DETROIT _ In one of the most uneventful games of the early season, the Detroit Tigers lost to the Angels on Tuesday evening, 5-2.
Daniel Norris' fastball was beaten up in the third inning, the Tigers could not solve rookie right-hander Griffin Canning and they failed to reach the .500 mark in the loss.
Norris allowed three consecutive singles to open the top of the third inning, all three batters scored and the Tigers could not match the offense in the remaining seven innings.
They eventually got to Canning, chasing him in the sixth inning after JaCoby Jones led off with a double, Nicholas Castellanos tripled him home and Miguel Cabrera drove in Castellanos with a single.
That rally cut the Angels' 4-0 lead in half, but the Tigers didn't score again.
Overall, Norris was OK, allowing three runs on five hits and two walks. He struck out two batters.
Zac Reininger's struggles continued, allowing a run on two hits in the sixth.
Norris built off his last start, pitching five innings again and showed positive signs of development. But his fastball remains sitting around 90 mph, and opposing batters aren't having too much difficulty in the batter's box. Norris has good enough stuff to get by, but does he have enough to have sustained success without that mid-90 mph fastball? It remains early, but it doesn't seem so. Norris threw 90 pitches, likely forcing his early exit.
After a slow April, Castellanos is starting to show the signs of his production returning. Castellanos dropped his hands to line a Canning fastball into the right-center field gap in the sixth, scoring the Tigers' first run. Castellanos has been squaring pitches up more consistently as of late, and perhaps the burden of performing in a contract year is beginning to fade away.
Superstar Shohei Ohtani, who had been rehabilitating from right elbow ligament reconstruction surgery, was activated by the Angels, going 0-for-4 with a walk and a strikeout.
Tigers manager Ron Gardenhire was not visible in the dugout throughout the game, and bench coach Steve Liddle appeared to be managing the game.
