Wentz makes strong impression with spot start

CLEVELAND -- Joey Wentz was on turn to start in Triple-A Toledo this weekend when the Tigers’ rainout here Thursday presented an opportunity to hop over and get another big league start. For five innings Friday night, he made the most of the spot opportunity.

Though his five scoreless innings got lost in an eighth-inning bullpen breakdown for a 4-1 loss to the Guardians and a doubleheader split at Progressive Field, the performance was a reminder of the Wentz that Tigers officials saw down the stretch last year. He still has work to do to get back to that form, but as he prepared to hop back over on the Ohio Turnpike and rejoin the Mud Hens, he could do so with reason for encouragement.

“I thought I just executed some pitches better,” Wentz said. “That’s kind of what I attribute it to, to be honest. I thought I threw the ball pretty good. Just happy to throw some zeros up for the team.”

The Tigers were five outs away from what would’ve been their second doubleheader sweep of the Guardians this season thanks almost entirely to Wentz. The Tigers were initially planning to start Matt Manning as scheduled Friday night, but instead, the club used the 27th roster spot for the doubleheader to recall Wentz, who entered with a 2-10 record and 7.03 ERA with the Tigers this season but had success against the Guardians, whom he beat in Cleveland in May.

It’s a notoriously tough lineup to strike out, but one that can be handled with soft contact. It’s also a lineup that featured five left-handed hitters for him, having used a righty-heavy lineup against fellow Tigers southpaw Tarik Skubal in the opener, a 4-2 Tigers victory. The balance prevented manager A.J. Hinch from stretches of righties or lefties, but it also allowed him to keep rolling with Wentz if he was on.

“This is an unusual lineup for him to face with so many lefties, so that’s going to change his pitch mix a little bit,” Hinch said. “Obviously, [it was] a long day for everybody and it’s not his general lineup that he’s going to face, even when he faces Cleveland. So he could mix and match a little bit off of their lineup, and I thought he responded pretty well.”

For the season, Wentz throws his cutter on about a quarter of his pitches. Friday, Wentz threw cutters on 34 of his 83 pitches, or 41 percent of the time, making that his primary offering and throwing secondary stuff off of that, including his four-seam fastball. While the cutter drew nine swings and misses, the four-seamer became a finishing pitch for strikeouts of Brayan Rocchio in the fourth inning and Gabriel Arias in the fifth.

Wentz went with back-to-back cutters to retire Guardians All-Star José Ramírez on a popout to first with a runner on in the third inning, then tripped him up a couple innings later with a first-pitch changeup following back-to-back one-out walks in the fifth. Ramírez popped that up harmlessly to Zack Short in foul territory behind third base.

“I liked the cutter quite a bit,” Wentz said. “When I get it to the right places, it’s a good pitch for me.”

Wentz tossed five scoreless innings for the first time since last September. Combine his effort with Skubal’s six strong innings in the opener, and Tigers starters held the Guardians to one run on seven hits over 11 innings for the doubleheader, the Tigers’ league-leading sixth twin bill of the season.

Andy Ibáñez’s fourth-inning RBI double over Oscar Gonzalez’s head stood as the lone run in the nightcap until the Guardians finally broke out in the eighth, capitalizing on Andrés Giménez’s four-pitch leadoff walk off lefty Andrew Vasquez. José Cisnero induced a ground ball from Gonzalez but lost Kole Calhoun to a one-out walk.

Rocchio, who had six strikeouts and one walk for the doubleheader, lined a game-tying single through the middle for his first ball in play of the day. Brennan’s ensuing drive to center carried over Matt Vierling’s head for two more runs.

That left Wentz with a no-decision despite a strong impression. With the Tigers looking to give several starters an extra day of rest when they can, and some starters nearing innings levels above and beyond where they reached last year, he’ll likely get another chance or two down the stretch as the Tigers survey their options going into the offseason, not to mention try to figure out Wentz’s long-term fit.