DETROIT — The Tigers certainly aren’t accepting moral victories these days, especially after an 8-1 loss like they endured Saturday against the Guardians, but at least they stopped Shane Bieber’s double-digit strikeout streak.
The former Cy Young Award winner had punched out at least 10 hitters in his last six starts against the Tigers. The only other pitcher to post a streak like that against another team was Nolan Ryan.
On Saturday, the Tigers’ put bats on balls against Bieber. Just not with much force. They collected eight hits, seven of them singles, against Bieber, and struck out five times in eight innings.
Harold Castro had two of the hits, including a double in the seventh. He scored on a sacrifice fly by Willi Castro, the lone marker against Bieber.
Tigers starter Alex Faedo came in with a streak of his own — he’d held opponents to two runs or fewer in all four of his big league starts. Make that five.
He didn’t get a lot of swings and misses (six) or strikeouts (two), but, except for the fourth inning, he got mostly quick outs, including nine fly ball outs.
His trouble in the fourth started with a walk to Jose Ramirez — who almost single-handedly wrecked the Tigers on this day — and was exacerbated by a couple of hanging change-ups on 1-2 counts to left-handed hitters.
Josh Naylor launched one to the base of the wall in right-center, a run-scoring double. Then with two outs and Naylor at third, Richie Palacios flipped a change-up into left field.
Three of the five hits against Faedo came in the fourth.
Faedo now has allowed the second fewest runs (nine) over his first five starts in Tigers history. Brian DuBois allowed seven in his first five starts in 1989.
For one of the rare times this season, though, the bullpen faltered and the Guardians scored four times in the seventh.
The inning started with a misplay in center by Daz Cameron. He tracked but didn’t catch a slicing liner by Palacios. It was scored a double. Right-hander Jacob Barnes then walked Myles Straw and Steven Kwan to load the bases.
That brought Ramirez to the plate. Manager AJ Hinch countered with sinker-baller and ground-ball collector Jason Foley. Ramirez hit a ground ball, but it left his bat with an exit velocity of 110 mph and whistled inside the bag at first, past diving first baseman Harold Castro and into the right-field corner.
Three-run triple.
Wait, there's more.
Ramirez, who came in hitting .328 with 64 extra-base hits and 87 RBIs in 113 games against the Tigers, launched a sinker from Drew Carlton 424 feet into the seats in right field in the ninth. That two-run homer gave him a five-RBI day, with three runs scored.
