Tigers' lack of support for Reese Olson reaches historic levels

The Tigers boast two of the best starting pitchers in baseball this season. Only one of them has been rewarded.

While Tarik Skubal has a 5-0 record to show for his 2.02 ERA, second best in the American League, Reese Olson remained 0-4 Tuesday night while shaving his ERA to 2.09, tied for third best in the AL. The young right-hander pitched eight shutout innings against the Marlins in the best start of his career only to watch the Tigers lose 1-0 in extra innings to one of the worst teams in the majors.

"That was a tough one, 10 innings of no runs," A.J. Hinch said Wednesday on 97.1 The Ticket. "Man, Reese has been incredible."

Olson, who beat out Matt Manning in spring training for the fifth spot in the Tigers' rotation, has allowed more than two runs just once in eight starts this season. In addition to his sparkling ERA, he's seventh in the AL in batting average against (.192) and tied for ninth in WHIP (0.99). And, of course, tied for last in wins.

The Tigers' lack of support for Olson is historic. Since ERA became an official stat in 1913, Olson is the only MLB pitcher ever to have an ERA under 2.25 and a record of 0-4 or worse over his first eight starts of the season.

In Olson's 47 1/3 innings this year, the Tigers have scored a total of eight runs -- or 1.53 runs per nine innings, by far the least run support in the majors. He has made six starts of five-plus innings and one earned run or fewer without getting a win, which matches Justin Verlander in 2016 and Frank Tanana in 1989 for the most by a Tigers pitcher in the last 50 years -- and we're only halfway through May.

"I’m just focused on throwing strikes and being competitive in the zone," Olson said after Tuesday's loss. "Our guys have been scoring runs, so I believe in them."

"He’s been unlucky but he’s pitched great," said Hinch. "And I think what gets overlooked with him is he won a competition (this spring). He was in the same mix with Matt Manning and Casey Mize. Reese wasn’t guaranteed anything coming into camp, so he had an unbelievably hard camp when it comes to schedule and he was pitching against all these good teams, on the road, and kept his head down and he’s doing the same thing now. Those zeroes come fast for him because he’s such a good strike-thrower and he’s got a lot of weapons. Reese keeps doing that, he’ll get plenty of wins."

The Tigers are 21st in the majors in runs scored, and 26th in OPS, but Hinch is confident the offense will soon come to life.

"We obviously are going to be a better offense as it warms up, that’s been the case for a lot of our guys," he said. "But it’s frustrating with these one-run games and one-run losses and opportunities missed. What I try to avoid as the manager is riding the rollercoaster to where they feel more pressure than ever when we do get run-scoring opportunities. Our best games are when we have a little bit of freedom and we’re willing to swing the bat a little earlier in the count and free ourselves up to take our best swings, but the low-scoring games are frustrating for all of us."

Olson, for his part, said that he's "happy with the way things have gotten off to a good start." Not that the 24-year-old ever had any doubt that he could succeed at this level: "I have all the confidence in the world in myself."