WASHINGTON — Five days ago, Spencer Torkelson and Riley Greene stood in front of their lockers in the clubhouse following multi-hit performances in a convincing 4-0 win over the Pittsburgh Pirates.
Both players revealed the Detroit Tigers‘ approach at the plate against Pirates right-hander Luis L. Ortiz, who threw 44 strikes and 37 balls in his 81-pitch start. The Tigers scored two runs off him in both the first and third innings.
“Get a good pitch,” Greene said. “The skipper always preaches to get a good pitch to hit and take your walks when they come. Our goal was to get a good pitch, and I feel like we did a pretty good job of that.”
“That was our approach the whole time,” Torkelson said, “just get a good pitch to hit and make him come to us. He could be a little wild, so we were really selective.”
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The Tigers (20-23) still have room to improve on offense, considering they rank 29th in MLB with 3.56 runs per game, but the quality of the plate appearances has been significantly better than last year’s team. Manager A.J. Hinch likes to talk about getting a good pitch to hit, and for the most part, the Tigers’ offense is executing their game plans against opposing pitchers.
“We have a hitters meeting before every game where we go over the starter and the relievers that we might get, and we develop a plan as a team,” said Torkelson, batting .239 in 42 games. “I think it’s committing to an approach as a team against individual guys. That’s really given us advantage counts and good pitches to hit.”
That’s one reason why the Tigers have won 18 of 32 games since April 13 and 10 of 16 games in May. Entering Sunday, they were 3½ games behind the Minnesota Twins for first place in the American League Central.
The key is getting a good pitch to hit.
“It’s like parenting, they’re so tired of hearing it,” Hinch said of the postgame comments from Torkelson and Greene. “It’s oversimplified but super-important. Riley, specifically, won’t even talk to me if he swings at a bad pitch because he knows what my reaction is going to be. It’s hard to do, but I appreciate their attention to the simple things that can lead to bigger results.”
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Another example of “getting a good pitch to hit” occurred May 10 against Cleveland Guardians right-hander Peyton Battenfield. The Tigers knew Battenfield, like teammate and fellow right-hander Shane Bieber, would primarily throw fastballs up in the strike zone and down-and-away as well as sliders (he calls them cutters) off the plate to right-handed hitters.
Facing Battenfield, the Tigers’ right-handed hitters refused to swing at pitches around the outside part of the plate, even if they were borderline strikes. Sometimes, Battenfield missed his spots for balls. Getting ahead in the count forced Battenfield to throw pitches over the middle of the plate, and when that happened, the Tigers were ready to swing at pitches they could hit. They scored two runs in the first inning and three runs in the third in a 5-0 win.
“From a team standpoint, I think guys are on ‘go’ from pitch one and specifically looking for pitches in those zones,” said Eric Haase, batting .259 in 35 games. “In Cleveland, a lot of those guys like to get their fastballs to the top of the zone and breaking balls off (the plate). We did a good job of hitting the fastball at the top of the zone.”
The Tigers caught some bad luck at the beginning of the season with a .189 batting average with runners in scoring position through 27 games (30th in MLB), but since May 1, the Tigers are hitting .250 in those situations through 16 games (14th in MLB).
Generally, the Tigers seem to be implementing a selective aggressive approach. Through 16 games in May, the Tigers rank 27th among the 30 teams with a 6.8% walk rate, but they’re tied for first with the Guardians with a 19.5% strikeout rate.
There haven’t been a ton of walks but very few strikeouts, meaning the Tigers are putting the ball in play.
“I would say selective aggressive,” said Greene, batting .289 in 42 games. “We’re swinging at pitches early that we can handle, and once we get deep in the counts, we’re battling. We’re not going down easy, either, and I feel like we’re having some great at-bats as a team, whether it’s 0-0 or 0-2. We’re trying to battle for each other.”
“With two strikes, it all goes out the window and you get into grind mode,” Torkelson said. “But in a count that you can’t strike out in, why would you hit that pitch instead of trying to get your pitch? And if you don’t get your pitch before two strikes, then you battle.”
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The Tigers held hitters meetings and developed game plans for their approaches against individual pitchers last season, too, but they lost 96 games as the worst offense in baseball, and one of the worst offenses in franchise history.
This season, though, the results are substantially different through a quarter of the season. For that, tip the cap to the players buying into the day-to-day game plans and getting on base.
“It’s hard to go up there with a team plan when you’re just trying to get knocks for yourself,” Torkelson said. “I felt like a lot of the team kind of felt that way last year. What we realized this year is we need to worry about what can help the team win, and that team at-bat, it’s going to work in your favor.”
Greene echoed his teammate and locker buddy.
The Tigers are finally playing as a team, and as a result, they’re winning games.
“I feel like we’re trusting each other,” Greene said. “I’m going to move this guy over (on the bases), so I’m going to trust you to drive him in, and most of the time, we get him in. I feel like that team chemistry is what we’re building and what we’re going to continue to build. We’re all boys.”
Contact Evan Petzold at epetzold@freepress.com or follow him on Twitter @EvanPetzold.