CHICAGO -- The Tigers placed starter Casey Mize on the IL with right adductor inflammation on Friday, the latest in a string of injuries that threaten to sink Detroit's once-promising season. The move was made retroactive to Thursday.
Mize was removed from his start against the Los Angeles Angels on Wednesday after he had thrown four scoreless innings because of discomfort in his right groin, an injury similar to one that landed him on the IL earlier this season.
Tigers manager A.J. Hinch is hopeful that this version of the injury is not as severe as the first one and said the move to the IL was made more out of the short-term needs of his roster than any alarm about Mize's injury.
"With Casey, we actually feel really good with where he's at, and it's less significant than it was when he had the episode in Atlanta," Hinch said. "But it's going to require a little bit of a slower week for him. We're in the stretch of games where we can't wait and don't have an off day, so we can't skip [his turn in the rotation]."
Mize, 29, is having perhaps the best season of his six-year career with a 2.27 ERA over nine starts and has been a bright spot in a Detroit rotation that has been besieged with injuries. In other words, the shorter his absence, the better.
"He really has the opportunity to potentially miss one start with some maneuvering of the rotation," Hinch said. "We're going to be cautious with it because we've gone through this before."
Reliever Beau Brieske was activated from the 60-day IL to take Mize's place on the roster. Brieske, who has been out since spring training with a left adductor strain, will join a bullpen that lost closer Kenley Jansen to a groin injury in the same game in which the Tigers lost Mize.
The Tigers transferred reliever Brant Hurter to the 60-day IL to open a 40-man roster spot for Brieskie.
Injury updates have become a part of Hinch's daily routine when he meets with the media with the flurry of maladies that have hit his team. Detroit currently has 15 players on IL, a list that includes 10 pitchers and a number of key position players such as Gleyber Torres, Javier Baez, Kerry Carpenter and Parker Meadows.
The pitchers out include two-time defending AL Cy Young winner Tarik Skubal and a pair of likely future Hall of Famers in Jansen and starter Justin Verlander, who is slated the throw a bullpen session Saturday. Skubal is scheduled to do the same at Tampa Bay on Monday.
Detroit, a playoff team in each of the past two seasons, was over .500 as recently as May 3. Since then, the Tigers have gone 4-18 and fallen into the AL Central cellar. Despite the challenges of the rash of injuries and the mounting loss total, Hinch is making no excuses for his team's struggles.
"I've never had a team that's faced this [many] injury struggles," Hinch said. "When you lose half your team at some point, it doesn't feel good. It doesn't look good. We're always searching for answers, but we're never going to use it as an excuse. Is it part of it? Of course it is."
