DETROIT — AJ Hinch came to the mound with two outs in the sixth inning Wednesday, fully intent on bringing in lefty Daniel Norris to face left-handed hitting Andrew Benintendi with a runner on third and the Tigers up by two runs.
Starter Casey Mize was aghast. He stared at Hinch in disbelief. He’d allowed just one single since the second inning and just erased that by inducing Jorge Soler to hit into a 5-4-3 double-play.
What happened next hasn’t happened much, if at all, this year.
Mize talked Hinch into leaving him in. Hinch looked in his eyes and essentially said, Go get ‘em.
One pitch later, after Benintendi flew out to left, Mize walked back to the dugout with the 4-2 lead intact — a lead that relievers Daniel Norris, Michael Fulmer and Gregory Soto defended in the final three innings to secure the Tigers' third straight win and their first series win against the Royals since early in 2019.
It also extended the Royals losing streak to 10 games.
It was Mize's third straight quality start and, in his sixth attempt, his first win at Comerica Park. He gave up just three hits and struck out four. And he did it, for the most part, without his splitter.
Mize threw 39 four-seam fastballs, with a velocity range of 90-97 mph, and 23 two-seamers (90-96) and mixed his slider off of those two fastballs. He only threw six splitters and seven knuckle-curves.
But more impressive than his pitch mix was his battle level. The Royals fought him hard. He went to eight full counts, but he won the battle seven times.
“His best stuff is good enough,” Hinch said before the game. “He doesn’t have to create things or make things up. He’s going to get outs in a lot of different ways, and he’s starting to believe that as he goes through the league a couple of times.”
Mize also neutralized the five left-handed hitters in the Royals lineup. Over his young career, lefties have hit .295 against him with a .986 OPS. But Wednesday, Mize limited them to one hit in 11 at-bats.
All the damage against Mize came in the first inning, after hit grazed leadoff hitter Whit Merrifield with a pitch and walked Carlos Santana after a 10-pitch fight.
Salvador Perez doubled in one run and the other scored on a sacrifice fly. Mize locked in after that and didn’t relent. Not even when Hinch came to get him.
The Tigers came into the game with the worst offensive numbers in the major leagues against left-handed pitching. They rank last in average (.178), on-base (.242) and slugging (.243). But they produced seven hits and four runs off Royals left starter Danny Duffy, who three weeks ago blanked the Tigers over 5 2/3 innings.
JaCoby Jones drove in the first run with a two-out, two-strike opposite field single to right.
Miguel Cabrera had a big night, too. He had a pair of RBI singles. The first one tied the game at 2 and the second made him the all-time Venezuelan-born hits leader with 2,877, passing Omar Vizquel.
Robbie Grossman tripled to start the fifth inning and scored on a double by Jeimer Candelario.
