Needless to say, this wasn't the outing that Detroit Tigers pitcher Casey Mize was envisioning following a terrific outing earlier in the week against Houston.
The Oakland Athletics took him deep three times in the first two innings, but he was able to settle down soon afterwards, pitching five innings while striking out four with no walks. However, his team's offense wasn't able to get anything going, dropping a second straight shoutout decision against the A's.
It's a credit to Mize for showing poise when what was a poor start that had the potential to snowball into a disaster was avoided.
“It’s something that could have snowballed and turned into an even worse outing,” he said. “I was able to put up a couple of zeroes, and then, unfortunately, they were able to put up another run on a slow-developing, (potential) double-play ground ball. It was a tough play because it wasn’t hit very hard. … I honestly felt like I made a lot of quality pitches after inning two.”
“Casey’s stuff looked fine,” manager A.J. Hinch said. “When he leaked into the strike zone in an area where they could drive the ball, they didn’t miss it.”
Matthew Boyd will be taking the mound tomorrow afternoon as the Tigers look to salvage what's left of the series against Oakland staring at 4:07 EST.
