Philadelphia Phillies left-hander Ranger Suárez entered Tuesday’s game against the Detroit Tigers with a 1.75 ERA in 15 starts, leading all MLB pitchers.
By the end of Suárez’s 16th start, his ERA jumped to 2.01 (though that was still good enough for first place) because the Tigers scored four runs on five singles in the fifth inning.
The Tigers earned a 4-1 win over the Suárez-led Phillies on Tuesday in the second of three games in the series at Comerica Park. With the victory, the Tigers (37-42) can take the series from the Phillies in Wednesday’s finale.
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For the Tigers, left-hander Tarik Skubal — the frontrunner to win the American League Cy Young Award — delivered seven scoreless innings on three hits and one walk with seven strikeouts against the National League’s best team to beat the NL’s best pitcher.
He threw 91 pitches.
Skubal, who retired 13 of his final 14 batters, has a 2.32 ERA in 16 starts, which ranks third in MLB. He trails only Suárez (2.01) and Boston Red Sox right-hander Tanner Houck (2.18).
The Tigers scored all four runs in the fifth inning against Suárez, sparked by three singles in a row from Justyn-Henry Malloy, Jake Rogers and Ryan Kreidler at the bottom of the lineup.
Kreidler failed to execute bunts on back-to-back pitches, immediately putting himself in a two-strike hole, but instead of striking out, he put a down-and-away changeup in play. The play was ruled an infield single, but shortstop Trea Turner booted the ground ball from Kreidler to load the bases.
The Tigers took a 1-0 lead when Matt Vierling grounded out.
Andy Ibáñez, a right-handed hitter who rakes against left-handed pitchers — with a .375 batting average vs. southpaws — provided some insurance when he attacked Suárez’s down-and-away changeup for a single up the middle, scoring two runs for a 3-0 lead.
A two-out triple from Riley Greene — his fourth triple this season — extended the Tigers’ lead to 4-0. Greene shot Suárez’s middle-down cutter past first baseman Bryce Harper and into the right-field corner.
Suárez allowed four runs on nine hits with zero walks and four strikeouts across six innings. He thrived on groundball outs in the early innings, but the Tigers found holes in the defense in the fifth to help Skubal win the pitching duel.
Meanwhile, Skubal generated 19 whiffs on 42 swings — a 45.2% whiff rate — with 11 changeups, five fastballs, two sliders and one curveball. His fastball averaged 97.5 mph.
Skubal bounced back from back-to-back below-average road performances in his last two starts, in which he allowed four runs in 6⅓ innings to the Houston Astros and five runs (four earned runs) in four innings to the Atlanta Braves.
This time, Skubal shut down the Phillies to show himself as one of the best pitchers in baseball.
Finishing what Skubal started
Right-handed reliever Shelby Miller and right-handed reliever Jason Foley completed the eighth and ninth innings, respectively, to finish what Skubal started.
Miller retired all three batters in the eighth.
Foley couldn’t keep the shutout intact, as Harper — the first batter in the ninth — blasted an elevated fastball for a solo home run to left field, cutting the Phillies’ deficit to 4-1.
It was Harper’s 20th homer this season.
But Foley retired the next three batters — Alec Bohm (flyout), Nick Castellanos (groundout) and pinch-hitter Bryson Stott (flyout) — to finish the game in a tidy 2 hours and 4 minutes.
Contact Evan Petzold at epetzold@freepress.com or follow him @EvanPetzold.
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