The Tigers are planning to pick left-hander Brant Hurter to pitch in tomorrow’s recreation towards the Royals, AJ Hinch informed reporters (together with The Athletic’s Cody Stavenhagen) earlier this afternoon. Hurter just isn’t but on the 40-man roster, however the Tigers nonetheless have an area open after transport Mark Canha, Jack Flaherty, and Andrew Chafin out on the day of the commerce deadline so a corresponding transfer will solely be obligatory so as to add the southpaw to the membership’s lively roster.
Hurter, 26 in September, was a seventh-round decide by the Tigers within the 2021 draft out of Georgia Tech. Hurter reached the Double-A degree in his first skilled season again in 2022 and went on to dominate the extent in 2023, with a 3.28 ERA in 118 innings of labor throughout 26 begins. He struck out a formidable 26.7% of batters confronted whereas strolling simply 6.6%, however the lefty has not been in a position to carry that success in Double-A over to his first style of Triple-A motion this yr. In 19 appearances (18 begins) on the highest degree of the minors in 2024, Hurter has been lit as much as the tune of a 5.80 ERA in 71 1/3 innings of labor. His strikeout charge has dropped to 21.7% whereas his stroll charge has crept up barely to 7.1%. Maybe extra notably, Hurter has struggled to maintain the ball within the park as typically as he did final yr, permitting extra residence runs already this yr than he did final yr regardless of a virtually 50-inning hole by way of quantity.
As he prepares for his MLB debut tomorrow, Stavenhagen notes that Hinch made clear that he is not going to be beginning the sport and can as an alternative act as a bulk arm following an opener. Whereas Hurter has typically been used as a typical starter within the minors up to now in his profession, he did have some success as a bulk pitcher earlier this yr, when he threw six scoreless innings at Triple-A towards the Reds’ Louisville affiliate after coming in as a reliever within the third inning.
With a rotation combine that at the moment options solely 4 pitchers (Tarik Skubal, Kenta Maeda, Bryan Sammons, and Kreider Montero), it will hardly be a shock if a powerful displaying from Hurter tomorrow earned him a extra prolonged look within the majors because the membership tries to piece collectively a rotation, whether or not that be in a correct beginning function going ahead or just as a bulk arm. The membership’s rotation depth took a large hit in latest weeks between the deal that shipped Flaherty to L.A. and up to date accidents to Reese Olson, Casey Mize, and Matt Manning. There was some suggestion previous to teh All-Star break that right-hander Beau Brieske could possibly be thought of for a rotation function within the second half, although that has not but come to move as he’s remained in a multi-inning reduction function out of the bullpen.
