DETROIT — Akil Baddoo couldn’t contain his frustration. He slammed his helmet at the feet of first base coach Alfredo Amezaga in the fourth inning after he grounded out to shortstop. He knew immediately he’d hurt something.
On the day the Tigers activated left-handed hitting Kerry Carpenter off the injured list, Baddoo, a left-handed hitter, left the game with an apparent leg injury.
They just can’t get out of harm’s way.
There was no immediate update from the team on Baddoo’s condition, and the game itself did nothing to assuage their collective frustration.
The N.L. West-leading Arizona Diamondbacks blew open a tie game with a seven-run outburst in the top of the seventh inning to hand the Tigers their seventh straight loss, 11-6 Friday night at Comerica Park.
Corbin Carroll, who had homered in the first inning, capped the rally with his first career grand slam home run off reliever Will Vest.
The Tigers had just tied the game in the bottom of the sixth, and right-handed starter Michael Lorenzen was on a run of 12 straight outs as he took the mound in the seventh. But he gave up back-to-back doubles to Christian Walker and Josh Rojas and an RBI single to Jake McCarthy.
Vest entered with two on and two out and was victimized by a disputed catcher’s interference call and then a walk to load the bases ahead of Carroll.
It was a tough way for Lorenzen’s outing to end. After allowing solo runs in the first two innings, he steamrolled through the Diamondbacks’ lineups − dusting 12 straight hitters in 47 pitches − until the seventh. He ended up getting charged for six runs.
The Tigers scattered seven hits against Arizona right-hander Merrill Kelly for 6.1 innings but didn’t do much damage.
Carpenter made an immediate impact. He singled and scored the first run in the second inning and his single in the sixth set up the tying run.
And it was Zack Short who drove in both runs. He delivered Carpenter first with a double in the first and then drove a fly ball to the wall in center, the sacrifice fly scoring Nick Maton who had walked and advanced to third on Carpenter’s single.
Catcher Jake Rogers, who singled in the fifth, hit a pair of solo homers − extending his team lead to eight. He hit one to left in the seventh and one to right-center in the ninth.
Rogers had an interesting night. He was called for catcher’s interference twice. The first one prolonged the seven-run inning, though watching the replays it was hard to see where the interference occurred. Then in the eighth, another catcher’s interference call negated a double-play ground ball.
If there was any pocket of light in this one for the Tigers, it was slight signs of the offense perking up. The six earned runs was two more than their earned run total on the six-game road trip and the 11 hits was one less than they mustered in the three games in Philadelphia.
Javier Báez hit his fourth home run, also in the ninth. Spencer Torkelson had a single, double and a walk and scored a run. Maton walked and had an RBI single.
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