Skubal sails until hitting wall during Crew's 3-run 7th

DETROIT -- Tarik Skubal hasn’t had much reason to flash frustration so far this season. But as the reigning American League Cy Young Award winner marched back into the dugout in the seventh inning following Blake Perkins' game-tying two-run double, he had a moment.

Skubal chucked his glove off the dugout wall, then flipped a mini cooler onto the ground. A game that seemed entirely under his control a couple innings earlier had turned, and the Brewers’ lineup of pesky, persistent hitters had gotten to him, ending his run of back-to-back wins with four runs on seven hits in six-plus innings.

On this day, however, Skubal's team picked him up, with Jahmai Jones' pinch-hit, game-tying homer in the bottom of the eighth and Spencer Torkelson's first career walk-off home run the next inning giving the Tigers a 5-4 series-clinching win Thursday at Comerica Park.

Skubal looked primed for another run at a no-hit bid early, retiring Milwaukee’s first 11 hitters in order with five strikeouts. He needed just 26 pitches (24 strikes) for his first trip through the Brewers' lineup, and he didn’t reach a two-ball count until Brandon Lockridge leading off the fourth inning.

Skubal was a strike away from a fourth hitless inning before William Contreras and Gary Sánchez hit back-to-back doubles, the latter a soft line drive just out of reach of a charging Kerry Carpenter in right field.

Skubal regained his rhythm from there, keeping a lead he gained on Riley Greene’s two-run homer in the first inning. The Brewers tried getting Skubal out of sorts with back-to-back bunt singles leading off the sixth inning, but Skubal used the ground ball and a strong Tigers infield to his advantage for a Contreras double play to strand the potential tying run on third.

Skubal took the mound for the seventh inning with his pitch count under control and a two-run lead restored, but a bloop single from Sánchez and a ground ball through the right side from Luis Matos put the tying run on base. Perkins thought about bunting, but Skubal fired a fastball off of his bat as he backed away. Perkins fouled off a couple of tough two-strike pitches to keep his at-bat alive for the rare Skubal mistake, a 97 mph fastball that wandered over the plate for Perkins to turn on. Sánchez and Matos scrambled home as the ball rolled to the left-field fence and manager A.J. Hinch prepared to pull his ace.

Once David Hamilton singled home Perkins with a ground ball off Tyler Holton, Skubal was in line for his first loss since April 7 and his first home defeat since the Mariners got him last July 11. That is, until his teammates' late-game heroics.