Yanks barely make Skubal sweat as anticipated pitchers' duel turns one-sided

NEW YORK – Tarik Skubal grew up in Arizona, pitched collegiately in the Pacific Northwest and has pitched in all sorts of conditions as a Tiger. Pitching in the heat is not going to aggravate him. Still, Skubal tends to sweat through jerseys quickly, prompting clubhouse manager Dan Ross to leave extras available for him to change through as his game goes on.

Usually, Skubal heads into a summer game with three jerseys on hand, and he’ll change every other inning while the clubhouse staff runs the old jersey through the dryer. On Tuesday night at Yankee Stadium, with a heat advisory looming around New York, the Tigers had four Skubal jerseys ready just in case.

Turns out Skubal didn’t need them; he changed jerseys only once. The air conditioning in the visitors’ dugout was going strong. And the way Skubal was dealing, he wasn’t out in the heat for long.

Nor were his teammates.

“When Skub's rolling, he's pounding the zone, he's striking people out, but it's not taking too long, either,” Kerry Carpenter said after the Tigers’ 9-3 win over the Yankees. “It feels like you're out there and then back in pretty quickly.”

As Skubal rolled through the Yankees’ lineup, all the heat was coming from him. He retired 13 consecutive batters, nine by strikeout, after Ben Rice’s first-inning homer. Skubal changed jerseys after the fifth inning, then allowed an unearned run in the sixth.

Had Skubal gone out for the seventh inning, he might have switched back. But the way the Tigers were rolling, they didn’t need him to.

It was a masterful bit of revenge for the two-time reigning American League Cy Young Award winner, and it held up Skubal’s end of what was expected to be a pitching duel opposite Yankees ace Cam Schlittler. Four Tigers home runs off Schlittler, two from Riley Greene, turned the potential duel into a runaway.

After allowing three homers to the Yankees last Wednesday at Comerica Park, Skubal was secretive about any adjustments he’d make. As Rice’s homer off a 94.9 mph fastball left the yard, it looked like more of the same. Then came the adjustment: Skubal threw the kitchen sink.

Skubal quickly ramped up, reaching back for a 98 mph heater to fan Ali Sánchez in the third inning. That started him on a five-batter strikeout streak that included four different strikeout pitches. Paul Goldschmidt, who homered twice off Skubal last week, fanned on a changeup to end the third. Amed Rosario fanned on a slider leading off the fourth. Skubal flipped a curveball into the zone for a called third strike to Rice, then fired a 99 mph fastball past Jasson Domínguez.

“I think it was an excellent job of using his whole arsenal,” manager A.J. Hinch said. “I mean, he was awesome. And some of that comes from facing a team back-to-back times. I think you're going to get a little bit more creative. You're going to try to show them something that maybe they didn't see last time. He was able to spin his breaking ball a little bit more.”

Skubal racked up 13 whiffs over 46 swings – four each on his fastball and his changeup – to go with 15 called strikes. Just as impressively, he consistently worked ahead in counts, delivering first-pitch strikes to 17 of 20 batters.

“My stuff was pretty good today,” Skubal said. “I think [catcher Dillon Dingler] did a good job of figuring out spots to throw curveballs and throw spin and use the changeup effectively. I think I was able to get to my glove side a little bit better with four-seamers and sinkers. And that opens a lot, especially when they're all right-handed. They have to cover a lot of stuff. I think I got into a good rhythm there and competed well. So all in all, a good day.”

Skubal and fellow Tigers All-Star pitcher Casey Mize quieted the Yankees over the first two games of this series, combining for 19 strikeouts and no walks over 13 innings with just two hits allowed. Per STATS, combined with Jack Flaherty's nine strikeouts and two hits allowed on Sunday vs. Houston, it was just the second time in AL history a team had its starter strike out nine or more batters while allowing two or fewer hits in three straight regular-season or postseason games (joining Justin Verlander, Anibal Sánchez and Max Scherzer on Oct. 10-13, 2013).

“It's pretty awesome,” Carpenter said. “That's a good lineup, and they're making it look pretty easy, and it's not that easy. It's pretty fun to watch, fun to play behind them.”

The result was a display at the end of June that looked a lot like Detroit did at the start of the month, when it swept the Rays at Tropicana Field. And as the Tigers (37-49) head into what is likely a now-or-never month for them to show they can get back into the American League playoff chase, they have another reminder how dangerous they can be when they’re clicking in multiple facets of their game.

“We definitely have some swagger about us right now,” Skubal said.