Tigers shut out by Padres for first loss of season
· Yahoo Sports
San Diego — Things were moving right along for Detroit Tigers starter Jack Flaherty on Saturday night. He set down the first eight hitters before catcher Freddy Fermin singled to keep the third inning going.
It was like the seal broke. Three straight singles, the last by Fernando Tatis Jr., broke a scoreless tie. Then with runners at first and third, Tatis broke for second base. Catcher Jake Rogers’ throw beat Tatis to the bag but second baseman Gleyber Torres whiffed on it.
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Instead of the final out, the Padres were up 2-0, a lead that proved insurmountable on this night.
The Tigers managed just two hits, both against Padres right-hander Randy Vasquez, and dropped the series finale 3-0 at Petco Park.
For Flaherty, it was the kind of Jekyll and Hyde performance he worked hard in the offseason to avoid. He wasn’t even at 40 pitches and nearly out of the third inning when Fermin singled and he had to work out of the stretch for the first time.
That seemed to take him out of his rhythm.
He struggled to close out that inning. He needed 21 pitches to record the final out. He got the first two hitters in the fourth, though the second out was loud. Gavin Sheets sent a ball to the wall in right that Zach McKinstry tracked and caught with a leap.
But Fermin singled again and put Flaherty back in the stretch, from which he hung a slider to Nick Castellanos. That ball went 373 feet to the base of the wall in left where Riley Greene caught it.
In the fifth, Flaherty got the first out and then walked three straight hitters. He threw 20 pitches in the inning, 15 were out of the zone. He was yanking just about every pitch to his glove side and, try as he might, couldn’t make the adjustment.
He was out of the game in the fifth at 89 pitches.
Lefty Brant Hurter cleaned up the mess, allowing only one run on a ground out by Jackson Merrill.
Colt Keith was the only Tiger who had a bead on Vasquez, who kept hitters off balance with a six-pitch mix featuring a riding, 95-mph four-seam fastball. Keith got both hits, a double and single.
Vasquez struck out eight in his six innings, getting 13 whiffs on 42 swings (six on 17 swings with his four-seamer.
The Tigers’ best scoring chance came in the first inning when Torres walked and Keith doubled him to third. But Torres was thrown out at the plate on a ground ball to second by Greene and Torkelson took a called third strike on a pitch that was outside the strike zone.
Torkelson opted not to challenge the call.
Rookie Kevin McGonigle struck out looking to start the second inning. Again the pitch was not in the zone and the Tigers didn’t challenge. McGonigle challenged another third-strike call in the seventh, but that call was upheld.
The Tigers didn’t put a runner on base against Padres' relievers Kyle Hart (three strikeouts in two innings) and Mason Miller (two strikeouts in the ninth).
@cmccosky
This article originally appeared on The Detroit News: Tigers shut out by Padres for first loss of season