Detroit Tigers: Kansas City splits the series with dominant victory

The Detroit Tigers were unable to win the series against the Kansas City Royals due to huge offensive performances from Dozier and Merrifield.

The Detroit Tigers played the final game of a four-game series against the Kansas City Royals today and wound up losing 10-2. Whit Merrifield, Hunter Dozier, and Jorge Soler had dominating performances at the plate and gave their pitchers more than enough room to work with. Kansas City’s win split the series 2-2.

Detroit’s offense was unable to answer early, despite having more hits in the early innings. Detroit did not get many runners into scoring position, however, and left four runners on base. Niko Goodrum was the exception at the plate, hitting a home run in the first and driving in another run in the third. The young switch hitter has proven to be valuable in 2019 for Detroit.

The Tigers tried something a little different with their bullpen today, using both Drew VerHagen and Tyler Alexander as relievers. VerHagen pitched four perfect innings before allowing back to back home runs to Dozier and Soler. Alexander did not do so hot, giving up four hits without recording a single out and increasing his ERA to 6.49.

It will be interesting to see how the Tigers move forward with their pitching, especially once players like Casey Mize and Matt Manning are moved up. We may also see other pitchers beginning to get new assignments, or being brought up and down in the organization. The same thing may happen for position players as well.

Detroit gets the day off tomorrow and then continues their homestand against the Seattle Mariners on Tuesday. Matthew Boyd is scheduled to start on Tuesday and will be looking to bounce back from a poor performance against Kansas City earlier this week.