DETROIT -- What fans at Comerica Park witnessed on Tuesday night was a pitching matchup that could possibly be seen again at next month's All-Star Game on July 16 at Globe Life Field.

Phillies left-hander Ranger Suárez matched the zeros Tigers southpaw Tarik Skubal put up on the scoreboard through four innings, but Suárez gave up four runs in the fifth inning of a 4-1 series-evening loss.

Suárez (10-2) had yielded only four runs total in June until this outing, while the nine hits allowed were a season high. However, he entered this start leading the National League with a 1.75 ERA and an opponents’ OPS of .538, while ranking second with a 0.89 WHIP.

“I thought he was fine,” manager Rob Thomson said. “I’ve seen him better. When they scored in the fifth, I thought he got a couple up in the zone. There have been a lot of games where he got ahead more than he did tonight.

“But I thought he was fine, and he battled. There wasn’t a whole lot of hard contact out there.”

Suárez went six innings, striking out four and allowing zero walks. Skubal (9-3) pitched seven scoreless innings with seven strikeouts, allowing three hits.

“That’s one of the better performances we’ve seen this year,” Thomson said. “I mean, [Skubal’s] got really good stuff. He comes right after you. He throws strikes. Secondary pitches, real good. The heater gets on you.

“He’s got really good stuff. He should be an All-Star.”

Phillies right fielder Nick Castellanos was asked what made Skubal so tough.

“Well, we’ll just put the fact that he can throw 101 [mph] over here,” said Castellanos, motioning away with his left hand. “He can throw all pitches for strikes. Hats off to him, he commanded the zone.

“When he fell behind, he knew how to get back without just giving you a cookie. Yeah, he performed, competed. Any time a pitcher comes up against us, it’s a challenge, and he was ready for it.”

Bryce Harper continued his power barrage with his 20th homer of the season off Detroit reliever Jason Foley in the ninth, but that was it for the usually formidable Philadelphia offense.

Harper also doubled in the third inning, extending his extra-base hit streak to six straight games, one shy of his career high. But singles by Kyle Schwarber and Whit Merrifield were the only other Phillies hits.

Detroit broke it open in the fifth, when the bottom three hitters in the order, Justyn-Henry Malloy, Jake Rogers and Ryan Kreidler, all singled to load the bases with none out. Philadelphia shortstop Trea Turner reached Kreidler’s ball in the hole, and it glanced off the heel of his glove. But he didn’t have enough time to record the out at second or third.

Then ex-Phillie Matt Vierling knocked in the first run with a groundout to short before Andy Ibáñez lined a single to center to score two.

Ibáñez said: “In the meeting before the game, we made a decision: All of us had to focus on the middle of the field, just a little bit to the left, but focus on the middle. So basically my at-bats, just focus on hitting the ball all the time to the middle of the field. We know that he throws a lot of sinkers and he gets a lot of ground balls because of his sinker, so we were waiting for that.”

Riley Greene finished the scoring by scorching a triple that one-hopped over first baseman Harper’s outstretched glove.

“Things didn’t go as we planned or we wanted,” Suárez said via interpreter Diego D’Aniello. “But I felt that I threw good pitches.”

If Suárez is selected to start the All-Star Game, he would be the first Philadelphia pitcher to do so since late Hall of Famer Roy Halladay in 2011.

When asked if he could possibly match up with Skubal again in the Midsummer Classic, Suárez said, “Honestly, I don’t think about that. I still have a couple starts left before that, and I just want to finish strong on those starts remaining before the break, and get the team some wins.”

Still, this one was definitely an in-season pitching matchup to be savored.

“You don’t get matchups like this very often,” Philadelphia president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski said before the game.

Dombrowski touched on what’s made Suárez so good so far: “He has a fire that burns bright, but it’s deep inside him. He doesn’t show it on the outside, but it’s there.”