Detroit – This puzzle manager AJ Hinch is tasked with putting together every night is nuanced and complicated and there are times when all the pieces don’t exactly fit.
Almost as if more than one piece can fit a certain space.
But if it’s stressing him at all, he’s not letting on.
“I don’t lie awake at night worrying about that part,” he said Friday before the Tigers lost the series opener to the Twins, 4-1, at Comerica Park. “We have a chance to get healthier and be better and get deeper. I’ve always said, give me as many hard decisions as you can and we’ll work it out.”
Facing right-handed starter David Festa Friday, for example, Hinch wanted to get left-handed hitting Colt Keith into the lineup. He could’ve started him on the right side of the infield for either second baseman Gleyber Torres or first baseman Spencer Torkelson.
He chose to start Keith at third base, which meant Zach McKinstry, who had three hits Thursday, would come off the bench.
“We have to find a way to get Colt in the lineup,” Hinch said. “I love the work he’s doing (at third base) but he needs experience. Both Joey (Cora, infield coach) and I talked about this. There is the natural feel for the position, but you need the experience in game at this level.
“It does allow us to give Z-Mac a blow. Colt playing third also allows us to go heavy left-handed if we want to, putting Z-Mac at short or Z-Mac in the outfield. We have a lot of ways to configure the lineup.”
On this night, though, no configuration was going to confound Festa, who seems to have the Tigers’ number. In April at Target Field, he allowed just an unearned run in 4.2 innings.
Friday, the Tigers managed two singles and only one runner in scoring position in 5.2 innings.
“He had control of all three pitches,” Keith said. “He was using his fastball effectively, which meant he wasn’t throwing it a whole lot and that hard slider was working for him. His changeup looked good, too. It was tough to get to him.”
It was Keith, though, who had the loudest contact off Festa, a 403-foot bomb to center that Byron Buxton caught on the warning track.
“I sat McKinstry tonight after one of his better games of the year to get Colt in the lineup,” Hinch said. “And also keep (Kerry) Carpenter and Riley Greene in there. I’m not going to sit (switch-hitter) Wenceel Perez. There are tradeoffs all the time.”
When Twins manager Rocco Baldelli went to lefty reliever Danny Coulombe with a runner at first and two outs in the sixth, Hinch was able to counter righty-swinging Jahmai Jones.
Coulombe won the battle, but Hinch was able to eliminate the Twins’ best lefty reliever in the sixth inning, still with lefties Greene, Keith and Parker Meadows in the lineup, and McKinstry available on the bench.
Keith tripled in the eighth off righty reliever Griffin Jax and scored on a single by Torres, his second hit.
Hinch was then able to use McKinstry to pinch-hit for Jones against the right-hander and he singled on the first pitch. Which brought Greene to the plate as the tying run.
Favorable matchups, for sure. The Tigers had their top run producers up with a chance to tie the game. But Jax was equal to the challenge, striking out Greene and Torkelson.
“We were one mistake away and we were ready to jump on that mistake, for sure,” Torkelson said. “But Jax is nasty. He made unbelievable pitches when he had to. Tip the cap.”
Closer Jhoan Duran, throwing 100-mph bullets, was no picnic, either, and he pitched a clean ninth.
“If you give them a chance to hand the ball to the back end of their bullpen, they’re really good,” Hinch said. “Those arms they have, they can get you to the finish line.”
The Twins nicked Tigers’ starter Sawyer Gipson-Long for single runs in the fourth, fifth and sixth innings. Matt Wallner and Brooks Lee hit back-to-back doubles with two outs in the fourth.
And Buxton shellacked a middle-middle sinker with two outs in the fifth. The ball left his bat with an 111-mph exit velocity and flew 425 feet several rows behind the bullpen in left.
Gipson-Long, who allowed four hits with five strikeouts, left with one on and one out in the sixth.
“It was OK,” said Gipson-Long, who started his career in the Twins’ organization. “Just good enough to lose. They put some pretty good at-bats together off me. But I thought I did a good job of controlling the zone. But that’s a good lineup. Sometimes it’s just a grind.”
The toughest inning of the night for the Tigers was the sixth, where lefty reliever Brant Hurter’s sudden control struggles continued. He faced three batters. He walked lefty Wallner, gave up an RBI single to Lee and hit lefty Kody Clemens.
In his last three outings, he’s walked five, hit two and only got two hitters out.
“We will keep putting him out there,” Hinch said. “We’re going to continue to get his delivery checked out. But there’s no way to simulate that stuff except in the game. We trust him. We believe in him. He can be better and he’s going to be better.
“But the best remedy for things like this is for him to go out and have a good outing. And that could be as early as tomorrow or Sunday. He’s going to get back going in the right direction.”
The Tigers will be reaching a decision point with their rotation soon. Reese Olson could be back off the injured list as early as Tuesday in Washington. It’s possible that Dietrich Enns, a lefty, could slot back into the bullpen.
That would give the Tigers the option of sending Hurter to Toledo to get his mechanics straightened out.
It’s all a puzzle.
And the lineup puzzle is only going to get tougher when infielder-outfielder Matt Vierling comes off the injured list, which could be as early as next week.
It will mean somebody, likely someone who has been contributing, possibly someone who is out of options, will be sent out.
“It’s something we will certainly continue to talk about,” Hinch said. “But I don’t know anybody in my chair who would be frustrated with bringing back a guy like Matt Vierling. We will have plenty to talk about and plenty to address.
“We will figure it out.”
@cmccosky