Tigers lose to Yanks for fifth straight loss

The entire city of Detroit now turns its lonely eyes to Tigers rookie Drew Smyly.

It's a lot to ask of a 22-year-old rookie making his fourth major league start and first at venerable Yankee Stadium to snap a five-game losing streak but that's what it's come to just 20 games into the season.

After the Tigers fell to the Yankees, 7-6, Friday night, they found themselves at 10-10 and tied with the Chicago White Sox at one game behind the Cleveland Indians, who lead the Central Division at 10-8.

The good news for the Tigers is that Smyly has thus far been completely unfazed by his big league experience.

In his last start, Smyly held down arguably the hottest lineup in the American League, the Texas Rangers, keeping them to just one run on five hits in six innings.

It won't get any easier Saturday as Smyly knows, having watched the Yankees tagging reigning AL MVP and Cy Young winner Justin Verlander for five runs (four earned) on seven hits in six innings.

"I mean, they're good," Smyly told FOX Sports Detroit's Trevor Thompson during the post-game show Friday night. "They're definitely good. It was fun. They're professional hitters. They've been around, doing it for a long time. So it's exciting to go out there and pitch against someone you've been watching on TV since you were a kid. Now you're in there, trying to help your team win the game. I'm pumped for it but you can't treat them any differently or it's going to backfire on you."

Yankees catcher Russell Martin hit a 92-mile-an-hour Verlander fastball out in the fifth inning, giving his team a 4-3 lead at that point. It was the first home run Verlander has allowed this season and the first in the regular season since last Sept. 24 when Baltimore's Mark Reynolds hit one.

"It was tough to feel the ball but that's the way it is on any cold night, you've got to get used to that, especially when your home park's in Detroit," Verlander told Thompson after the game. "But made some bad pitches, made some good ones that were hit hard. I look at the pitch to Martin, that really for me was the game when he hit that home run. Pretty good pitch. I would take my chances 99 times out of 100 with that pitch but tonight it didn't work in my favor."

It wasn't all bad news for the Tigers as the bats finally showed signs of coming to life after averaging just four runs a game on the recent 1-6 home stand.

Austin Jackson, who had cooled off after a hot start much like the rest of the team, went 4-for-5 with two RBI and two runs scored. He and Prince Fielder helped Verlander leave the game with a 6-5 lead.

Miguel Cabrera, who had an RBI single in the third inning, reached 1,000 career RBIs, the youngest to do so since Alex Rodriguez.

"He's a tremendous young player, one of the best in all of baseball," manager Jim Leyland told Thompson. "He'll get another thousand before his career is over. He's that kind of player."

Brad Eldred also had a pretty auspicious Tigers debut, hitting an RBI triple in his first at-bat and going 2-for-5.

"I wasn't sure if he was going to catch it or not, made the dive there and got past him so I was obviously fired up to get that first run across the board for us," Eldred told Thompson.

Back to the bad news. The Tigers lost the 6-5 lead in the eighth when Mark Teixeira hit a sacrifice fly off Joaquin Benoit.

Young Brayan Villarreal threw hard but didn't quite have the command he needed. His ball in the dirt in the bottom of the ninth got past Avila for a passed ball, scoring Derek Jeter for the game-winning run.

"I thought we swung the bats much better tonight," Leyland said. "I thought Verlander was pretty good but he probably didn't have his off-speed stuff going. He didn't have a real good feel for his changeup.

"I don't know if it was the cold weather or what, his off-speed stuff, he didn't look as comfortable with it. We had a chance to close it down. We just didn't do it. Of course he was a little wild, obviously. Kid was probably pumped up a little bit, got a little wild."

It's too early to have Panic in Tigertown, despite the skid.

"I think everybody in this locker room is still confident in this team and our ability," Verlander said. "It's just a matter of time before we turn it on, and when we do, I think it's going to be a lot of trouble for a lot of teams."

Now the Tigers just hope Smyly can give the Yankees hitters a little trouble.