DETROIT – We’re about to find out what this version of the Detroit Tigers is really made of over the next 14 days.
Starting Thursday, the Tigers enter a stretch of 14 straight games without a day off. They’ll play the division-rival Minnesota Twins seven times, the defending World Series champion Texas Rangers four times, and the ever-dangerous Tampa Bay Rays three times.
That’s a big step up from the competition the Tigers have seen so far. Other than a quick two-game series against the surprising Pittsburgh Pirates, the Tigers have had it easy, playing nine games against teams with a combined 10-25 record.
It was exciting to see the Tigers jump out to a 5-0 start, but there was a lingering concern in the back of everyone’s minds: Why can’t this team hit?
The offensive struggles finally caught up to them, as they lost four of their next five games before Pirates closer David Bednar gifted them a ninth-inning rally to break the streak.
So here we stand: 7-4 against weak competition with way more questions than answers.
Thursday will be the perfect barometer between the Tigers and Twins -- two of the teams expected to compete near the top of the AL Central. Both have their aces on the mound: Tarik Skubal for the Tigers and Pablo Lopez for the Twins.
Lopez is by far the best starter Detroit has seen, so Skubal will have to be nearly perfect to give his team a chance.
The Tigers will also see Joe Ryan and Bailey Ober this weekend before welcoming the Rangers to town for a four-game set. Then it’s off to Minneapolis for a quick rematch before a three-game trip to Tampa.
Detroit’s next off-day is April 25, and at that point, we’ll know whether this team is actually going to compete deep into the summer or if it’s going to be another long, disappointing season.
It’s clear already that the AL Central will be much better than advertised. In fact, the Tigers and Twins aren’t even in the top two spots.
Cleveland lost ace Shane Bieber for the rest of the season, but that hasn’t stopped a surprising offense from scoring 69 runs in 12 games to fuel a 9-3 start. The Guardians benefitted from playing the A’s and White Sox, but they also won a series in Seattle and took both games against the Twins.
The Royals are even more impressive. They nearly won a hard-fought series in Baltimore before returning home to take six straight -- including a pair against the Houston Astros. Kansas City has a superstar in Bobby Witt Jr. and some powerful bats behind him, and the starting rotation is sneaky good.
If the Tigers can come out of these next 14 games with a winning record, they’ll earn some credibility as the calendar flips to May. If not, one or more of the three other AL Central contenders could create a wide gap.
And we’ve all seen how the Tigers struggle to dig themselves out of holes the last three years.
During the spring, we heard the Tigers say they wanted to get off to a stronger start, and they’ve succeeded so far. But a “strong start” doesn’t mean beating up on the White Sox and Mets for a couple of weeks -- the Tigers need to win baseball games through the end of April.
Can they do it? We haven’t seen enough yet to know. But we’re certainly about to find out.