Detroit – The education of Tarik Skubal continued Friday night. And the lessons aren’t getting any easier.
The rookie left-hander was hit hard and took his sixth loss of the season without a win, as the Cubs opened the three-game interleague set at Comerica Park with a 4-2 win. The loss snapped the Tigers’ four-game winning streak.
Skubal started the game by striking out three of the first four batters and ended his outing by retiring five straight — but it was messy in between.
Much to the delight of the large Cubs contingent in the stands, Kris Bryant smashed a two-run home to right field in the second. It was the 11th home run Skubal had allowed in 30 innings.
It was also the first opposite field home run Bryant has hit off a left-handed pitcher since 2015. He hit that off Dodgers Clayton Kershaw, so Skubal is in good company there at least.
The Cubs added two more in the fifth on doubles by Jason Heyward and Anthony Rizzo, and a broken-bat single by Javier Baez. The Baez bloop was the only softly-struck ball.
Through the first five innings, the Cubs put 18 balls in play against Skubal with an average exit velocity of 97.5 mph. Hard-hit balls. They put 10 four-seam fastballs in play with an average exit velocity of 100.3 mph. Harder-hit balls.
But as he has all season, even with his ERA hovering just under 6.0, he stayed in the fight. He left two runners on in the second and two more in the fifth. Then he closed out his night with a clean sixth inning. Stuff to clean up, stuff to build from.
The Tigers, meanwhile, had their hands full with veteran right-hander Jake Arrieta. He hadn’t pitched since April 30, sitting out with a cut thumb. But you’d never know it.
He allowed just two singles and a walk through five innings and erased all three with double-play balls – two from Jonathan Schoop. Thus, he faced the minimum through five. In fact, he faced he minimum for 5.2 innings.
Then a little lightning. Jake Rogers and Robbie Grossman hit back-to-back home runs. For Rogers, it was his first home run in the big leagues since August of 2019. For Grossman, it was his fourth of the season and it was a monster – 442 feet, deep into the right field seats.
Both came off Arrieta’s sinker.
But they needed more. They managed just two other hits, singles, and didn’t put any other runners in scoring position. They only struck out five times, but they were beating balls into the ground most of the night — 10 ground ball outs.
The Tigers bullpen held serve, getting a scoreless inning from Bryan Garcia and two from Chicago native Kyle Funkhouser. But the Tigers hitters couldn’t dent the Cubs bullpen. Relievers Ryan Tepera, Andrew Chafin and Craig Kimbrel set down the last nine with allowing a ball to leave the infield.
Kimbrel struck out the side in the ninth.
Twitter@cmccosky