Ace left-hander Tarik Skubal will take the mound as the Detroit Tigers look to avert a three-game series sweep by the Texas Rangers on Sunday evening in Arlington, Texas.
Skubal (10-3, 2.33 ERA) is the defending American League Cy Young Award winner.
Texas has captured five of its past six games and, with a 4-1 victory on Saturday, guaranteed a win of its second straight series against a first-place team. The Rangers took two of three from AL West frontrunner Houston prior to the All-Star break.
The Tigers lost their season-high sixth straight game but still own a double-digit lead in the AL Central. Detroit has just seven combined hits in the first two games of this set.
Skubal’s last appearance was a one-inning stint as the starter in the All-Star Game in which he allowed two runs on three hits and struck out two. He has a no-decision and a loss in his past two regular-season starts and surrendered four runs on four hits and two walks over five innings in 12-3 defeat at home against Seattle on July 11 in his most recent appearance.
Skubal’s “mini slump” followed a dominating June in which he won all five of his starts and allowed a combined seven runs over 33 1/3 innings of work. He’s struck out 153 and walked just 16 in 121 innings this season.
“I don’t want to take credit for what our team’s been able to do,” Skubal said at the All-Star Game. “I just play my role, which is pitch. It’s an honor to have the trust of the guys in the clubhouse that every time I go out, they think we’ll win. That’s probably the coolest thing about this.”
Skubal beat Texas at home 2-1 on May 9, allowing one run on two hits and striking out 12 in a seven-inning stint. That showing allowed him to improve his career mark against the Rangers to 2-1 over five starts and lower his ERA versus Texas to 2.97.
The Rangers scratched scheduled starter Nathan Eovaldi due to back tightness and will send left-hander Jacob Latz (1.0, 3.00) to the series finale.
Manager Bruce Bochy said Eovaldi experienced tightness in his back during batting practice on Saturday.
Latz’s last start was June 24, when he took a no-hit bid into the seventh inning before allowing a hit against the Baltimore Orioles. He has a 10.80 ERA without a decision in four career relief appearances against the Tigers.
Eovaldi had been dynamite as the Rangers’ “other ace” alongside Jacob deGrom.
Eovaldi is 3-0 in four starts since a month-long stint on the injured list that ended on June 27 and has lowered his ERA from 1.87 through his three appearances in July. He allowed two combined runs on 12 hits and two walks over 18 2/3 innings with 19 strikeouts over those three games.
Eovaldi gave up a run on five hits and a walk and fanned eight over 7 2/3 innings in his most recent start, a win over the division-leading Astros on July 13.
Eovaldi has produced 94 strikeouts in 91 innings over 16 starts. The Rangers recognize how much he has meant to them; even though he was not voted or selected to the All-Star team, Texas paid him a $100,000 All-Star bonus.
“I was very thankful and appreciative (for the payment of the bonus),” Eovaldi told the Dallas Morning News. “Representing the Rangers at the All-Star Game is always a goal of mine that I set out to achieve at the beginning of the season. So I’m thankful that they felt like I should have been on the All-Star team.”
–Field Level Media
