Detroit, MI

Detroit Tigers prospect Jackson Jobe torched by Yankees in 8-6 loss in spring training

Published

9 months ago

March 13, 2025

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Detroit Tigers prospect Jackson Jobe torched by Yankees in 8-6 loss in spring training

The Detroit Tigers lost, 8-6, to the New York Yankees on Thursday in Lakeland, Florida.
Tigers prospect Jackson Jobe allowed three runs (two earned) in 3 2/3 innings.
Former Yankee Gleyber Torres homered for the Tigers.

LAKELAND, Fla. — The Detroit Tigers lost, 8-6, to the New York Yankees on Thursday at Publix Field at Joker Marchant Stadium.

Detroit is 9-9 in Grapefruit League play.

What happened

Right-hander Jackson Jobe is extremely confident in his abilities as a starting pitcher, as he revealed after his last start by making a bold statement: “Here’s my stuff. If you hit it, great. Odds are, you’re probably not.”

On Thursday, the New York Yankees hit his stuff.

They hit it hard.

The 22-year-old allowed three runs (two earned runs) on three hits and one walk with three strikeouts across 3⅔ innings, throwing 41 of 68 pitches for strikes. The Yankees averaged a 95.5 mph exit velocity on 11 balls in play, including eight balls in play that had at least a 100 mph exit velocity.

“I just gave up a couple homers,” Jobe said. “That’s all it is. I mean, it happens.”

The damage occurred in the fourth inning, when Jasson Domínguez pulled a middle-down 86.5 mph changeup for a two-run home run to right field and Paul Goldschmidt destroyed a middle-middle 96.6 mph sinker for a solo homer over the batter’s eye in center field.

Before Domínguez’s homer, Javier Báez — playing third base for the first time since 2019 — made a fielding error that allowed the leadoff hitter to reach safely.

The homer from Goldschmidt traveled 447 feet.

“Fastball command wasn’t great,” Jobe said, “but the pitches that they hit out of the yard were, I thought, decent pitches. Those are good hitters. Tip your cap.”

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Starting off

Not only did Jobe allow hard contact, but he also failed to miss bats at even an average clip.

Despite elite individual pitches, he generated just three misses on 28 swings — for a 10.7% whiff rate — with one fastball, one sinker and one sweeper. He has a 17.1% whiff rate in spring training, which is a little bit concerning because MLB pitchers averaged a 25.6% whiff rate from 2022-24.

Facing the Yankees, Jobe struggled to located his four-seam fastball.

“I think I threw a lot of uncompetitive fastballs, whether it was up or arm side,” said Jobe, whose fastball averaged 97.5 mph. “That’s something I’ll work on. Being able to get the heater down and follow up with offspeed down, I think that helps me. It all starts with the fastball.”

This spring, Jobe has a 3.65 ERA with four walks and eight strikeouts across 12⅓ innings in four starts. Although he is expected to make the Opening Day rotation, the Tigers haven’t guaranteed anything to him yet.

At the plate

The Tigers faced Yankees left-hander Max Fried, who signed an eight-year, $218 million free agent contract in the offseason — the largest contract ever for a southpaw. He allowed one run on one hit and zero walks with three strikeouts across four innings, throwing 57 pitches.

In the first inning, ex-Yankee Gleyber Torres — who signed a one-year, $15 million contract with the Tigers this offseason — hit a solo home run off Fried’s 93.6 mph fastball.

It was Torres’ third homer of spring training.

The Tigers added one run in the fifth inning and two runs in the sixth inning. In the fifth, Colt Keith and Báez hit back-to-back doubles against right-handed reliever Fernando Cruz, with Báez ripping Cruz’s 93.5 mph sinker with a 109.3 mph exit velocity.

Both Torres and Keith had two-hit performances.

The Tigers tacked on two final runs in the bottom of the ninth as Yankees relievers Yerry De Los Santos and Hayden Merda had issues finding the strike zone; they issued four straight two-out walks (to Ryan Kreidler, Bligh Madris, Andrew Navigato and Roberto Campos) before Jace Jung flew out to end the game.

On the mound

After Jobe, the Tigers relievers struggled.

Left-hander Andrew Chafin allowed four runs on three hits and two walks with one strikeout in the fifth inning, throwing 26 pitches. His sinker velocity averaged less than 89 mph, down from last year’s 91.7 mph average.

This spring, Chafin has given up six runs on three hits and five walks in three relief appearances.

Right-hander Tommy Kahnle, a former Yankee, failed to complete the sixth inning, with one hit and two walks despite getting just two outs while exhausting 26 pitches. In the seventh, right-hander John Brebbia gave up one run but recorded three outs.

Three stars

1. Torres; 2. Keith; 3. Báez.

Next up

Friday (1:05 p.m., no TV) vs. Pittsburgh Pirates in Bradenton.

Contact Evan Petzold at epetzold@freepress.com or follow him @EvanPetzold.

Listen to our weekly Tigers show “Days of Roar” every Monday afternoon on demand at freep.com, Apple, Spotify or wherever you listen to podcasts. And catch all of our podcasts and daily voice briefing at freep.com/podcasts.

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Detroit, MI

Detroit Medical Center tightens visitor policies as Michigan flu cases surge

Published

7 hours ago

December 5, 2025

Press Room

Detroit Medical Center tightens visitor policies as Michigan flu cases surge

New visitor rules aim to curb flu spread

DETROIT – The Detroit Medical Center is tightening its visitor policies amid a surge in flu cases across Michigan.

This comes as the state reports its highest number of child flu deaths in 20 years.

Patients are allowed up to two visitors at any one time.
Visitors ages 12 and under are not allowed on inpatient hospital floors or in observation units.
Visitors ages 13 and older who have a fever, cough, or rash are asked not to visit.
All visitors with illness or cold symptoms are also asked to refrain from visiting.

“We’ve seen an uptick rate over about three or four consecutive weeks, where the test positivity rate started in the small two to four percent range, later went up to about nine percent, thirteen percent two weeks ago, and we were close to twenty-one percent last week,” said Chief Medical Officer at Children’s Hospital Michigan Dr. Rudolph Valentini. “This is the time to get your flu shot. Please protect yourself and our community and your friends and family by getting your flu shot because the flu is here.”

The full guidelines can be read here.

—> How to protect your family from stomach viruses and flu this holiday season

Experts urge residents to get a flu shot for the best protection against influenza.

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Detroit, MI

Lions ‘took the reins off the D-line’ in five-sack win over Cowboys

Published

20 hours ago

December 5, 2025

Press Room

Lions ‘took the reins off the D-line’ in five-sack win over Cowboys

Detroit — Speaking to reporters Tuesday, defensive coordinator Kelvin Sheppard teased the potential for personnel and schematic tweaks.

The Detroit Lions were coming off an outing in which they never sacked Green Bay Packers quarterback Jordan Love. They had four sacks in their last four games, and only 2½ of those came from the defensive line. Sheppard, asked if the lack of a pass rush was hurting his ability to run as much man coverage as he usually likes, was blunt in his assessment: “I don’t think we’ve affected the quarterback to play any style these past couple weeks.”

Changes were needed, and changes were seemingly made.

“They kind of took the reins off the D-line a little bit this week in an effort to create more,” defensive end Aidan Hutchinson said following Detroit’s 44-30 win over the Dallas Cowboys on Thursday. “If I had to guess, it’s how we’ll move forward.”

Took the reins off?

“How do I explain it? Just getting off the ball, even when it could be (a run), it might be (a) run. It’s just really having more of a pass mentality,” Hutchinson said. “Because where teams get us a lot is that block-it-up, (play action pass), eight-man protection, and then (the QB’s) sitting back there and hitting us. It’s getting faster on those transitions and stuff, it’s been an emphasis. I think we did that today, for sure.”

Indeed they did. The Lions sacked Dak Prescott five times, an impressive feat against a quarterback who has been so skilled at escaping danger. Heading into Thursday, opposing defenses had converted only 10.3% of their pressures against Prescott into sacks. That was the third-lowest rate in the NFL among the 42 QBs who had dropped back at least 100 times this season.

Three of Detroit’s sacks came from defensive end Al-Quadin Muhammad, who now leads the team in sacks (nine) through 13 games. Muhammad played 33 snaps against the Cowboys, his most since Week 7. The ninth-year pro said he wasn’t sure how much opportunity he’d receive Thursday, but he was prepared to make the most of whatever he was given.

“I’m just taking it one snap at a time, and then at the end of the game I realized, ‘OK, I did play a lot. I did play a little bit more than normal.’ I don’t really care about the snaps. I don’t focus on the snaps,” Muhammad said. “I let the coaches make whatever decisions they decide to make. I know they have our best interest at heart.”

Muhammad has 12 sacks in his time with the Lions, which spans 22 games over two seasons; he was signed to the practice squad last October before being brought up to the active roster one month later. Before joining the Lions, Muhammad had 12 sacks in 84 appearances, dating back to when he was drafted by the New Orleans Saints in the sixth round of the 2017 NFL Draft.

“It wasn’t just me,” Muhammad said of his three sacks against the Cowboys. “It was a collective effort. There’s other guys out there that’s on the field rushing, as well. Shoutout to the other guys in our room, and shoutout to the defense. … When I did get some opportunties to win the one-on-ones, I won the one-on-ones. But, most importantly, it’s a collective effort.”

rsilva@detroitnews.com

@rich_silva18

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Detroit, MI

RoboCop statue rises in Detroit: ‘big, beautiful, bronze piece of art’

Published

1 day ago

December 4, 2025

Press Room

RoboCop statue rises in Detroit: ‘big, beautiful, bronze piece of art’

The statue looms and glints at more than 11 feet tall and weighing 3,500 pounds, looking out at the city with, how to put it … a characteristically stern expression?

Despite its daunting appearance and history as a crimefighter of last resort, the giant new bronze figure of the movie character RoboCop is being seen as a symbol of hope, drawing fans and eliciting selfie mania since it began standing guard over Detroit on Wednesday afternoon.

It has been 15 years in the making. Even in a snowstorm in the dark, people were driving by to see it, said Jim Toscano, co-owner of the Free Age film production company, where the statue now stands firmly bolted down near the sidewalk.

RoboCop hit theaters in 1987, portraying a near-future Detroit as crime-ridden and poorly protected by a beleaguered and outgunned police force, until actor Peter Weller appeared as a nearly invincible cyborg, apparently created by a nefarious corporation bent on privatizing policing.

There was a time when Detroit pushed back on anything pointing to its past reputation as an unsafe city, and the movie, which developed a cult following, spawning two sequels and a reboot, didn’t help its image.

But with violent crime trending down for years and homicide numbers now below mid-1960s levels there is less pushback and city officials offered no objections to the statue’s installation, Toscano said.

“Detroit has come a long way. You put in a little nostalgia and that helps,” he said.

The statue campaign appears to have started around 2010 when Detroit’s mayor, Dave Bing, was tagged in a tweet that noted Philadelphia’s statue of the fictional boxer Rocky Balboa and said RoboCop would be a “GREAT ambassador for Detroit”.

Bing tweeted back, saying there were no such plans. But some Detroiters ran with the idea, crowdfunding it through a 2012 Kickstarter campaign that raised more than $67,000 from more than 2,700 backers worldwide, and Detroit sculptor Giorgio Gikas finished the statue in 2017. Then, it got stuck, stored away from public view.

The Michigan Science Center in Detroit ultimately nixed plans to host the sculpture in 2021, citing pressures from the coronavirus pandemic and the need to focus museum resources.

Things remained in limbo until about three years ago when Toscano’s company bought a building in Eastern Market, an open-air produce market, shopping and entertainment district just northeast of downtown. Toscano says he thought they were “kidding” when he was contacted by the creator of the statue idea and Eastern Market officials. But he and his business partner gladly came on board: “It’s too unusual, too unique, too cool not to do,” Toscano said.

Toscano, 48, says he has only viewed the first RoboCop movie.

“It wasn’t a big film in our house,” he admitted. But if there is one iconic line uttered by RoboCop that fits this moment, Toscano said it would be: “Thank you for your cooperation.”

On Thursday, James Campbell approached the statue and told three picture-takers: “I own this. Do you guys know that?” the Associated Press reported.

Campbell said he donated $100 to the original Kickstarter campaign over a decade ago, which makes him a “0.038 percent owner of this statue”.

“I’m here to see this big, beautiful, bronze piece of art,” he said. “What a piece of cinematic history to represent the city of Detroit,” he added.

Campbell called the statue a symbol of hope: “He’s a cyborg crime fighter! In the movie, in the futuristic Detroit, he’s there to save the city,” he said.

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