Tarik Skubal doesn't finish fifth inning in Tigers' loss to Twins

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Minneapolis – The Tigers aren’t panicking, not this early in the season. But they aren’t having much fun, either.

“Losing sucks,” Spencer Torkelson said before the Tigers lost their third straight and second in a row to the division-rival Twins 4-2 Tuesday at Target Field. “You can tell yourself it’s early, just keep going. But we want to win. This is a results-driven industry and we understand that.”

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The loss is the Tigers’ sixth straight on the road and the second straight with ace Tarik Skubal starting.

Unlike his previous loss, when he pitched seven strong innings in Phoenix, Skubal seemed to be walking the highwire from the start on another chilly night in Minneapolis.

He stranded runners at the corners with one out in the second. He stranded a runner at third in the third inning. He pitched around an error and a single in the fourth.

In the fifth, he lost his balance and fell off the wire. It started, as crooked-number innings tend to, with a walk. He walked Byron Buxton after he got ahead 0-2. It was the first walk he’d allowed in 18 innings this season.

BOX SCORE: Twins 4, Tigers 2

He followed that up with another walk, losing Austin Martin after he’d gotten ahead 1-2.

Luke Keaschall broke the scoreless tie, ripping an RBI single on an 0-1 changeup.

Skubal got ahead of Ryan Jeffers 0-2 and couldn’t put him away. Jeffers lined a two-run, opposite-field double on a 91-mph outside slider. After Victor Caratini struck out for the second out, Skubal got ahead of Josh Bell 0-2.

Same story. Skubal threw a changeup above the zone and Bell lashed it for a double to left, ending Skubal’s night.

Entering the game, hitters were 1-for-14 against his changeup. The Twins got three hits off it in five innings.  

It was Skubal’s shortest outing, not counting his injury-shortened start in Miami last September, since Aug. 8 last year when the Angels KO’d him in the fifth at Comerica Park.

The Tigers are now 2-7 in Skubal’s starts at Target Field.

But he does not carry the burden of this loss alone. It was another too-little-too-late offensive performance.

Going into the fifth inning Tuesday, Skubal had posted 10 straight scoreless innings. And the Tigers hitters also went scoreless in those 10 innings.

They had an early chance to nick Twins’ starter Taj Bradley. Zach McKinstry doubled and Torkelson singled with one out. But Bradley struck out Parker Meadows, and after he hit Javier Baez in the back to load the bases, Colt Keith grounded out to second.

Bradley only allowed one other runner into scoring position through the sixth and ended up striking out 10.

Torkelson and Meadows started the seventh with singles to knock Bradley out of the game. And, against lefty reliever Taylor Rogers, rookie Kevin McGonigle lined a two-out RBI single.

The Tigers brought the tying run to the plate in the eighth. Reliever Cole Sands walked McKinstry and Torkelson with two outs and manager AJ Hinch used his trump card. He sent up lefty slugger Kerry Carpenter to bat for Parker Meadows.

Carpenter has been out of the lineup the last two nights fighting off a stomach virus, but Hinch was going for the big blast.

Twins manager Derek Shelton, who was out of left-handed relievers, countered with the next best thing. Right-hander Eric Orze’s splitter, a platoon neutralizer, has held lefties hitless this season (0 for 8) and held them to a .217 average last year.

He used it to strike out Carpenter and end the inning.  

McGonigle struck again in the ninth. After Baez doubled off Orze, McGonigle golfed a breaking ball that nearly hit the plate into the right-field corner for an RBI double.

Shelton summoned right-hander Justin Topa got the final two outs.

Tigers fall to 4-7.

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This article originally appeared on The Detroit News: Detroit Tigers pitcher Tarik Skubal had a rare short outing vs. Twins

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