Add injury to insult on an already rough night for Tigers pitchers, as ex-Yankees prospect Rony Garcia had to leave Tuesday’s game against his old team with a hand issue after throwing just 15 pitches.
Garcia came in to start the second inning after starter Tyler Alexander was removed following a 42-pitch first, and with one on and one out, his 15th pitch of the outing was spiked directly into the dirt at the front of the mound and skittered towards the first base dugout:
Tigers trainers and manager A.J. Hinch came out to look at Garcia, whose hand was, as Suzyn Waldman said in the WFAN booth, “stuck in a claw-like motion.” The right-hander left the game to be replaced by Will Vest, who was the Tigers’ third pitcher of the evening after the first two recorded all of four outs, and the Tigers said shortly after that Garcia left with a cracked fingernail.
Garcia, 24, was originally an international free agent signing by the Yankees in 2015, and the Tigers selected him in the 2019 Rule 5 Draft after a year where he threw 130 1/3 innings between then High-A Tampa and Double-A Trenton.
The righty made 15 appearances in the shortened 2020 season, remaining on the Tigers’ roster all year to satisfy his Rule 5 requirements, but he pitched just 23 1/3 innings between Detroit and Triple-A Toledo in 2021 before a knee sprain ended his season in mid-June, and he had pitched 3 2/3 innings over two appearances this season before entering Tuesday’s game.
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