Casey Mize is on tap for Game 4, with the Tigers banking that will be enough to get them past the Mariners in the best-of-five series. Should the series extend to a winner-take-all final showdown, the clubs will return to Seattle, where Game 5 starters have yet to be announced.
The Tigers haven’t won at home since Sept. 6 — a shutout of the White Sox that featured yet another Skubal gem — and Flaherty welcomes the chance both to snap the team’s seven-game losing streak there and to experience postseason baseball in Detroit.
“It’s going to be a lot of fun. Hometown games are incredible. Playoff games in general are incredible,” he said. “You get to be at home, get the home crowd behind you.
“That last series there against Cleveland at home, they were behind us. We didn’t perform as well as we would have liked, but it’s all in the past now. So you just take that and hopefully, you know, multiply that times a couple.”
Flaherty, of course, was referencing the penultimate series of the home schedule, during which the Guardians swept Detroit to pull to within 3 1/2 games of a lead in the division they’d eventually win. The Tigers ultimately got the last laugh against the Guardians by winning the AL Wild Card Series two weeks later behind Flaherty’s 4 2/3 strong innings.
He’ll do his part to help history repeat itself, as Seattle owned the season series against the Tigers, 4-2, with both losses coming in Motown. Flaherty said the raucous home crowd is every bit an advantage he’s hoping to tap into.
“You know Detroit shows up, and it’s something I’m looking forward to,” Flaherty said. “You hear about it, so it’s something I’m looking forward to and just feeding off of that energy.”
Flaherty saw the Mariners just once this season, when he fanned seven and allowed two runs on a pair of solo homers over five innings during Detroit’s 8-4 loss on July 13. Having won a World Series with the Dodgers last season, the righty also brings experience of having competed — and succeeded — on baseball’s biggest stage, something that’s not taken lightly.
Mize starting Game 4 is a departure from the norm in that he had previously been in front of Flaherty in the rotation, but a key to the “pitching chaos” concept the Tigers are known for is flexibility on multiple fronts, so the decision made sense.
“Every series is a little different. We did flip them last time, and we’re doing it again,” manager A.J. Hinch said. “Both are working off relatively controllable pitch counts. … Obviously, Jack on regular routine [and] regular rest is really attractive. When he catches his rhythm and timing, the things we’ve seen over the last couple of starts, that’s a really good version of him.”
This configuration will give Mize an extra day of rest and work between his last start — a three-inning affair in Game 2 of the AL Wild Card Series against Cleveland — and Wednesday. While Flaherty matches up a bit better against Mariners batters, when Hinch was asked why he chose to lead with Flaherty, he hinted there were small reasons to follow this particular plan, but also said it could have gone either way.
Logan Gilbert will start for Seattle opposite Flaherty. The Mariners have not yet named a starter for Game 4.
