez fell behind on a 3-0 count to Young, he challenged him with back-to-back fastballs. Young took the first, then saw Sanchez (1-5) hang the second and drove it deep to left for his second home run in as many days.

With that, they were on their way toward to .500, even if they weren't celebrating it.

"It means we've been winning," Young said. "We look a lot better on paper at .500 in a pennant race than five games below .500 and three games out. We want to continue the trend and try to win this series before the All-Star break and set ourselves up to go play in Baltimore after the break."

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 join forces to ace late-surging Royals
Homers by Prince, Young stretch win streak to four straight

By Anthony Odoardi / MLB.com | 7/7/2012 9:49 PM ET

BOX>

DETROIT -- For the Tigers, Saturday's win to get above .500 was a complete team effort.

Doug Fister wasn't especially great and Jose Valverde nearly surrendered a four-run ninth-inning lead, but eight runs provided from all spots in the lineup got it done, as the Tigers secured a series win with an 8-7 victory over the Royals at Comerica Park.

"That when you know you got a team. When everybody's contributing and everybody's helping win a game," said manager Jim Leyland, whose team moved above .500 for the first time since May 10.

Aside from Ryan Raburn, each Tigers hitter contributed with a base hit or an RBI. In fact, the only player besides Raburn not to tally a hit was All-Star third baseman Miguel Cabrera.

The day began with Austin Jackson and Prince Fielder. After Fister yielded two first-inning runs to put Detroit in an early hole, Jackson quickly extended his hitting streak to a career-high 14 games with a single and Fielder crushed a two-run shot -- his 14th blast -- to erase the deficit.

From there, it was the bottom half of the order that made the difference. Ramon Santiago and Gerald Laird sparked a three-run, second-inning rally with back-to-back doubles. Santiago also doubled in the fourth and came around to score both times. Laird finished 3-for-3 and his two-base knock off Bruce Chen ended a 15 at-bat hitless streak against left-handers.

"We've thought all along that we've got a good club, and now we're starting to get contributions from a lot of guys," Leyland said. "That's what it takes. You can't rely on the Prince's and Cabrera's every time. All these guys got to step up and get some big hits."

Chen was the fourth straight lefty the Tigers have faced. And by the end of the game, the veteran pitcher became the fourth straight lefty the Tigers have beaten. Entering Wednesday's game, Leyland called out his team for posting an 8-13 record against lefties. They're now 12-13 with a chance to break-even on Sunday against Royals southpaw Everett Teaford.

One player Leyland specifically noted was outfielder Delmon Young, who tallied 32 RBIs in 40 games after being traded to Detroit in August. Through 76 games this season hitting behind Cabrera and Fielder, Young had 34.

However, Young's one hit in Saturday's game proved to be the biggest -- a two-run homer in the seventh inning to increase the Tigers' lead to four. It was Young's third straight game with a homer, which is the longest streak of his career.

"Delmon's been a run producer and that's what we expect out of him," Leyland said. "He's not going to hit a home run everyday obviously, but he's an RBI guy and that's what we need with the two big guys. Pretty much guys have been getting on in front of him all year long, so if he does what he did today, that's huge for us."

It proved to be pivotal, because of Valverde's near collapse in the top of the ninth. The 34-year-old closer loaded the bases with none out and Billy Butler drove in two with a single. Mike Moustakas hit a sacrifice fly to make it a one-run game, before Valverde finally got out of it by striking out Jeff Francoeur to end the game.

"You like to see the crowd in it a little more, put a little more pressure on the other team instead of waiting until it's too late," said Fielder of the 39,392 fans in attendance who thought the game was in hand. "But fortunately, Valverde's tough. He's mentally strong and he got out of it."

Valverde's final strikeout pushed the Tigers to within four of the 2011 Yankees' American League record of 710 K's before the All-Star break.

However, the inning nearly erased another chance at a win for Fister, who entered the game with a 1-6 record despite five games allowing two runs or fewer. The right-hander also entered with a three-game losing streak and 10.05 ERA in his past three games. He was somewhere in between on Saturday.

"He left a couple pitches up and struggled with his command, but he settled down and made pitches and kept us in the lead," Laird said. "It obviously, wasn't his best outing, but it's one that he can build off of."

Fister yielded eight hits and four runs in six-plus innings. But the Tigers will need to see more of the pitcher who went 8-1 with a 1.79 ERA down the stretch in 2011 to continue climbing in the standings.

"It's a step in the right direction," Fister said. "There's still things that we need to work on. Still things that we need to brush up on, but this is, again, a step in the right direction."

And so is a four-game winning streak.

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

Prince's three-run blast
07/08/12 - 00:52
7/8/12: Prince Fielder knocks a no-doubter off Tim Collins for a three-run shot to right field in the fifth inning


Prince caps power show in sweep of Royals
Tigers extend win streak to five as they enter All-Star break

By Anthony Odoardi / MLB.com | 7/8/2012 4:06 PM ET

BOX>

DETROIT -- It will be remembered as a disappointing first half of the season for the Tigers, but in their final week leading up to the All-Star break they proved there's certainly a lot to look forward to.

The red-hot Tigers concluded the first half of their season by sweeping the
Royals and extending their win streak to five with a 7-1 victory on Sunday afternoon before 36,693 at Comerica Park.

For manager Jim Leyland, ending on a strong note was about the team finally putting together the combination of things it takes to win ballgames.

"It's what I talked about all year. It's big hits, some big home runs, hitting the ball out of the ballpark, [we] got good pitching, got good bullpen [pitching]," Leyland said. "There's no secret what it takes to win. That's just the way it is."

Detroit got all of the above on Sunday. It started with a solid outing from
right-hander Max Scherzer, who missed Tuesday's start after tweaking his left hamstring. He returned to fire seven innings of five-hit, one-run ball as he improved to 8-5.

The right-hander credited his success to staying ahead in the count with a slider-changeup combination that resulted in seven strikeouts and one walk. The walk issued was to Alex Gordon to open the game, but Scherzer didn't allow another batter to reach even a three-ball count until the sixth inning.

"I feel being able to locate my fastball and, obviously, where my slider and my changeup are, are at the best of my career [in] being able to be consistent with it from start to start," Scherzer said. "I think that's why I'm generating a lot more swing and misses."

The 27-year-old Scherzer has recorded quality starts in six of his past seven outings. He's also fanned 49 batters in that span as he enters the All-Star break ranked third in the American League in strikeouts.

Aside from a fifth-inning home run by Salvador Perez, Scherzer cruised through the afternoon. And so did the Tigers' offense against their fifth straight left-hander in Royals starter Everett Teaford.

With 12 hits on Sunday, the Tigers are batting .317 with 52 hits and 31 runs scored during their current five-game streak.

Those hits again came from all parts of the order. Prince Fielder did what he normally does, hitting a monster, three-run home run on the first pitch he saw in the fifth inning. Delmon Young hit his fourth homer in as many days -- the longest streak by a Tigers hitter since Marcus Thames homered in five straight from June 13-17 in 2008. And Jhonny Peralta sent one over the fence for the first time since May 29.

"That's what we need," said Leyland, of his Nos. 5, 6 and 7 hitters going a combined 7-for-12 with two doubles, two home runs, four runs scored and four RBIs. "That's what we had last year, and that's what we need this year if we're going to make our run."

That run is still very possible with no team in the AL Central running away with the division lead.

The Tigers are just 3 1/2 games back of the first-place White Sox despite being two games above .500 for the first time since April 25. In addition, Detroit is just now starting to play its best baseball.

"I've managed for a long time and ... I've seen a lot of races go to the wire," Leyland said. "And there's very few races that are won before the All-Star break. It's not impossible to climb that hill."

On one hand, the break comes at perhaps the worst time with the Tigers having finally put it together. On the other, the pressure of being under .500 with the break approaching might have lit a fire beneath the group.

Leyland just hopes his club bring its A-game back in five days against Baltimore.

"Hopefully they'll come back fresh in the second half," Leyland said. "They deserve it. They worked hard. Effort has not been a problem in the first half. We haven't got enough wins, but effort hasn't been a problem."

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

Fister strong as Tigers win sixth in a row

By Greg Luca / MLB.com | 7/14/2012 12:38 AM ET

BOX>

BALTIMORE -- As the Tigers were hovering below .500 for much of the first half of the season, manager Jim Leyland never questioned the caliber of his team.

Behind a dominant performance from starter Doug Fister and contributions up and down the lineup, the Tigers looked like the team they're capable of being on Friday -- the team Leyland always knew was in there somewhere.

"I've liked our club all along," Leyland said. "I never got off our club, even when we weren't playing good in the first half. I know it's a good club that's going to play good at some point, and now we've racked up six in a row, and that's pretty good."

After entering the All-Star break with five consecutive wins, the Tigers kept the hot streak going in a dominating 7-2 victory in the opener of a three-game set at Camden Yards, extending their winning streak to a season-high six, the longest active stretch in the Majors.

"We played a really good game tonight," Leyland said. "We looked like a really good team, and we are a good team."

Like the team as a whole, Fister hasn't always played to his potential this season. Hampered by injuries that have forced him into a pair of stints on the disabled list, Fister entered Friday 1-3 with an 8.85 ERA in his last four starts.

He responded with one of his best outings of the season, allowing only one run on three hits and no walks in seven innings.

"I think he had a little bit of a depressing first half, physically," Leyland said. "I thought he was terrific. I was really pleased with that. I thought it was important to show him some confidence after the first half and get him pitching, because he's huge for us. So, hopefully, that was a good sign."

Fister showed signs of peak performance right out of the gate, notching two strikeouts and inducing a pair of broken-bat groundouts in the first two innings -- a sign that he was locating his pitches and getting a lot of late movement.

After allowing eight runs on June 27, six runs on July 2 and four runs on Saturday, Fister viewed Friday's performance as a "good step in the right direction."

" (I) really focused on keeping the ball down and moving in and out on hitters," said Fister, who lamented his inability to drive the ball and keep it down in the zone during his rough stretch. "It's just a matter of finally getting back in line and back together again. It's a process that we're kind of really just trying to fine-tune."

"(I) really kind of forgot about mechanics and just went with feel, and tonight was a little better."

The right-hander retired the side in order in five of the first six innings, giving up a pair of doubles in the third that scored the Orioles' lone run against him.

Fister said he felt like he located the ball better than he had in his last few outings, part of the reason he struck out five looking in tying a season high with eight strikeouts.

He threw 65 of his 94 pitches for strikes.

"He mixes speeds more than I think I've ever seen," Orioles catcher Matt Wieters said. "It's tough when a guy has that kind of sinker and be able to mix in a curveball and a changeup. He did a great job tonight."

"He looked sharp, he looked confident," said Leyland, who added that Fister's curveball was a key piece of his arsenal on Friday. "He looked like he had confidence in making his pitches and getting the ball where he wanted to."

The Tigers pounded out 13 hits in support of Fister, most notably a 454-foot home run Miguel Cabrera blasted to dead center in the fifth.

Cabrera's homer was the only run the Tigers scored with less than two outs, as Detroit went 3-for-6 with two outs and runners in scoring position.

"We got some big hits up and down the lineup," Leyland said. "Everybody made a contribution, and that was good to see."

Jhonny Peralta also homered in the four-run fifth, scoring Delmon Young and Brennan Boesch with a three-run blast to right off of left-hander Dana Eveland.

Much-maligned second baseman Ryan Raburn recorded his 11th RBI with a single to left in the fourth, and Boesch got the scoring started with a two-run single in the first.

Every Tigers starter notched a hit with the exception of Quintin Berry, who made up for his 0-for-5 day with a sprinting, leaping catch in left to rob Wilson Betemit of a home run in the fifth.

"That's something special," Fister said.

"It was a beauty," Leyland said. "He made a great play, it was just a tremendous play."

After a moment of confusion when only Berry knew he'd made the catch, the left fielder jogged back to the dugout with a smile stretched across his face, tossing the ball into the stands and accepting congratulatory fist bumps from each of his teammates.

"I got a good jump, and it stayed in just enough so I could get to it," Berry said. "I thought everybody knew I had it, so I was still kind of excited myself, a little overly excited. But everybody let me know to let them know a little earlier next time."

Between Berry's defense, hits up and down the lineup and Fister's dominant performance, the Tigers opened the second half on the right foot.

"Tonight was another good step forward," Fister said. "It's momentum. The team is coming together. Everyone is coming together well and playing hard together. That's the biggest key for us. We'll keep it going tomorrow."

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

Bullpen falters in extras as Tigers fall to Orioles

By Greg Luca / MLB.com | 7/14/2012 9:36 PM ET

BOX>

BALTIMORE -- On a wild night when both teams blew saves and squandered multiple chances to win, a walk-off homer by the Orioles' Taylor Teagarden proved to be the decisive blow.

Staked to a 6-5 lead, Joaquin Benoit entered in the bottom of the 13th and gave up three runs, snapping the Tigers' six-game winning streak.

After J.J. Hardy smacked a one-out homer to tie the game, Teagarden blasted a two-run shot to right to seal the O's 8-6 win.

Many times throughout the afternoon start that wore on until long after sunset, the game appeared to be decided many times, only to have the trailing team fight back at every turn.

With one out in the top of the 13th, Danny Worth, who entered in the ninth as a pinch runner, doubled down the third-base line, moved to third on a wild pitch and scored easily on Quintin Berry's first-pitch single against Matt Lindstrom to give the Tigers a 6-5 lead.

Given a 5-4 lead in the bottom of the 11th, Jose Valverde gave the Orioles life by yielding a one-out double to Nick Markakis. After J.J. Hardy struck out for the second out of the inning, Valverde fell behind Jim Thome 3-0 before giving him the intentional pass.

Adam Jones was up next and blooped a fastball into left field, scoring Markakis from second to tie the game.

The Tigers were lucky to even see the 11th after trailing by three runs heading into the ninth. But, against All-Star closer Jim Johnson, the Tigers knocked as many hits as they had in the previous eight innings combined to score three runs and tie the game at 4.

Miguel Cabrera led off with a single before Delmon Young reached on an error by third baseman Ryan Flaherty. Jhonny Peralta knocked an RBI single up the middle and Brennan Boesch doubled into the right-field corner, scoring Young and putting runners on second and third with one out.

Berry followed with a line-drive single to left to score Worth from third. As Boesch rounded third to try to give the Tigers the lead, O's defensive replacement Endy Chavez threw home, beating Boesch to the plate by a wide margin to preserve the tie.

After a pair of scoreless frames, Prince Fielder and Delmon Young led off the 11th with back-to-back singles before a pair of fielder's choices put runners on first and third with two outs for Alex Avila.

The O's brought in lefty Troy Patton to try to escape the jam, but Avila blooped a 1-2 slider to center to score Young and give Detroit a 5-4 lead.

Prior to the late inning drama, the Tigers had struggled to get anything going.

Austin Jackson led off the game with a walk and scored when Fielder drove a double to the gap in left-center, but that was all the scoring the Tigers could muster against O's starter Wei-Yin Chen.

The left-hander from Taiwan retired 15 in a row after Fielder's double, finishing the game with only one run allowed on two hits and two walks in six innings.

Tigers' starter Max Scherzer snapped his streak of five consecutive quality starts, lasting only five innings while giving up four runs on nine hits and two walks with only four strikeouts.

Scherzer failed to retire the side in order in any inning, allowing the most hits he has in a game since April 24, but held the Orioles to 1-for-7 with runners in scoring position to limit the damage.

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

Tigers top O's behind dominant Verlander
Detroit ace improves to 7-0 against Baltimore with scoreless gem

By Greg Luca / MLB.com | 7/15/2012 7:07 PM ET

BOX>

BALTIMORE -- From Justin Verlander's first pitch, it was clear Sunday's outing would be nothing like the All-Star Game.

Not that the right-hander or Tigers manager Jim Leyland were ever seriously concerned about the five runs Verlander allowed in the first inning of Tuesday's Midsummer Classic.

After years of watching the 2011 American League MVP and Cy Young Award winner dominate all comers, very little was surprising about Verlander's eight scoreless innings in the Tigers' 4-0 victory against the Orioles at Camden Yards. With the victory, the Tigers opened the second half with a series win.

"The horse did what horses do," Leyland said. "Just a stellar performance by Verlander, and we go home winning the series."

Verlander tried to put on a show at Kauffman Stadium in Kansas City during the All-Star Game, hitting 101 on the radar gun in the first inning. He made it obvious it would be all business on Sunday, painting the corner with an 89 mph offering on his first pitch of the game.

"I wasn't worried at all," Leyland said of Verlander's All-Star showing. "The fans, they wanted to see him throwing 100 mph, he threw it 100 mph. They hit it 120 at times. Today, he went right back to pitching, which I assumed he would."

Verlander allowed only three hits -- two to Jim Thome -- as the Orioles were unable to advance a runner to third. Verlander allowed only two walks and notched eight strikeouts, moving him to within four of the Major League lead.

Verlander admitted after the game that he was eager to get back out on the mound and prove his All-Star struggles were an aberration.

"I just needed to tell myself that that's not the pitcher that I am," Verlander said. "I think everybody that has watched me or follows the Tigers or myself knows that that's not me, that's not the way I normally pitch. It's easy to turn the page on that and say that's not the way I pitch. Let me go out there and do what I normally do, start nice and easy and try to get some quick outs."

After admittedly knocking some rust off in a rocky first inning that he needed 23 pitches to escape, Verlander cruised, retiring 12 batters in order after allowing a two-out double to Thome in the third.

Mark Reynolds broke up that streak with a single to left in the seventh, but Verlander retired the next four batters, striking out J.J. Hardy with his 117th pitch to end the eighth inning.

"After the All-Star Game I thought we were going to have a real good shot of lighting him up, but I think he was just setting us up," Orioles left fielder Chris Davis said jokingly. "He's good. He won the MVP last year for a reason. I felt like, at times, that he was just toying with us."

Verlander had all four of his pitches going on Sunday, including the sometimes-elusive changeup and his looping breaking ball, which he discovered at the most unlikely of points.

"Actually, I thought I found it at the All-Star Game, to be honest with you, which is kind of funny," Verlander said. "I just never had the opportunity to throw it except for a couple of times, because I was behind in the count on everybody. But that felt pretty good, and I thought I carried that over to today."

Dominance in this setting was nothing new for Verlander, who improved to 7-0 against the Orioles and 5-0 with a 2.05 ERA in six starts at Camden Yards in his career.

He completed at least six innings for the 61st consecutive start, tying Catfish Hunter for the third-longest streak since 1918. Only Bob Gibson (78) and Steve Carlton (69) have had longer stretches.

The oppressive heat and humidity on Sunday afternoon only made his accomplishment that much more impressive.

"The thing that gets lost in the shuffle of this game today: It was hot," Leyland said. "So I don't think people realize what a great game he pitched today."

Less than 24 hours after finishing an 0-for-6 night to snap a 16-game hit streak, Austin Jackson gave Verlander all of the offensive support he would need on the game's second pitch, driving a low fastball into the first row in right-center.

The homer was Jackson's third leadoff home run of the season, and gives him a run scored in 12 straight games, the longest streak by a Tigers player since Rocky Colavito scored in 12 straight in 1961.

Brennan Boesch, starting at designated hitter for the fourth time this season, led off the second inning with a double off the top of the wall in left-center and scored on Jhonny Peralta's blooper to center.

The Tigers made it 3-0 in the sixth, when Prince Fielder drew a one-out walk, Boesch moved him to second with a bloop single and Alex Avila plated him with a grounder just past the glove of a diving Robert Andino at second base.

The bottom five of the Tigers' order hit .313 for the weekend series, and Leyland thinks the group is turning things around after a rough start to the season.

"It's getting deeper," Leyland said of the lineup. "The lineup is extending out a little bit like it should, and will, and has in the past. So that's good to see."

Miguel Cabrera finished the scoring with a solo shot in the ninth inning for his 20th homer of the season.

Jose Valverde came on in relief of Verlander to protect the four-run lead, allowing just one hit to preserve the shutout and bounce back after blowing a save on Saturday.

"He's a real proud guy, I like him a lot," Leyland said. "He was able to turn the page, and I think that's one of the reasons he's a real good closer."

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

Berry's spark, Boesch's blast propel Tigers

By Jason Beck / MLB.com | 7/17/2012 12:43 AM ET

BOX>

DETROIT -- This is the kind of comeback victory the Tigers were expected to get this year. As a result of Monday's 8-6 win over the Angels, the Tigers are finally where they expected to be, in line for a postseason spot.

It's not the spot they want, but the way they're going, they could have a shot at that this weekend.

"Everybody's rolling right now. It's contagious," said Quintin Berry, the man at the forefront of the roll. "We're playing great baseball."

The Tigers' eighth win in nine games pushed them four games over .500 (47-43) for the first time since they were 10-6 on April 22. Thanks to a White Sox loss at Boston, Detroit moved within 2 1/2 games of the American League Central lead.

Once the Twins finished off a 19-7 win over the Orioles, Detroit passed up Baltimore for the newly created second AL Wild Card spot. If the season ended today, they'd be visiting the Angels for one game to advance to the Division Series.

They'd be heading in with momentum. Having Berry as the catalyst for it wasn't in the game plan, but they're going to run with him.

"He's a different dimension for those guys," said Angels manager Mike Scioscia, who knows something about the pressure fast players can put on a team.

The Tigers, on the other hand, haven't had much of that during Jim Leyland's tenure as manager. He's taking advantage of it now. He wasn't happy about the jumps Berry got on his two stolen bases that set up the tying run ahead of Brennan Boesch's go-ahead homer, but he'll take the results.

"He's been absolutely fantastic for us," Leyland said. "He's done a terrific job, there's no question about it. That gives us another way to score some runs sometimes. But the thing that I'm impressed with is that he's knocked in some big runs. He's had good at-bats and knocked in some big runs."

That's what he dreamed of doing during seven years in the Minor Leagues.

"That's all I wanted to do is be able to help a team win," he said. "I'm just happy for that."

He did all of that on Monday by taking advantage of what the Angels were giving him.

When Ervin Santana had seemingly settled in after a four-run fifth inning and a 5-2 lead, Berry noticed third baseman Maicer Izturis playing him in the middle of the infield dirt with two outs and nobody on.

"I haven't seen that pretty much all year," Berry said. "That's the first time I've seen anybody play me back like that. I definitely wasn't going to let that go by."

Berry dropped a bunt on the first pitch he saw, extending the inning for a Miguel Cabrera walk and back-to-back RBI singles from Prince Fielder and Delmon Young to pull the Tigers within a run.

Izturis was playing much closer when Berry came back up in the seventh. Instead, he laced a line-drive single off Hisanori Takahashi. That brought veteran LaTroy Hawkins into the game, and put Berry in motion.

"I saw [Howard] Kendrick and I knew the pitcher had a real slow leg kick, so I knew I could steal it from a dead standstill," Berry said. "With his leg kick and Kendrick backing off, I thought I had a good chance to get it."

It was the steal of third after a Cabrera groundout and intentional walk to Fielder that was really close.

"Usually when you've got Miggy or Prince up, you let them swing," Berry said, "but I thought it was a good opportunity for Delmon. I thought it was a good opportunity to get to third, get a sac fly."

Replays showed Izturis had the ball in time to make a tag. Berry got his hand in just ahead of it.

"I knew I was in there, but it was close," Berry said. "Sometimes when you make it close like that you never know what the human eye's going to see."

Said Leyland: "Not that he wasn't safe, but with a jump like that, he could've been thrown out easily."

Young rewarded him with a fly ball to deep center field, scoring Berry easily and bringing up Boesch with a man on for the potential go-ahead run.

Boesch's ninth home run of the year continued the makings of a second straight summer tear. He has gone 13-for-30 with two homers and nine RBIs over an eight-game hitting streak.

"You just keep battling every day. Baseball's that way," Boesch said. "You just get another opportunity the next day to contribute. If you don't contribute the day before, you come back the next day. ... That's how I try to go about my business. Hopefully I contribute to wins, and today was one of those times."

After Mark Trumbo's fourth home run in five games whittled the lead to 8-7 in the eighth, Berry struck again with a ground ball through the middle, scoring Austin Jackson. With that, Berry had his second three-hit game in three days, and his seventh in 46 games this year.

Berry's hardest-hit ball all night was snagged on a leaping catch from Torii Hunter in right field, which started a double play. He joked after that he wanted to keep it on the ground.

"He's obviously been a spark -- and he's hitting in a great spot," Scioscia said. "You're hitting in front of Cabrera and Fielder, that's not too bad a spot. ... He's a spark for them, he gives them a dimension of speed with he and Jackson at the top of the lineup, and they're using it. They used it tonight."

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.

Shutout streak ends after Turner's early exit
Tigers blanked for first time since last July 16; prospect goes two

By Jason Beck / MLB.com | 7/18/2012 12:35 AM ET

BOX>

DETROIT -- One year ago Tuesday, the Tigers were coming off a complete-game shutout at the hands of ex-teammate Edwin Jackson and trying to salvage a game against the White Sox. They won their next game, moved into a tie for first place in the American League Central and never trailed in the division the rest of the year.

They hadn't been shut out since then until Tuesday's 13-0 blanking at the hands of the Angels. But even after a 158-game scoring streak that ranked as the longest in franchise history, it seemed like a footnote the way the evening unfolded.

One year ago at the same time, the Tigers were debating what to do with Jacob Turner, ranked by MLB.com as Detroit's top prospect, who was dominating hitters at Double-A Erie at the time. Two weeks later, he made his Major League debut at Comerica Park against the Angels.

Turner wasn't ready for the Majors, but it was a one-time assignment until newly acquired Doug Fister filled their rotation void. After Tuesday's outing, the sentiment was similar, and the results backed it up.

"Jacob is a potential top-of-the-rotation guy that just needs some more seasoning, I think," manager Jim Leyland said after Tuesday's loss.

Hours earlier, Leyland had lamented calling up Rick Porcello too early in hindsight, taking the blame for the growing pains that have followed Porcello since he made the rotation three years ago at age 20. Turner's results seemed to frame it eerily well.

The way Turner climbed the Tigers' farm system, it's easy to forget that he turned 21 in May and has just 18 starts above the Double-A level. Had he gone to college instead of signing out of high school, this would've been his Draft year.

He has tantalized with outings that have given the Tigers a chance, including five innings of one-run ball four weeks ago against St. Louis. Tuesday wasn't one of them. Whether it was a regression or a hiccup is up for debate among the many scouts, maybe a dozen, who were present for his showdown opposite Angels pitching prospect Garrett Richards.

They weren't all here for Turner; more than a few were here for the Angels, who are likewise in the trade market for help. They saw a show, all from the Angels.

"There's pitches up here that you pay for a lot more than you might down there," Turner said. "I'm just getting a little sharper on everything."

Those scouts watched Turner befuddle Mark Trumbo on a breaking ball in the first inning for an 0-2 count, then deliver a sinker that didn't sink and hung over the plate for Trumbo to hammer 415 feet for a three-run homer and a 4-0 lead before Turner had recorded an out.

"Trumbo's a good hitter. I mean, that was supposed to be a sinker down and in and it stayed out over the plate, and he hit it hard," catcher Alex Avila said in defense of the pitch selection. "There's always going to be times where a guy looks silly on a pitch, and then you come back with it and he hits that pitch."

They saw Mike Trout continue to defy rookie expectations with an opposite-field homer that hit the concourse in right-center field on a bounce. Estimated at 442 feet by ESPN, it's the kind of homer reserved in these parts for Miguel Cabrera. They saw Albert Pujols follow five pitches later with a shot into the Tigers' bullpen, which quickly sprung into action to replace Turner in the third.

"He's got a good arm," Angels manager Mike Scioscia said of Turner. "We saw him last year. There's no denying his arm. But like some young pitchers with big arms -- and we've seen it with Garrett, we've seen it from some other pitchers that have been around -- sometimes it takes a while for guys to harness it."

Turner (0-1), who pitched a complete-game shutout in his last Mud Hens start July 7, gave up seven runs on six hits in two innings Tuesday.

Said Leyland: "We could've caught lightning in a bottle and he could've had a great outing, but I wasn't really expecting that. I wasn't expecting what happened to happen, either."

Richards (3-1) had that kind of outing, statistically at least, allowing three singles despite four walks over seven shutout innings that Leyland described as "effectively wild."

Turner's not ready yet, Leyland said, but he had no answer whether Drew Smyly, the 22-year-old rookie whose intercostal strain prompted Turner's callup, will be. The rotation spot comes back around for Sunday's series finale against the division-leading White Sox, who beat the Red Sox on Tuesday to go 3 1/2 games up on Detroit.

It's a critical set, which is why Justin Verlander was lined up to pitch the series opener on Friday. If Smyly isn't ready, the Tigers have a decision to make. They aren't expected to turn to Duane Below, who made a spot start earlier.

Unless the Tigers pull a trade in the next few days, they might have to turn back to Turner, ready or not, which made Leyland's remarks unusual.

"Could that happen? It could," Leyland said. "Will that happen? I have no idea."

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.

Fister fans 10 Angels as Tigers bounce back

By Anthony Odoardi / MLB.com | 7/18/2012 11:40 PM ET

BOX>

DETROIT -- Tigers manager Jim Leyland has repeatedly said that pitching will be the determining factor in how far Detroit can go this season. He's also said he's not fully sure what he has in his starting rotation outside of Justin Verlander. On Wednesday, a fully healthy Doug Fister reminded him.

Facing an Angels' lineup that scored 13 runs on 18 hits and five homers Tuesday, Fister retaliated with eight innings of two-hit, one-run ball as he recorded 10 strikeouts and the Tigers defeated the Angels, 7-2, in front of 37,915 at Comerica Park.

"When you consider who he's pitching against and what they did last night, I think it was really a well-needed effort for us, and we got it," Leyland said. "It was a very good effort. He looked like Fister."

The Fister that Leyland's referring to is the one who went 8-1 with a 1.79 ERA after being traded to Detroit at the Trade Deadline last season. It's also perhaps the one who had a 2.72 ERA through his first eight starts this year, despite a 1-4 record.

It's not the Fister who -- still recovering from a rib-cage injury that sidelined him twice -- allowed 23 runs in four games and 20 1/3 innings prior to the All-Star break.

"I wouldn't say [the disabled-list stints] hurt me, but obviously you're not as sharp as you should be. ... If you're not doing it," Fister said. "It's been something that we had to go through and get over, but now I think we're putting it behind us."

If his last two outings are any indication, he appears well on his way to finishing out another season strong. Fister is now 2-0 with a 1.20 ERA in two second-half starts. He's allowed five hits in 15 innings while striking out 18.

"He's getting his arm strength back, getting his command back and today made my job easy," catcher Gerald Laird said. "He was throwing everything for a strike, hitting his spots and getting a lot of weak ground balls and fly balls."

The Angels had one hit that was well-struck, and it came in the first inning. He K'd the first two batters of the game before leaving one up to Albert Pujols, who hit it 418 feet.

It was the only run the Angels scored off the right-hander and it proved to be the last time a baserunner would reach second.

He retired the next eight batters before walking Pujols in the fourth inning. Fister yielded a leadoff single to Alberto Callaspo in the sixth, but rebounded to sit down the final 11 hitters he faced.

"The last two months, we've been swinging the bats pretty well, and this is probably one of the best performances we've seen," outfielder Torii Hunter said.

Hunter said Fister's pitches had "crazy movement." So did Laird.

"His ball was moving all over the place today, but it was actually moving to where we were trying to locate it," Laird said. "He was on his game tonight. It was fun for me to catch."

Fister's 10 K's marked the second double-digit-strikeout performance of the 28-year-old's career. The last came with Detroit against Cleveland on Sept. 5, 2011.

It likely would have been a complete game, but he took a line drive off the chest in the seventh inning and it stiffened up while sitting on the bench in the eighth. Having already missed a lot of time, Leyland wasn't going to risk it.

"He was going back out for the ninth and at the last second they came down and told me. ... I couldn't take any chances," the skipper said.

At that point, the game was already in the bag. The Tigers pegged C.J. Wilson for seven runs on eight hits and five walks through six innings. It established a new season high in runs allowed for the Angels' lefty.

Delmon Young hit an RBI single in the first inning to tie the game and then the Tigers strung together four hits to plate four runs in the second.

Leyland was obviously happy with the hitting, especially after being questioned about starting Ryan Raburn, Danny Worth and Jhonny Peralta, who entered the day 1-for-14 with seven strikeouts vs. Wilson.

But for the skipper, it will always be about pitching.

"[It was] just a nice clean game, but dictated by pitching," he said. "And at the end of the day, that's what's going to decide everything. ... Good pitching tonight shut down a team that hit five home runs last night."

Good pitching tomorrow by Max Scherzer could also give the Tigers a series win against the second-best team in the Majors since the start of May. It could also set them up to take first place in the American League Central this weekend when the White Sox come to town.

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

Max's masterpiece lifts Tigers to series win
Starter allows one run, three hits, fans nine in 7 IP; Avila, Miggy homer

By Anthony Odoardi / MLB.com | 7/19/2012 6:16 PM ET

BOX>

DETROIT -- Max Scherzer had a tough act to follow Thursday. One night after Doug Fister's eight-inning, two-hit, 10-strikeout performance, the Tigers were just hoping for a win to line them up nicely for this weekend's series vs. the first-place White Sox. What they got from Scherzer was another masterpiece.

Scherzer fired seven innings of three-hit, one-run ball while striking out nine in the afternoon series finale against the Angels to give the Tigers a 5-1 win in front of a sellout crowd of 40,311 at Comerica Park.

"He was terrific," Tigers manager Jim Leyland said. "The last two nights we just got excellent pitching, and you always look like a good team when you do that. I mean, we shut down a powerhouse. That's a really good team."

The Angels entered the four-game set against the Tigers with the second-best record in the Majors since May 1. They continued to swing the bats well their first two days in Detroit, racking up 29 hits and 19 runs.

The final two were quite different, as Fister and Scherzer limited them to three runs on five hits in their combined 15 innings of work. The result was Detroit taking three of four and winning their fourth series in five tries.

"Fister was more of a finesse guy who located really well, kept us off-balance a number of ways," Angels outfielder Mark Trumbo said. "Today? That was filthy. There wasn't a whole lot to be had today. He was throwing in the upper-90s with two other legitimate pitches."

For Scherzer, his success usually depends on those two other pitches -- his slider and changeup. Although Scherzer called his fastball command the key to bouncing back from an ugly start against the Orioles -- he allowed nine hits and four runs through five innings -- it was the offspeed stuff, he said, that resulted in the K total.

"When I have a good slider, a good changeup and I'm able to locate those pitches, if I do get some strikeouts it's because of that," Scherzer said. "Because I'm locating offspeed well. And today was no different."

Whereas a high-strikeout performance is rare for Fister, it's become the norm for Scherzer.

With his nine K's on Thursday, Scherzer moved back to fourth in the Majors in strikeouts (134). He also became the only pitcher in the league with at least nine K's in seven starts.

"He's got unbelievable stuff," catcher Alex Avila said. "He's shown this year he's one of the best in the game, that's for sure."

To be considered one of the league's best involves some consistency. And although his ERA sits at 4.61, he's notched quality starts in seven of his past nine outings.

The right-hander didn't allow a hit until the third inning. By that time, the Tigers' offense had already spotted him a three-run lead with an RBI double by Jhonny Peralta and a two-run home run by Avila -- his first since May 22 -- in the second inning.

Detroit continued to tack on runs with Danny Worth's first RBI double of the season and Miguel Cabrera's 21st homer. But Scherzer only needed two from his offense to earn his ninth victory.

The first Angels hitter to reach second came in the fifth inning, and the only damage, a solo homer by rookie sensation Mike Trout, occurred in the sixth. He struck out the final two batters he faced before leaving the game to the bullpen.

Asked how he felt, Scherzer said: "Very good. That's a very good lineup.

"They've got tons of different hitters, but they're good hitters. To be able to come out there, go seven innings and only give up one run, that's good stuff for me."

The Tigers haven't lost a series since June 25-27 in Texas. Now they welcome the White Sox to town, and they'll have a chance to reclaim first place in the American League Central.

Leyland said he knows it will be an exciting week for the city -- especially with Justin Verlander vs. Jake Peavy to open the series Friday -- but he's viewing it as another midseason matchup.

"I'm sure it's going to be big for everybody in this community and the surrounding areas, but it's July," Leyland said. "So however it turns out, whether we do well or don't do well, it's not going to be the end of the world."

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