Minneapolis — What had been evident for a few days became reality Tuesday night. The Tigers will not finish with a .500 record.
The Minnesota Twins, using an emergency starter and five relievers, stymied the Tigers 3-2 at Target Center, dropping them seven games under .500 (75-82) with five games to play.
A week ago, the Tigers were 74-78 having just taken two straight from the White Sox. But they’ve lost four of five since as the offense has gone dormant, especially early in games.
The Tigers didn’t score until the ninth. With two outs, Akil Baddoo and Jonathan Schoop both lined RBI singles against reliever Alex Colome. But it was too little too late.
Wasted in the loss was a strong and eventful outing by lefty Tyler Alexander.
He not only had to grapple with some early command issues, he also had to contend with home plate umpire Tim Tichenor giving Twins hitters late timeouts after he’d already commenced his delivery.
The first time it happened, with Willians Astudillo batting in the second inning, he flipped the ball 67 mph to the backstop. He did that earlier this month, too. He said it is better to just release a crazy underhanded pitch than try to stop in mid-delivery.
The second time it happened, with Brent Rooker batting in the fourth, Alexander flipped the ball behind his back.
None of those shenanigans rattled him much, though. He knifed through the Twins’ lineup for six innings, allowing just one run, which the Twins produced without a hit in the third inning.
His sin there was walking speedy Byron Buxton to start the inning. Buxton stole second, went to third on a fly out to right field and scored on a sacrifice fly by Mitch Garver.
Alexander wriggled out of a mess in the first inning, striking out Miguel Sano with two on. After that, he allowed two base runners, retiring the last 12 hitters he faced, striking out five of the last nine.
But he left the game trailing 1-0 as the Tigers’ early offensive ineptitude continues. They’ve managed just two runs total in the first five innings over the last five games.
They bent Twins rookie starter Charlie Barnes Tuesday but couldn’t break him. Just called up from Triple-A Rochester, the lefty Barnes had made a mess of his seven starts with the Twins earlier this year (0-3, 6.61 ERA).
The Tigers put runners on base in each of his four innings – seven in all. None scored. Zack Short popped out and flew out with two runners on in the second and fourth innings. Miguel Cabrera, who notched his 2,987th career hit in the sixth inning, flew out to center with a runner on second in the third.
Nada.
Relievers Jorge Alcala, Tyler Duffey, Caleb Thielbar and Ralph Garza, Jr., kept the goose-eggs coming through eight until the Tigers marked against Colome.
The Twins padded their lead in the seventh against right-hander Jose Urena. The second pitch he threw, a 94-mph fastball, was blasted into the second deck in left field by Sano. His 30th homer of the season left his bat with an exit velocity of 110.8 mph and traveled 410 feet.
chris.mccosky@detroitnews.com
Twitter: @cmccosky