Less than 10 days after the Tigers relished in the euphoria of Spencer Turnbull’s no-hitter against the Seattle Mariners, Detroit had its back against the wall with Cleveland right-hander Shane Bieber toying with no-hit stuff. In the bottom of the seventh inning, that fate was halted by Jonathan Schoop and a 402-foot leadoff homer.
Prior to that inning, Detroit hitters had no remedy for Bieber’s arsenal and couldn’t materialize any runs from the three walks they worked out of him leading up to the seventh. But on one pitch in his third at-bat, Schoop ended Bieber’s no-hit bid and provided one of two runs for Detroit on Thursday afternoon. The Tigers dropped the series finale in a 5-2 loss at Comerica Park.
There was sensible excitement headed into the afternoon matchup between Tigers left-hander Matthew Boyd and Bieber. The two pitchers battled it out in an Opening Day showdown as Miguel Cabrera helped power Boyd’s first win of the season with a two-run homer off Bieber in the midst of snow flurries.
Round 2 of the matchup was a similar pitchers’ duel with a couple of long balls sprinkled in. This time around, Boyd was tagged for the loss as he gave up four runs in five-plus innings with five strikeouts and two walks. The southpaw was unable to record an out in the sixth inning as José Ramírez, Harold Ramirez and Eddie Rosario each recorded a hit and scored a run to put Detroit in a four-run deficit that it was unable to overcome.