When Detroit Tigers left-hander Eduardo Rodriguez pitches Thursday against the New York Mets, facing former Tigers ace Justin Verlander, watch the fingers of the catcher behind the plate.
Rodriguez, 30, has been taking the old-fashioned approach to calling pitches. He ditched PitchCom, the electronic device that transmits signals pitches and locations, at the beginning of the regular season.
He won’t use PitchCom unless a runner is on second base.
“It’s just what feels good,” Rodriguez told the Free Press on Wednesday. “It’s the same, PitchCom and fingers down, but it’s just more comfortable. We like it that way, and we only use PitchCom when somebody is on second base, which is what it was made for the most. We like putting the fingers down.”
Rodriguez, without PitchCom, has been dominant on the mound.
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He has a 2.21 ERA with seven walks and 30 strikeouts in 36⅔ innings over six starts this season. In his past four starts, he owns a 0.68 ERA with three walks and 24 strikeouts in 26⅔ innings.
“He just likes the fingers,” catcher Jake Rogers said last week. “We’re on the same page pretty good. He likes the fingers until a runner gets on second (base), and then we’ll use pitch count. I think it’s just what he likes.”
Rodriguez, who has an above-average 64.2% first-pitch strike rate and is getting whiffs on his cutter again, missed a perfect game by seven outs April 23 against the Baltimore Orioles at Camden Yards. Ryan Mountcastle hit an eight-pitch changeup for a single with two outs in the seventh inning.
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Rodriguez, in spring training, wanted to call his own pitches with a PitchCom device attached to his left hip, after doing so March 3 in his second start. The Tigers stressed a “collaborative” plan amongst pitchers, catches, coaches and advance scouts based on the scouting report.
One month later, Rodriguez officially returned to the old way of calling pitches.
“That’s how we’ve been playing all our career,” Rodriguez said, “and we like it like that. We’ll keep doing it.”
Welcome to Detroit
Right-hander reliever Brendan White, the Tigers’ 27th-man for Wednesday’s doubleheader against the Mets, was at a restaurant with his parents in Toledo on Tuesday evening when he realized the Tigers and Mets postponed the series opener because of inclement weather.
The entire family started getting their hopes up.
“We’re from New York,” White said early Wednesday. “They drove out on Monday afternoon. They were waiting for the (Triple-A Toledo) game on Tuesday, and when our game got canceled, we went out to dinner, and then we noticed the Tigers game had gotten canceled. So, you never know what happens. You start to think about it. We talked about it a little bit at dinner, and then it happened.”
White, a 26th-round pick in the 2019 draft, received the call from the Tigers around 8 p.m. Tuesday, around the same time he walked out of the restaurant with his family. By Wednesday morning, the 24-year-old reliever had a locker in the Tigers’ clubhouse as the 27th man.
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White has a 2.08 ERA this season, with six walks and 14 strikeouts in 13 innings across nine relief appearances in Toledo. His new cutter has morphed into a gyro slider. He also throws a fastball, sinker, splitter and traditional slider.
“It’s a little bit different, like different movement profiles, but it’s coming along,” White said of his new pitch. “I’m really happy with how it feels and the progress it’s made. Throwing it in games and seeing the results so far, it’s been good. It was just a little bit easier for me to manipulate to more of a gyro than a cutter based on what we would use it for and the idea behind it.”
He logged an impressive 67.9% strike rate, to go with a 2.67 ERA, for Double-A Erie in 2022. The Tigers were impressed by his confidence to attack hitters through his six innings in spring training.
If White pitches, he will be making his MLB debut.
“Not sure it’s the same scenario as the other day, where Zack (Short) stayed,” Tigers manager A.J. Hinch said Wednesday. “But getting Whitey here for a day is nice for him and his family, and it shows that we are committed to the guys that are performing.”
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About those new walls
Outfielder Kerry Carpenter is healing from a Grade 1 shoulder sprain, sustained Thursday against the Orioles at Comerica Park, when he robbed a home run from Mountcastle. He crashed into the right-field wall and injured his right shoulder.
The Tigers reconstructed the outfield walls with material and padding to enhance player safety this season.
“I couldn’t tell,” Carpenter said Tuesday. “But maybe it would have been a Grade 2 last year.”
Carpenter, 25, is hitting .217 with four home runs, five walks and 22 strikeouts in 20 games. His power production earned him a spot in the middle of the Tigers’ batting order, often as the cleanup hitter.
The Tigers placed him on the 10-day injured list April 29, retroactive to April 28.
“I actually don’t know,” Carpenter said of a timetable for his return. “We’ll see each day whether it’s good to go or not. I’m working on it and hoping it feels better each day, which it has been.”
‘He’s sick’
Miguel Cabrera, who primarily plays against left-handed pitchers, wasn’t in the starting lineup for Game 1 of Wednesday’s doubleheader against the New York Mets, even though the Tigers were facing left-hander Joey Lucchesi.
“He’s sick,” Hinch said. “He’s under the weather.”
Cabrera’s former teammates, 38-year-old Max Scherzer and 40-year-old Justin Verlander, are pitching for the Mets in Game 2 of Wednesday’s doubleheader and Thursday’s series finale, respectively. Cabrera, who turned 40 in April, is hitting .189 with three walks and 11 strikeouts in 15 games this season.
Cabrera reported to the clubhouse Wednesday morning.
Contact Evan Petzold at epetzold@freepress.com or follow him on Twitter @EvanPetzold.