Series Preview: Mariners (21-15) at Tigers (15-21)

With their convincing win yesterday afternoon, the Mariners pushed their run differential into the positive side of the ledger. They’ve still been the beneficiaries of some good Cluster Luck—they’ve gained a couple more runs of Cluster Luck since the beginning of the month. But this upcoming stretch of play should give them ample opportunities to expand their run differential. Beginning with this series in Detroit, the Mariners won’t play a team with a record currently over .500 until June 5. Just seven of those games are on the road. If everything goes right, this team could be around 15 games over .500 by the end of the month.

The Tigers aren’t as toothless as you’d expect a rebuilding club to be. But their schedule has been fairly soft to start the year. They’ve played just four teams with records currently over .500 (one of those series was a one-game, rain soaked series against the Yankees), and they managed just a single win against them. Playing the AL Central definitely helps.

Since they only committed to a full rebuild within the last year or so, their roster is still filled with holdovers with only a few promising youngsters contributing regularly. Eventually they’ll restock their farm system with prospects, but for now, they’re relying on players like Jose Iglesias and Mike Fiers. They certainly won’t be part of the next great Tigers cycle.

Unfortunately, some bad injury luck has sidelined two of the Tigers best hitters for the foreseeable future. Old friend Leonys Martín was enjoying a career renaissance this season but was placed on the disabled list with a knee injury this week. And their best player, Miguel Cabrera, was lost to a hamstring injury last week. One of the few actual prospects getting regular playing time in the majors is leading the team in fWAR. Jeimer Candelario was acquired last year at the trade deadline from the Cubs and he’s flourished in Detroit. He’s always shown good plate discipline throughout his minor league career but the power he’s found in the majors is a new development.

Probable Pitchers

After three years of mediocre pitching befitting a back-of-the-rotation starter, it seems like Matt Boyd is finally putting everything together this season. His ERA is exactly three and it’s backed up by FIP of 3.70. But he’s also been fairly lucky too. His strand rate is pretty high, his BABIP is a very low .248, and he’s cute his home run rate in half. On the surface, those stats might indicate some serious regression towards his career norms is ahead. But it appears that Boyd has been quite adept at managing hard contact against him this year. His xwOBA on contact is just .315, the 14^th lowest mark among all starting pitchers in baseball. More than half of the balls in play off him have been fly balls, justifying his low BABIP even further. Along with a low walk rate, Boyd is quickly becoming one of the more promising pitchers in the Tigers organization.

After winning the Rookie of the Year award in 2016, Michael Fulmer’s follow-up campaign was marred by an elbow injury that cut his season short in August. It’s possible to blame that elbow injury for the drop in strikeout rate he suffered last season because it’s bounced back this year. The effectiveness of his changeup has waned a bit. That was the pitch that drove his award winning rookie season but it’s not generating the same kind of whiff rate it was back then. The physical characteristics of the pitch look the same so I’m not sure what’s going on. He has added a couple inches of depth to his slider. That hasn’t translated to a better ground ball rate yet, though opposing batters continue to have trouble making solid contact on the pitch either way.

With Jordan Zimmerman shelved due to a shoulder injury, Blaine Hardy steps into the rotation in his place. He’ll be making his first start in the majors on Sunday after spending his entire career pitching out of the bullpen. The Tigers had been stretching him out in Triple-A before recalling him at the beginning of the month. I’m not sure how long they expect him to last but the Mariners could see a bullpen day if Hardy can only go three or four innings. He relies primarily on a four-seam fastball with an insane amount of “rise” on it. If he were a qualified pitcher this season, the vertical movement on his fastball would rank second in the majors. He pairs that heater with a big, 12-6 curveball and a decent changeup and slider as well.

The Big Picture:

The Angels snapped the Twins five-game win streak last night in the first game of a four-game series in LA. The Astros took care of business against the Athletics earlier this week and host the Rangers over the weekend. The Red Sox barely avoided a four-game sweep at the hands of the Yankees, winning in dramatic fashion yesterday. The Blue Jays host the Red Sox while the Yankees host the Athletics this weekend.