MILWAUKEE -- With Tuesday night¡¯s 5-0 loss to Milwaukee being the fifth game in the Tigers¡¯ stretch of 13 in 13 days and 23 in 24 overall, manager A.J. Hinch wanted to find a way to give his rotation some extra rest.
That was the motivation for the decision to bump Detroit¡¯s current starters back a day and have right-hander Keider Montero take the ball for Wednesday¡¯s series finale at American Family Field.
¡°It's all about the rotation and giving multiple guys a benefit from it,¡± Hinch said Tuesday afternoon. ¡°We've been able to go this entire way so far without any of our starters being on that traditional five-day start, and we have a chance to continue it with arguably a guy who could've been on our team from the get-go.¡±
Neither lefty Tarik Skubal nor righties Reese Olson (who will now start Thursday's series opener against the Royals), Casey Mize or Jackson Jobe have pitched on fewer than five days of rest. Right-hander Jack Flaherty -- who allowed three runs in 4 2/3 innings and took his first loss of the season on Tuesday -- and Olson even had six days of rest between their first two starts.
With it still being so early in the season -- the Tigers have roughly 90 percent of their schedule remaining -- Detroit hasn¡¯t had to push its starters too hard. Still, during this long stretch of games, Hinch felt it was important to find at least one day of extra rest for the rotation.
¡°We talked about being proactive and making decisions, and we are in a stretch of 23 out of 24 days where we have a game,¡± Hinch said. ¡°We may do this a couple of times throughout the year to see how much of a benefit we can get out of pitching from a strength, which is yet another good starting pitcher. ¡ We've said all along that we're going to need more than the group that we broke [Spring Training] with. This is a perfect example of that, and a lot of our pitching staff will benefit from that, just given that [Montero] can take a rotation spot and push everybody back.¡±
The Tigers selected Montero¡¯s contract in November 2023, and they brought him up for a pair of spot starts last season (May 29 and June 26). He was recalled a final time on July 3 and finished out the season in Detroit.
Montero made 19 appearances (16 starts) for the Tigers over the past three months of the regular season, posting a 4.76 ERA in 98 1/3 innings. He impressed the coaching staff as a rookie and threw Detroit¡¯s only complete game of the season -- a Maddux -- on Sept. 10.
Then, after the team¡¯s late march to the postseason, Montero had a two-inning relief appearance and a one-inning start in the American League Division Series against the Guardians.
The 24-year-old didn¡¯t break camp this season with the big league team, and then he allowed three runs in four innings in his first Triple-A start on April 4. But after Montero tossed 5 2/3 scoreless frames on Thursday, Detroit made the call.
¡°It was a terrible conversation sending him out [toward the end of Spring Training],¡± Hinch said. ¡°I mean, this guy started a playoff game for us. He's got weapons. He's really talented. He's gone and handled it well, and went down and had a really good outing five days ago. And now, he's back with us.¡±
In a corresponding move, Brenan Hanifee will be optioned to Triple-A prior to Wednesday's series finale. Hanifee entered Tuesday with a 2.70 ERA in six appearances. He came on in relief with two outs and a runner in scoring position in the sixth, and he managed to coax an inning-ending grounder out of Joey Ortiz (with a nice assist from second baseman Gleyber Torres).
The 26-year-old came back out for the bottom of the seventh with the Brewers leading, 3-0. An error by third baseman Andy Ib¨¢?ez didn¡¯t help, but Milwaukee went on to score two runs (both unearned) while forcing Hanifee to throw 35 pitches in the frame.
¡°He needed to finish as much as he could,¡± Hinch said. ¡°... We wanted Hanifee to keep the ball on the ground to Ortiz, and he did. When he went back out for the next inning, it was kind of his inning to get through, regardless, given where our 'pen is and where it's likely to be over the next few days.¡±