DETROIT — Normally, Alex Lange takes the mound for his warmup pitches with Aerosmith’s “Sweet Emotion” blaring on the Comerica Park sound system. It’s his entrance music as a closer, and the energy fits his high-octane personality.
Lange still got about 10 seconds of his music as he finished his warmups for the eighth inning with an eight-run deficit, but most of his tosses came under the sounds of Queen’s “Bohemian Rhapsody.” That was the sing-along song of the night, a ballpark staple, but it also seemed like a better soundtrack for the setting.
This wasn’t about trying to keep the Tigers close enough for a rally, not in an eventual 9-3 loss to the Twins on Monday night. Nor was it all about Lange filling an inning after starter Joey Wentz allowed eight runs on 10 hits in three innings, though manager A.J. Hinch said he used just about every pitcher who was available without restriction.
This was, at least in part, a prescribed inning for Lange to work on strike-throwing after weeks of control issues culminated in him being pulled with a ninth-inning lead two days earlier. This was his chance to reverse the momentum and get back to the form that made him a solid closer for the first couple of months.
As Lange’s continued struggles showed, the strike-throwing remains a work in progress.
Lange started off strong, spotting a fastball on the outside corner and a curveball on the inner edge before flipping a breaking ball to fan Jordan Luplow. But then the control wavered — a five-pitch walk to Michael A. Taylor, a 3-2 pitch that was nowhere close to Donovan Solano. Jorge Polanco chased a 2-2 changeup well off the plate for the second out, but Joey Gallo didn’t offer at any of the five pitches he saw on his way to a two-out walk.
With no place to put Max Kepler, Lange threw two fastballs at his feet, the second hitting him to drive in a run for a 9-0 lead.
With the pitch count climbing, Ryan Jeffers was Lange’s final batter, according to Hinch. If Jeffers reached, Lange would have the ignominy of being replaced by a position player, Zack Short. Lange spotted a first-pitch curveball for a strike, coaxed Jeffers into chasing a breaking ball down for strike two, then spotted a 96 mph fastball on the outside corner to get the strike from plate umpire Pat Hoberg.
It was a wild ride of an inning for Lange: 29 pitches, 13 strikes, 0 balls put in play. The Twins swung at only one of Lange’s 14 fastballs and took six for strikes.
“Obviously, if you look at it on the positive side, we know he’s going to miss bats,” Hinch said after the game. “And obviously, it was important for him to finish his inning. … But as good as it is to punch out hitters, giving them free baserunners is just not a path of success that you can sustain.
“[We’re] going to continue to root for him, going to continue to push him, but one step forward within the inning, one step backward.”
Lange walked three batters for the third consecutive outing. According to research on baseball-reference, he’s the first Tigers pitcher since at least 1901 to post three consecutive appearances of three or more walks in one or fewer innings, and the first MLB pitcher to do so within the same season since White Sox reliever Rob Dibble in his first three appearances of 1995.
That was Dibble’s final Major League season in a career that had a metoric rise with Cincinnati in 1988, and he walked 46 batters over 26 1/3 innings that year between Chicago and Milwaukee. Lange is just getting started, having completed his first full Major League season last year. He didn’t walk multiple batters in an inning this year until May 14, his 18th appearance, and he’d walked three batters in a game only once in his career before this streak.
“You can’t appreciate the good without the bad, so I’m thankful for the struggles,” Lange told Bally Sports Detroit before Monday’s game. “I’m going to continue to learn and continue to get better.”
What happens when the Tigers have another save situation remains to be seen. Hinch has stuck behind Lange despite never actually labeling him the team’s closer. But he has acknowledged Detroit could have to get creative.
“Certainly under the circumstances, we’re going to have to consider all of our options,” Hinch said Sunday. “But regardless of what inning that Alex pitches, the strikes will have to increase for him to stay effective and stay in leverage.”