Royals 3, Tigers 1: More injuries, less offense

Well, they say bad news comes in threes. Yesterday was the gut punch news of Casey Mize landing on the IL with what was revealed today to be a strain in his elbow ligament. This was followed by the 10-day IL placement of Javier Báez before the game. And during today’s game, which the Tigers lost to the Kansas City Royals, 3-1, Matt Manning was removed with right shoulder discomfort. [Intense screaming sounds]. Okay, here’s how the game went down.

Manning pitched well in his two innings of work, consistently getting soft contact from the Kansas City hitters. The only thing not to like was the placement as seeing-eye ground balls allowed the Royals to score a run in the first inning. Bobby Witt Jr, bounced a soft comebacker back to Manning that he couldn’t corral, and then advanced into scoring position on a weak dribbler right through the middle of the infield. Witt would score on a sacrifice groundout to give KC the early lead. The weak contact continued in Manning’s second inning of work, as did the bad luck as the first two hitters would reach, one on a grounder deflected into center by Harold Castro, and another on a blooper that fell in.

Manning struck out the next batter and then got some help as Lopez hit a single to Eric Haase in left field, but Nicky Lopez tried to impersonate Miggy and ran through Vance Wilson’s stop sign. But there is only one Miguel Cabrera and only he can score running though stop signs, as Haase fired a laser to Garneau to get Lopez at the plate by 10 feet. Merrifield then grounded back to Manning who lunged at the ball and deflected it to Castro who fired to get the final out.

That unfortunately proved to be Manning’s final pitch as he would be removed due to injury after that. His final line: 5 hits, 1 run (earned), 0 walks, 2 strikeouts in 2 innings. The Tigers and their fans are now left holding their breath that he can return to the mound soon. AJ Hinch indicated that it was a precautionary move after the game.

The Tigers tied the game in the top of the second inning, but nearly went away empty handed. Daz Cameron walked with two outs and was picked off first but the throw to second from first was high and thanks to a perfect slide, he was JUST able to get his foot to the bag ahead of the tag. That would prove to be a fortunate turn of events as Garneau followed with a double the bounced off the left-field wall to score Cameron and tie the game.

Things stayed tied up for a while thanks to some quality work from Drew Hutchison in relief of Manning. But the Tigers continued to be the only team in the league that cannot hit Kris Bubic. He continued where he left off last year and made the Tigers hit weak grounders and flyballs, although they did manage to draw plenty of walks off him today, at least. That only added to the frustration as the Tigers only cashed in one of those walks. Bubic finished with a final line of 4.1 IP, ER, 2 H, 6 BB, 4 SO.

The Royals would take the lead in the sixth after Will Vest hung an 0-2 breaking ball to Hunter Dozier who blasted it over the left field wall for a 2-run home run. The closest the Tigers would come to scoring came off the bat of Robbie Grossman who squared up a Dylan Coleman’s fastball and hit it to a point in deep right field where apparently only in KC it is not a home run.

That’s the way it would end tonight in KC. Though the loss is sure to be overshadowed in the minds of Tiger fans with the injury to Manning, especially coming a day after the news of the elbow injury to Casey Mize. All fans can do now is hope and pray. Hug your loved ones tonight. Call your parents. Pet your pets. These are dark time in Motown. Dark times.

Notes

After the game, AJ Hinch said they removed Manning as a precautionary reaction to him reporting some discomfort and in consideration of the Mize news.

The Robbie Grossman flyout was a maybe not just a Kauffman Stadium special. There’s apparently maybe another stadium that it would not have gone out. Its a facinating part of this game thanks to the unique stadium contructions uncommon to most major sports. And one I definatly spent way too much time researching durring the game instead of keeping up with the recap. As far as I can tell, I think the other stadium is San Fransisco.