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The Detroit Tigers have totally used the 2024 season as take-off point, and now, they have become one of the best teams in MLB. They entered their Tuesday night ballgame against the Pittsburgh Pirates with a record of 60-41 — good for the best record in the entire MLB at that point in time. However, since the All-Star break, the Tigers haven't exactly been good, winning just one of their past five games — including an 8-5 defeat to the Pirates on Tuesday.
The Tigers basically shot themselves on the foot on Tuesday. Casey Mize did not have the best of games, allowing five runs (four earned) on 10 hits in just 4.0 innings of work, and Detroit's defense was all out of sorts, with third baseman Zach McKinstry committing two throwing errors and catcher Jake Rogers compounding matters with a throwing error of his own.
Nonetheless, Tigers manager A.J. Hinch vowed that he and his team will be better and that they will clean up the mistakes they made in their brutal loss to the 20 games below .500-Pirates on Tuesday.
“We had a really bad mental game today. That's really rare for this team. We paid for it. It's tough because some of it might be trying to do too much, some of it might be trying to do too little – trying to stay under control. They're just mistakes that we know we can fix, and we will fix. We will be better,” Hinch said, per Evan Petzold of Detroit Free Press.
The good news is that the Tigers have so much breathing room to figure out what's been ailing them after coming out of the All-Star break with such lethargy. They have a nine-game advantage over the second-place team in the AL Central, Cleveland Guardians, so it's far from panic time yet for Detroit.
Tigers look to get back to powerhouse ways
The Tigers are in the middle of a dream season, with their young core finally bearing fruit after getting a taste of the playoffs last year. But their only win thus far since the All-Star break has come with Tarik Skubal starting on the mound, and it's not going to be a recipe for success if Detroit has to rely on Skubal and Skubal alone to win games.
The Tigers' bats have to wake up. They have an OPS of .561 since coming out of the All-Star break, and they have to break out of this cold spell if they were to go back to winning ways.
