Boston — Tarik Skubal has reached a level of dominance where any smudge on his line score draws a gasp.
Given an early four-run cushion Saturday, Skubal, despite one little hiccup, made it stand up and the Tigers evened the series with a 4-1 victory over the Boston Red Sox at Fenway Park, ending a nine-game road losing streak.
“Best pitcher in baseball,” rookie Kevin McGonigle said.
Skubal, the reigning two-time Cy Young winner, blew through the first four innings, allowing only a walk with eight strikeouts. But things got dicey for a minute in the fifth. Wilyer Abreu led off with a single and Ceddanne Rafaela lobbed one off the Green Monster for a double.
When Skubal walked Caleb Durbin to load the bases, the chilled spectators (46 degrees in the fifth inning) got on their feet.
They sat down quickly.
Skubal induced a 4-3 double-play from Connor Wong, which plated a run but killed the rally.
“Kind of self-inflicted,” Skubal said of the fifth. “The four-pitch walk mixed in with a couple of knocks. I have to be better later in the game, just getting ahead and staying aggressive and not beat myself.”
He pitched out of a first-and-third jam in the sixth, too, striking out Willson Contreras and Trevor Story (for the third time each) and getting Abreu to ground out to Gleyber Torres at second.
“No outs and bases loaded and give up one, that’s a big win,” Skubal said. “First and third with no outs in the sixth and give up none, that’s a big win. I made pitches when I needed to, but I probably need to do a better job getting ahead in the early at-bats and then hopefully we’re not in those situations.”
When they tallied up all his numbers, it was another quality start: six innings, four hits, one run and a season-high 10 strikeouts.
He got 19 whiffs on 42 swings, 12 whiffs on 16 swings at his change-up.
“The change-up performed better today,” Skubal said. “But I still think there is room for improvement. I need to be able to throw it in the zone and out of the zone when I need to. I need to execute pitches out of the zone early in counts to where those aren’t six- and seven-pitch at-bats and end them in three to four pitches.”
BOX SCORE: Tigers 4, Red Sox 1
The Red Sox chase rate on the change-up was 55%. But in the fifth and sixth, they were able to force him to throw more pitches over the heart of the plate. Rafaela’s double came on a 3-0 fastball and then he walked Durbin on four pitches.
“He rarely misses like he did today where he fell behind multiple batters in a row,” Tigers manager AJ Hinch said. “I just thought he was in battle-mode. It looked like he was in control. He was missing bats and using his whole arsenal and he won some big at-bats.
“That was the key for him. He stayed mentally into the game and didn’t get too frustrated with a few big misses.”
The Tigers worked 35 pitches from Red Sox starter Brayan Bello in the first inning. It only produced one run, on a bases-loaded walk to Kerry Carpenter, but it set the tone for a short outing, which they hastened with a three-run fourth.
“The sooner you can get to their bullpen the better,” said McGonigle, who got two hits and hit three bullets off Bello, each with exit velocities above 100 mph. “I think we did a really good job of taking the tough pitches and making him come to the heart of the plate.”
Carpenter ignited the three-run fourth with his fourth home run of the season. He launched a change-up into the Tigers’ bullpen in right field.
After a walk to Wenceel Perez and a double by Javier Báez, Jake Rogers hit a sacrifice fly to center and McGonigle lashed an RBI single.
“Every game, no matter how much you are up or down, it’s always close,” McGonigle said. “This is the highest level of baseball and anything can happen at any time. I think we do a good job of not sitting on (a lead). We keep grinding it out, keep playing good baseball.”
Lefty Tyler Holton, who has allowed just one run in 9.1 innings this season, made sure there would be no Red Sox uprising. He got six straight outs, getting the game to the ninth inning and Kenley Jansen.
“He was huge,” Hinch said. “He got a couple of punch-outs, a couple of balls on the ground. He left those left-handed hitters on their bench (Jarren Duran, Masataka Yoshida, Marcelo Mayer) because of his ability to get the right-handed hitters out. I have a ton of confidence in him and he has a ton of confidence that he’s going to make pitches.
“Super huge for the rest of this four-game series to only use two relievers today.”
Jansen, the closer for the Red Sox in 2023 and 2024, pitched a scoreless ninth for his fifth save as a Tiger and 481st of his career, the most among active pitchers, third-most all-time.
It was Skubal’s first pitcher victory at Fenway Park, a fact that, well, it might not make it onto his resume.
“It was my first?” he said. “That’s cool, I guess. I don’t really care about that. I just want my team to win on the days I pitch. That’s what I care about, not my own personal wins.”
Chris.McCosky@detroitnews.com
@cmccosky
This article originally appeared on The Detroit News: Tarik Skubal pitches Detroit Tigers to first road win in 10 tries
Reporting by Chris McCosky, The Detroit News / The Detroit News
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
