Will Vest's extra-innings blowup vs. Guardians prompts scrutiny around Tigers' usage

The Tigers came into their series against the Guardians with the chance to clinch the AL Central. It would've taken a sweep, and the Tigers were coming off of a series loss against the Marlins, but there would be no bigger statement than knocking the hot Guardians down a peg and clinching in their home ballpark against a division rival.

But the Tigers' extra-innings loss on Tuesday night means that they'll have to wait until at least the first game of their home series against the Braves on Friday.

After a heroic pinch-hit, two-out home run in the bottom of the ninth from Kerry Carpenter, the Tigers went into extras with Will Vest, arguably Detroit's most trustworthy reliever, on the mound. Brayan Rocchio started the inning on second base, and the Guardians went on to smash four consecutive extra-base hits and three runs off of him before he got his first out. Cleveland would tack on another — their seventh of the game — before the inning was over.

Spencer Torkelson kept Detroit's hope alive in the bottom of the frame when he clobbered a one-out, two-run homer, but Riley Greene and Trey Sweeney couldn't keep it going. The Tigers lost, 7-5.

There were a lot of missed opportunities during that game, but the big story was Vest. Cody Stavenhagen of The Athletic noted that his fastball velocity had been down for quite some time, and 97.1 The Ticket's Jeff Riger drew attention to Vest's 8.44 ERA in extra innings.

Will Vest's velocity experiences massive drop-off during extra-innings blowup in Tigers-Guardians loss

Vest's fastball velocity has reached up to 99 MPH this season, but he topped out at 96.4 against the Guardians on Tuesday. Two of them accounted for half of the extra-base hits Cleveland got off of him.

In Vest's defense, some of those swings just seemed lucky; Steven Kwan reached down on a breaking ball way below the zone and Angel Martínez got a fastball well off the plate. And AJ Hinch really didn't have another option with Kyle Finnegan on the IL, which left the Tigers devoid of any other high-leverage relievers.

Vest pitched more innings last month than in any other month of the season, owing in part to Finnegan being on the shelf, so part of his struggles could just be plain exhaustion. Finnegan should be coming off of the IL soon, which could help alleviate that for Vest.

However, it still doesn't bode well for the Tigers' postseason when one of their best bullpen arms can't seem to handle extra innings, and then there's the more immediate matter of just getting through the rest of the regular season with their hold on the AL Central still intact. The Guardians are slowly chipping away it with five games still to play against them, and they proved on Tuesday that they're capable of identifying (and exploiting) the Tigers' weaknesses.