CLEVELAND -- Like many Major League relievers, Tyler Holton was once a pretty good starter. He was a 10-game winner at Florida State in 2017 before an Opening Day injury the following season led to Tommy John surgery and a ninth-round pick by the Diamondbacks in the MLB Draft. He was a regular starter as recently as ‘19 in Arizona’s farm system before making the jump to the bullpen.

Still, that didn’t prepare Holton for what he did this week at Progressive Field. Nor did it give Tigers manager A.J. Hinch a reason to hand the lefty reliever the ball to start.

“I guess the whole thing about the bullpen is not knowing when you’re going to come into the game,” Holton said. “But starting, going to sleep the night before, you’re getting ready to go. It’s a little bit different.”

Twice in three days, Holton started a bullpen game against the Guardians, facing nearly the exact same lineup. Twice, he emerged with a scoreless outing, including two innings in Thursday’s 3-0 win to salvage a four-game series split and a 4-3 road trip to open the second half. “Two-Start Tyler” tossed 3 2/3 scoreless innings combined on three hits with a walk and four strikeouts.

He hasn't allowed a run in his past 12 appearances.

In a season that has featured Tarik Skubal and Jack Flaherty as the horses of the Tigers’ rotation, Holton deserves some love for helping Detroit through a critical stretch with three viable starters. It’s not what the Tigers want, especially when they entered the season with seemingly more starting pitching options than they knew what to do with.

“We’re not in a good spot,” Hinch said Thursday morning.

That makes what Detroit is doing even more impressive. The Tigers return to Comerica Park on Friday for a nine-game homestand against the Twins, Guardians and Royals within two games of .500. With no starter listed for Sunday’s series finale against Minnesota, it’s possible Holton will get a third opening assignment this week, depending on how the Twins’ lineup shakes out.

He’s getting the hang of it with repetition.

“I changed my routine slightly today, just trying to make it feel more bullpen-ish [with] the amount of throws that I did in the bullpen,” Holton said. “I feel like it paid off. I felt like I had a little bit more energy coming into the game today and just a better mindset. I felt like my stuff was a little bit crisper today.”

Holton’s value in versatility has been apparent since last season, when he tossed 85 1/3 innings over 59 games after joining Detroit on a waiver claim at the start of Spring Training. He appeared in every inning from the first to extras, and he has pitched in every inning from the first to the ninth this season. He has the pitches to dominate lefty-lefty matchups, and the change of speeds to keep right-handed hitters off-balance.

He has become a Swiss army knife of sorts for a manager who has come around to bullpen games. Thursday marked the third time in as many seasons that the Tigers used six or more pitchers in a shutout. Holton has pitched in two of them, including a seven-pitcher blanking of the Guardians on the next-to-last game of the 2023 season.

“He throws strikes,” Hinch said. “I don’t want to jinx him, but he’s going to pound the strike zone. He can really get the ball to all four areas of the strike zone, and he can throw a ball when he wants. He even mixed in a couple curveballs today, which is not something he does in the traditional reliever role, but he has it in his repertoire. Changeup’s always good. The cutter to both sides of the plate today was excellent. And he’s fearless.

“Going into a game, he’s not going to make anything more out of it than what’s there. And when you look at the outing, four out of five [hitters atop Cleveland’s order] are All-Stars. It’s a pretty incredible effort.”

Holton was aware of the All-Stars, though he didn’t try to focus on them or try too hard to mix things up for a second matchup in three days.

“They definitely have some threats there in their lineup,” Holton said, “but you have to stick to your strengths. You have to go out there and pitch at the end of the day. You don’t want to overthink it.”