ARLINGTON, Texas — Only two more days left in this misbegotten month for the Tigers.
It started with crippling injuries to their best hitter (Riley Greene) and best pitcher (Eduardo Rodriguez), which triggered a slog of nine straight losses. The injuries have continued to pile up and so have the losses, even with a stretch of better baseball.
They fell to 8-17 in the month (34-45 on the season) Wednesday, taking a 10-2 drubbing from the American League West-leading Texas Rangers at Globe Life Field.
But faces up. Better days are ahead. Lefty starter Tarik Skubal, out all year recovering from flexor tendon surgery, threw 68 pitches over four innings in his latest rehab start for Triple-A Toledo. He gave up a pair of unearned runs and three hits, but struck out four and his fastball was sitting at 95 mph and hit 97.
Rodriguez is scheduled to make a rehab start for Toledo Thursday.
By the first week of July, it’s possible one or both could be back in the rotation.
Pitchers Beau Brieske and Alex Faedo are also nearing the end of their healing time. Both could end up fortifying a overly taxed bullpen if the rotation gets whole.
Greene and outfielder Akil Baddoo (out since June 10 with a right quad strain) should be starting their rehab assignments fairly soon, as well.
This is a tough league to compete in short-handed, as the Tigers have shown. It certainly didn’t feel like a fair fight Wednesday.
The Rangers ambushed rookie lefty Joey Wentz literally from his first pitch.
Marcus Semien slugged the first-pitch Wentz threw, a 92-mph fastball, into left field for a double. Corey Seager hit his fourth pitch into right field for a double. Before the first inning ended, the Rangers sent 10 hitters to the plate, banged out five hits and scored four runs.
Two of the runs were unearned because of a throwing error by Zack Short at third base. First baseman Tyler Nevin couldn’t come up with the scoop.
The Rangers hit a pair of solo home runs in the third inning — Josh Jung and Ezequiel Duran.
Wentz soldiered into the fifth inning, not insignificant given the heavy workload the bullpen has carried through this month (109 innings before Wednesday, second most in baseball).
Rangers’ slugger Adolis Garcia took another bite out the Tigers, too. He blasted his 20th homer of the season off reliever Garrett Hill, a two-run blast in the sixth. He homered in each of the first three games in the series.
Garcia ended up with three hits, including an RBI double off Hill in the seventh.
His last hit led to the ultimate indignity for the Tigers — the dreaded position player pitching. Jonathan Schoop, who has pestered manager AJ Hinch to use him in those situations, got his wish. He ended the seventh inning, getting Jung to fly out to the track in center.
Schoop, who hit 86 mph and was throwing 78-mph change-ups, pitched a scoreless eighth inning, too, giving up only a single to Mitch Garver.
Catcher Jake Rogers played left field in the eighth so that Hinch could get Javier Baez out of the blowout game. Zach McKinstry moved from left field to shortstop.
The Tigers efforts to fight back into the game were hamstrung by the absences of Greene and Baddoo, both left-handed hitters. With Nick Maton back in Triple-A, they were left with just two left-handed bats against Rangers’ right-handed starter Dane Dunning, who blanked the Tigers for 8-plus innings.
One of those lefties, McKinstry, got two of the four hits Detroit mustered against him. Kerry Carpenter, the other lefty, hit a two-out, two-run homer off him in the ninth.
Dunning, who struck out 10, was one out away from a complete game shutout.
It was the sixth time the Tigers have been shutout this month, the 11th time this season.
Miguel Cabrera was ejected from the game in the fifth inning by first base umpire Ben May. Cabrera, as he often does, playfully asked for an appeal on a checked swing. May rung him up, indicating that he swung through the two-strike pitch.
Cabrera, as he was walking back to the dugout, waved his hand dismissively and May ejected him.
