Life of Pi: Tigers vs. Mariners ALDS Preview

Did you know that Tarik Skubal attended Seattle University? What’s that? You knew it already? Oh. Well, that’s great. Kudos to you for doing the research. I hope you are prepared to have that one fact bludgeoned so deeply into your brain over the next week that decades hence, when all the other thoughts start falling out of your aged skull, it will be all that remains. “Seattle Redhawks, only D-I program to offer him a scholarship,” you’ll mutter over and over like a protective spell as you putter through the halls of the nursing home. After defeating the Cleveland Guardians in the Wild Card round, the Detroit Tigers are headed to Seattle for the American League Divisional series. Tarik Skubal is coming home. Let’s get to the preview.

With the second-best record in the American League, the rested Seattle Mariners certainly look to be the clear favorite. They’ve got three (or maybe four) great starters lined up. They’ve got a top-10 bullpen by both ERA and FIP. Their team 113 wRC+ gives them the third-best offense in baseball. They finished the season by winning 17 of their last 21 games. On the other hand, it’s worth noting that all 17 of those wins came against non-playoff teams. Before that 21-game stretch started, the Mariners lost four straight, also to non-playoff teams. Their final act of the regular season was getting swept at home by the Dodgers. The Mariners finished the season with just three more wins than the Tigers and a run differential advantage of just five runs. Their Pythagorean records are identical. These teams are not as different as you may think.

During the Wild Card round, the Tigers were forced to empty their bag of tricks in order to hold off a Guardians team that stole the AL Central crown from under their noses. They relied on their ace, they coaxed just enough great relief performances out of a less-than-great bullpen, they played small ball, they induced errors, they bafflingly pinch-hit for their best hitter. During Game 3, they even got desperate enough to try scoring some runs. Will they come into the ALDS depleted, or will they finally regain the swagger they had when they went into the All-Star break with the best record in baseball?

In the other dugout, the question is whether the Mariners will be rusty. They set out a schedule designed to keep them in the swing of things during a five-day layoff. They took Monday off and held a light team workout on Tuesday. They held full intrasquad scrimmages in front of fans on Wednesday and Thursday, replete with the Salmon Run, which Victor Robles jumped into and won in order to make sure that Humpy’s winless streak remained intact. (More importantly, Robles showed no signs of spawning then dropping dead, as is traditional after a salmon run.) Cal Raleigh and Eugenio Suárez homered. Ichiro Suzuki played right field and flashed Julio Rodríguez’s No Fly Zone sign after making a catch. The Mariners will hold another light workout today. “Like they say, motion is lotion,” Raleigh told reporters, leading one to wonder: Who are they? Why on earth would they ever say this? And how can I go back to a time when this expression hadn’t lodged itself in my consciousness?

Starting Pitching

After using their three dependable starters in the Wild Card series, the Tigers’ lack of pitching depth may well be the story in Game 1. Skubal, the ace of all aces, is lined up to pitch Game 2 on Sunday on regular rest, with Casey Mize and Jack Flaherty lined up for Games 3 and 4. That leaves Troy Melton and Keider Montero for Game 1, possibly with Melton starting and Montero in a bulk role. The good news for the Tigers is that two travel days would allow Skubal to pitch Game 5 on regular rest.

In a way, the big question for the Mariners is whether Bryan Woo will be available to pitch at any point during the series. Woo went 15-7 with a 2.94 ERA this season and would have been the logical Game 1 starter, but he hasn’t pitched since September 19 due to pectoral inflammation. He threw a 15-pitch simulated game on Thursday, but told reporters, “I’m still not where I want to be in terms of game speed of everything… A week from now, hopefully we’ll be in a better spot.” However, a week from Thursday would be Game 5. As you’ll see, having their best starter available for Game 5 would be great, but it would still leave the team with a major hole to plug for Game 4.

The Mariners are expected to announce their Game 1 starter today, and they’ll be able to choose from three pitchers with five first names between them: Logan Gilbert, George Kirby, and Luis Castillo. Although Kirby ran a 4.21 ERA this year, the highest of the bunch by far, both he and Castillo closed out the season on a high note, and all three pitchers ran FIPs between 3.38 and 3.88 while putting up between 2.4 and 2.6 WAR. Whatever order they decide on, the Mariners will be able to come out of the gate with three quality starters.

That leaves Game 4 on Wednesday, just four days after Game 1, which means that the Game 1 starter won’t be ready to pitch on full rest. In an ideal world, Woo will be ready on Wednesday, and the Mariners will have their best pitcher going in what would be an elimination game for one team or the other. The more likely scenario is that the Mariners will use some combination of Bryce Miller and Emerson Hancock while cobbling together a bullpen game. Getting Woo back for Game 5 – in a matchup against Skubal, no less – would be great, but at that point, the Mariners would already have both their Game 1 and Game 2 starters available to pitch on regular rest; Woo wouldn’t represent that big of an improvement. Getting him back for Game 4 and dodging a bullpen game or an underwhelming starter really could change the complexion of the series. Still, it’s unlikely, and both teams will probably end up having to survive some form of bullpen game.

As for which of Seattle’s three healthy starters gets the ball tomorrow, it’s at least possible that the schedule could have some effect on Seattle’s decision-making process. They have some pretty big splits this season. Kirby has by far the worst ERA on the road, but the best FIP. If the Mariners put stock in those numbers, they might look to push him to Game 3:

Relief Pitching

The bullpens look like the real differentiator between these two teams. In Andrés Muñoz, Matt Brash, Eduard Bazardo, and Gabe Speier, the Mariners can roll out four different relievers with sub-3.00 ERAs (and only one FIP above 2.69). Luke Jackson has also pitched lights-out over 10 appearances since going from Detroit to Seattle, though admittedly his early-season results were less impressive.

Over the regular season, the Tigers bullpen ranked 17th by ERA and 24th by FIP, and then it ran even worse numbers against the lowly Guardians offense in the Wild Card round. They’ll now face one of the best offenses in baseball. Will Vest, Kyle Finnegan, and Tyler Holton pitched brilliantly against the Guardians, but if any of them should falter, the Tigers may not have the depth to finish the job.

Hitting

For a couple of reasons, the Mariners should have the edge here. Although they scored just eight more runs than the Tigers over the course of the season, they did so in the most difficult offensive environment in baseball. They hold the wRC+ advantage, 113 to 103. They can roll out MVP candidate Cal Raleigh and Rodríguez, who, as usual, has been playing on an MVP pace during the second half. In Dominic Canzone, Josh Naylor, Jorge Polanco, and Randy Arozarena, they’ve got four more players with a 120 wRC+ or higher. The only Tigers to beat that mark were Riley Greene at 121 and Jahmai Jones, who ran his 159 wRC+ over just 150 plate appearances. The Mariners will also run out all right-handed starters, and the Tigers have been worse against righties this year, running a 98 wRC+. Moreover, the Tigers batted just .218 with one home run against the Guardians.

Still, neither team is a pushover. Javier Báez was the biggest hole in the Detroit lineup this season, running a wRC+ of just 86, but he went off in the Wild Card series. Moreover, his giant weakness is chasing pitches out of the strike zone, and in the Mariners, he gets to face the team with the third-highest in-zone rate in baseball. Kerry Carpenter also had a great Wild Card series, and after missing the past two weeks due to rib inflammation, Colt Keith and his 109 wRC+ may also return at some point during the series. Also, the Tigers won’t have to face Tarik Skubal.

The narratives are just sitting there waiting for us. Raleigh will have the chance to put an exclamation mark on a possible MVP season. Skubal, the presumptive AL Cy Young, could get the chance to pitch two games, including Game 5, in Seattle (where, and I don’t know whether you’ve heard this before, he went to college). The Mariners starting rotation, which has the league’s best ERA over the past three years, has the chance to dominate in the postseason. No matter what happens, we’ll either hear that the Tigers finally righted the ship against the Guardians while the Mariners were rusty after a five-day layoff, or that the Guardians exposed the Tigers’ weaknesses while the Mariners’ 90-win season was proof that they’re true championship contenders. At some point in between all the storylines, they’ll play some baseball too.