The 2021 Detroit Tigers have been a tale of two teams. The month of April was nothing more than abysmal. The team posted an 8-19 record surrendering 133 runs while scoring a measly 75 for a run differential of -58. Come May, the team seemed to turn things around on both sides of the ball going 14-13 allowing only 116 runs and scoring 119 for a +3 in the run differential column.
Offensive Catalyst: Robbie Grossman
Grossman hits walk-off homer against NYY 5/28/2021
As Robbie goes the Tigers offense goes. Through the first two months of the season Grossman played in 52 of the teams 54 games. In the 32 loses posted between April and May Grossman went 23-for-108 (.212) at the plate collecting 18 walks good for a .325 OBP. On the opposite side, in the 22 wins, he went 22-for-79, good for a .278 BA, while collecting another 16 base on balls giving him an OBP of .400. As the leadoff hitter it seems as though his patience and approach at the plate has had a trickle down effect for the remainder of the lineup.
The team posted a slash of .199/.257/.345 while striking out 280 times in the month of April. The month of May was a much improved offensive performance of .248/.329/.367 with lowered strikeout numbers (269) and an impressive 102 base on balls.
Grossman is currently one of six (6) Tigers to have collected at least 10 walks on the season: Grossman (37), Candelario (22), Goodrum (17), Baddoo (17), Schoop (14), and Cabrera (14). As a team the Tigers have collected 165 walks through 54 games, good for 18 more than the 58-game 2020 season (147). Jeimer Candelario is currently pacing for 65 free passes which would be good for second highest in a single season for his career to the 2018 season (66) while Grossman is pacing for 108 total walks, which would make him the first Tigers hitter to walk more than 100 times since Miguel Cabrera in the 2011 season.
As Grossman improved at the plate Jonathan Schoop was right behind him. Schoop is currently on a 4-game multi-hit streak and has been on-base in 17 consecutive games. He finished the month of May slashing .275/.342/.404 while collecting 30 hits and driving in 12 to go along with an OPS of .745. Grossman also saw a significant bump in his batting average from April (.212) to May (.265).
Candelario belts a homerun
Candelario has been the best Tigers batter this season by far. Candy is currently hitting .279 with an OPS of .756. Jeimer also has an impressive on-base streak of 28 games and has reached base 42 times this year in comparison to Grossman’s 39 times on base (53 games played each).
As a team the Tigers have left a total of 352 men on base thus far in 2021, pacing for 1036 on the season. This mark would be the lowest number of LOB in a season since their last playoff appearance in 2014. It is important to note that while Grossman may be the catalyst offensively and his trickle down effect that I spoke of earlier is a key component to this offense improving from April to May we must also give credit to Manager AJ Hinch’s hiring of Scott Coolbaugh as the team’s hitting coach.
Pitching Catalyst: Chris Fetter
Fetter visits the mound at Comerica Park
One of the biggest improvements from recent years is the Tigers pitching staff, particularly the starting rotation, and this is thanks to first-year pitching coach Chris Fetter. To date the top-5 starters for the Tigers have thrown 20 quality starts: Mize (6), Boyd (5), Urena(4), Turnbull (4) and Skubal (1). The 20 quality starts are more than double 9 posted by the top-5 starters of the 2020 season: Turnbull (4), Boyd (3), and Skubal (2).
The current starting rotation of Boyd, Mize, Skubal, Urena and Turnbull are currently on pace for 59 quality starts on the season which would be good for an estimated 37% of all games started which is on par for the 2019 MLB average of 37% (1,764 quality starts of 4,858 games started).
Mize throws 6.1 innings in a quality start on 5/23/2021
Tiger starters have a sub 4.00 ERA (3.85) with a 7.6 K/9 in 285 innings pitched in comparison to relievers with a 5.14 ERA and 10.1 K/9. Chris Fetter has been able to work with the starters to get them deeper into games, including Turnbull’s no-hitter earlier this year. As a result, we have seen a much better pitch selection and working of the count by said starters. Fetter was able to get his pitching staff to lower their ERA from 5.08 (4.04 by rotation) in April to 3.60 (3.48 by rotation) in May. There was also a 21.6% increase in strikeouts from 199 in April to 242 in May as well as a 12.6% decrease in walks from 103 in April to 90 in May.
Haase discusses things with Turnbull
It also appears that the platoon of Eric Haase and Jake Rogers behind the plate has garnered better results from the pitching staff. In the 11 games behind the plate for Haase the pitching staff has posted an ERA of 3.33 in 92 innings surrendering only 34 runs with a .211 BAA. Rogers has also been behind the plate in 11 games, pitchers have posted a 2.80 ERA in 93.1 innings allowing only 29 runs with a .231 BAA. These numbers are significantly better compared to the 5.45 ERA in 104 innings with Greiner and 5.06 ERA in 186.2 innings with Wilson behind the plate.
The Tigers are currently 1-0 in the Month of June headed into play on June 3rd against the Chicago White Sox. Only time will tell if this team can continue to get better.
**All statistics pulled from Baseball-Reference and MLB**