ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — Troy Melton gave the Detroit Tigers exactly what they needed Wednesday night: a rocky start, then eight innings that turned into a road win and a sweep. The rookie right-hander allowed runs in each of the first two innings, then retired 17 straight Tampa Bay hitters as Detroit beat the Rays 7-2 at Tropicana Field.
The win completed a three-game sweep and gave the Tigers 25 runs and 10 home runs across the series. That is the kind of burst Detroit had been searching for after a brutal 6-22 May, and it came against a Tampa Bay club that entered the matchup atop the AL East. For a team trying to stop the damage of that month, sweeping the division leaders on the road was a sharp answer.
Melton was not clean early. He allowed an RBI single to Yandy Diaz in the first inning and a solo home run to Cedric Mullins in the second, then walked Jonathan Aranda to open the third. After that, he never looked back. Melton needed just 24 pitches to get through the fourth through seventh innings, faced the minimum over the final five frames and finished with five strikeouts. It was the first time in his career that he completed eight full innings.
Detroit gave him support almost immediately. Dillon Dingler singled home Gleyber Torres in the first inning, then launched a two-out, three-run homer in the fourth for his third long ball of the season and his second four-RBI game. Jake Rogers added a home run off Nick Martinez in the second inning, ending a drought of 107 homer-less plate appearances, and later dropped a sacrifice bunt as the Tigers kept piling on.
Martinez had been coming in with a 1.62 ERA and had not allowed more than two runs in any of his previous 11 starts, which made Detroit’s work at the plate stand out even more. But the Tigers kept making hard contact and forcing Tampa Bay to work from behind. Melton, after leaning on his cutter once his four-seam fastball and splitter were not getting the job done early, drew 22 balls in play that averaged 86.9 mph off the bat and got nine ground-ball outs.
The sweep also offered something more than a clean finish to a series. It showed a team that had just been swept in three straight losses to the White Sox in Chicago could turn around quickly and take care of a strong opponent in its own park. The bigger question now is whether Melton can bring this same efficiency the next time he takes the mound. After an eight-inning outing like this, the Tigers will want to know if it was a breakthrough or just the start of one.
