Let me take you inside the Detroit Tigers clubhouse at Comerica Park.
To a row of lockers against the far wall, the one closest to the showers.
Because that row of lockers symbolizes everything that has gone wrong for this scuffling team, which lost to the Boston Red Sox 4-0 on Wednesday, May 6, the bizarre end to a three-game sweep at Comerica Park.
The row of lockers starts with Justin Verlander, who has been honored with the first stall. Then, moving from left to right, Tarik Skubal has the next locker. Then, Casey Mize. Then, there is an opening to the bathroom. Then, Gleyber Tores. Then Javier Báez. Then, Framber Valdez.
As I stared at those lockers on Wednesday night, something dawned on me. Because nobody was there. Nobody was packing for the upcoming road trip to Kansas City. Because all the players who should have been at those lockers were either hurt or suspended.
An entire wall of players and the start of the next one. I mean, that’s some big-time names. Gone from this team. Like a tornado of misfortune came down and whisked them away.
So, when you ask, what is the vibe of this team?
It’s hard to say. Because half of this team is missing. Literally. When Torres was added to the injured list on Wednesday, he became the 15th Tiger on it, just this season.
It’s simply ridiculous.
But wait.
I have more.
The Tigers played on Wednesday without manager A.J. Hinch, who was suspended for one game after Valdez beaned Red Sox infielder Trevor Story on Tuesday. When Valdez was suspended, Hinch was given an automatic suspension by rule.
So, bench coach George Lombard filled in for Hinch.
In this strange, ridiculous season, when there are nearly more hurt players than healthy ones, of course they played a game without their manager.
It just seemed fitting.
“It’s obviously weird without A.J. there,” Riley Greene said. “But George is great.”
This group has bounced back before
Even though the Tigers have lost three straight, even though they try to play clean baseball but keep ending up in the mud, even though they seem to find new ways to lose every time you turn around, nobody in this clubhouse is freaking out.
This is largely the same group that climbed out of a monster hole in 2024 and made the postseason.
This is the same core that played horrible down the stretch in 2025, made the playoffs and got within one game of advancing to the ALCS.
So, losing eight of their last 12 games hasn’t caused widespread panic.
At least not in this clubhouse.
“Just got to focus on the next day,” Greene said. “Obviously, the injuries suck, and, you know, it is what it is, but still have baseball to play, and we got to go out and win baseball games.”
To the outside world? Yes, it might look like the wheels have come off. This team has played like crap and it’s become painful to watch. Clearly, they don’t look like a playoff team right now.
Then again, half their team is missing.
So, it’s hard to come to a conclusion about this group, in May, considering they are playing with a roster filled with replacement parts.
More than anything, they just have to hold on until they get healthy again.
“We have a bunch of good guys that care,” Lombard said. “They want to win. They want to be the best they can possibly be. And then we’ve been through it before.”
Then, he said something incredibly interesting. Something you can imagine him telling his players.
“Failing is the first step to learning how to do things,” he said. “It’s the first step to success. So we fall on our face, and then, how fast can we bounce back from it?”
Yes, they have crashed, landing face first a lot recently, especially in this series against the Red Sox clouded by injuries and weirdness surrounding Valdez.
And we are still waiting to see the bounce back.
“I’ve been around some good teams,” Lombard said. “Every team I’ve been on, it’s a grind. It’s never easy, and it looks like that from afar, and you go on these winning streaks, and even last year, we were winning a ton of games, and it was tough at the end, and then you find a way to just be resilient and win games.”
I guess, they are still stuck on the tough part.
Not the winning one.
Jack Flaherty finds his groove finally
“You guys have 15 on the injured list,” I said to Jack Flaherty. “You’ve dropped some games. What gives you faith that you guys are going to bounce back from this and handle this kind of adversity?”
“It’s May right now,” Flaherty said. “We got a lot of guys in here that are going to give everything that they got every single day. And I think two really good examples of that has been Keider (Montero) and Ty (Madden). What Ty did (Tuesday), he was he was really, really good. And what Keider’s been able to do, it’s been really fun to watch.”
Flaherty, it should be mentioned, was an incredible bright spot on Wednesday, taking a critical step forward after some bad outings. He struck out 10 and walked just one in five innings.
So, even though the Tigers lost – victims of sloppy defense and lack of offense – that’s a huge step forward for this team.
“I thought Flaherty did a nice job, especially with some of the stuff that he’s been through,” Lombard said. “I believe in Flaherty.”
Right now, considering everything else, that was the most important thing to come out of this game.
For this team to stay alive, for this team to avoid falling in a huge hold, it desperately needs somebody like Jake Flaherty.
Oh, one other thing.
Something I don’t even want to point out but I feel I must.
Flaherty has the locker closest to Verlander on the other side.
But it’s against the other wall. So, he’s gotta be safe, right?
Contact Jeff Seidel: jseidel@freepress.com. Follow him on X @seideljeff.
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Tigers playing bad baseball with replacement parts. It can’t last, right?
Reporting by Jeff Seidel, Detroit Free Press / Detroit Free Press
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
