Detroit Tigers lesson learned in September: Starting depth isn’t ideal

Detroit Tigers fans have seen some of the team’s starting pitchers struggle in September. The results aren’t the best where the future is concerned.

Detroit Tigers starting pitchers haven’t had the best month of September.

With Justin Verlander dealt to the Houston Astros at the end of August and Michael Fulmer being sidelined for the rest of the year due to injury, a number of inexperienced starters were forced to step in.

At first, this seemed like a positive idea—at least where 2018 was concerned.

Detroit could audition the likes of Buck Farmer, Chad Bell, Myles Jaye and Artie Lewicki to see if any of the group could make an impression ahead of a potential rotation job in 2018.

After all, the Tigers will head into next season with a rotation that has plenty of question marks after Fulmer.

While there were encouraging developments from Matthew Boyd, Daniel Norris and Jordan Zimmermann in September, the other starters struggled.

Struggled mightily, actually.

Farmer’s five starts lasted a collective 19.2 innings.

While he missed plenty of bats with a 9.61 strikeouts-per-nine-innings rate and a 10.2 swinging strike percentage, the right-hander was also tagged for 5.03 walks and 1.37 home runs per nine frames.