The Tigers are going to promote pitching prospect Troy Melton, reports Jason Beck of MLB.com. Melton will start for the club on Wednesday, making his major league debut. The club will need to open a spot for him on both the 40-man and active rosters.
Melton, now 24, was the Tigers’ fourth-round pick in 2022. Since then, he has climbed the minor league ladder, putting up strong numbers along the way. Overall, he has thrown 273 minor league innings over 66 games. 63 of those were officially starts, with the other three technically being long relief outings. In that time, he has allowed 3.63 earned runs per nine with a 28.1% strikeout rate and 6.5% walk rate.
That includes his 75 1/3 innings this year, split between Double-A and Triple-A. He has a combined 2.99 ERA on the season. His 6.4% walk rate is still good and he has nudged his strikeout rate up to 32.4%.
Coming into 2025, many evaluators put Melton in the middle of the Tigers’ top 30 lists but Eric Longenhagen of FanGraphs was especially bullish. He gave Melton the #80 spot on his preseason top 100 list. Longenhagen notes that Melton sits in the upper 90s with his fastball with a slider and “splinker-style” changeup.
It’s unclear if Melton will be getting a rotation gig for a while or if this is just a spot start. The Tigers are three games into a stretch of playing 13 straight right after their pitchers where thrown off their normal routines by the All-Star break, so perhaps this is just to give everyone else a breather. Since this is his first major league call, he has a full slate of options and could be sent back down to the minors after his debut.
As of now, the Tigers have a rotation consisting of Tarik Skubal, Jack Flaherty, Reese Olson, Casey Mize and Keider Montero. The first four aren’t going anywhere but Montero’s not cemented in there. He’s been optioned to the minors and moved to the bullpen at times this year, so that could perhaps happen again if the Tigers want Melton to get more than just a spot start.
Photo courtesy of Junfu Han, Imagn Images.
Good move. Need some new blood to reinvigorate the team.
Go Troy. Go Canyon High Commanches!
Comanche 🙂
I was hoping they’d recall him this week to take Carlos Hernandez’s place in the pen.
Except the article says he’s set to start on Wednesday. That would be Reese Olson’s turn. However, they also have 13 games in 13 days so maybe it’s just trying not to tax the rotation. Fingers crossed!
They just came out of the all star break. You would think everyone would be well rested. Maybe it would make more sense in the middle of that stretch, not at the beginning.
I saw that. I was just saying I hoped he’d be put in the pen since it seems like the logical place for him right now with all their recent struggles. He has swing-and-miss stuff which our pen desperately needs. Lange will probably be up soon too.
Montero’s rotation spot is iffy. Olson goes Thursday. Skip Montero.
Mize on Friday. Skubal Saturday and back to Flaherty Sunday
Warnbeeb, you made my day! My 60th birthday is Saturday, and we get to see Skubal!
Could be a showcase.
I wouldn’t trade him for a rental, but I could handle it if the acquired player is under team control for at least another year.
Hernandez most likely to go. Manning will probably be DFA’d when they need another pitching spot.
I’m thinking Ennis on 26 man and Horn on 40 man?
I don’t believe I would DFA Horn. To much potential. Probably just release Hernandez.
What happened to Manning wasn’t the rotation supposed to have Skubal, Olson, Manning and Turnbull, Norris and Boyd a couple years ago as the future amazing rotation?Just curious not ripping on them.
Why would they do DFA Manning? Can’t Fetter fix him? I mean Fetter can fix anyone. I heard he magically turned a pile of garbage into Skubal. Why not give him a chance to work that magic on Manning?
Matt Manning has been in professional baseball for 10 years. His ERA, this year, his 10th, in AAA is over 6.00. His WHIP is 1.65.
His ship has sailed.
Unfortunately Manning has gone backwards and his stuff plateaued after his numerous injuries.
Great move. Guy throws mid 90’s and has been really good at both AA and AAA this year. He has 101 k’s in 75 innings this year. Could be a lottery ticket type promotion for the Tigers and or a big trade chip for next weeks deadline. Facing the Pirates this week should help ease him in as well.
I doubt they would dfa someone on the IL.
Smart to have him debut vs the Pirates. They’re gonna make him look like a hall of famer!
I’m excited to see him pitch, whether it’s to fill a rotation spot, a bullpen spot or as a trade showcase for something bigger.
I really do not get “splinker”
A split finger traditionally has very low/minimal spin while the effectiveness of a sinker is directly tied to spin.
No relation to Bill
If the A’s are willing to discuss Miller, Melton can as far as I’m concerned
Aztec 4 Life to the rescue.
Good move. Curious to see how he looks. He’s got good numbers on the farm and is well-regarded. I’d be very hesitant to trade him unless it’s for a top-shelf talent.
In pretendland, what if Melton and the rest of the pitching staff finished the 2nd half strong so much so that Flaherty was expendable and we made him the closer… He throws so many dang pitches and has a good k rate. Maybe a playoff idea
I should hire a promoter.
Flaherty is looking brutal these days.
Running out of arms, unless we can trade for one or two, why not ?
Flaherty cannot get a swing and miss on pitches in the strike zone. Watch. If it’s in the zone and they swing, they hit it. Might be a foul, but they don’t miss anything in the zone.
Greene has been figured out. His swing is so angled (45%) that he can’t barrel high heat. Look how many lazy pop ups he hits. He’s K’ing over 40% in July. He hits it hard, maybe, once per week.
McKinstry should hit 3rd. Greene needs to hit 5-6-7.
Tigers should get McGonigal to Toledo. See if he can help in September. Watched Erie yesterday. Both he and Clark come to the plate looking to hit. Nothing bothers them. They don’t have Bryce Harper’s power, but they sure look like him otherwise. Those two guys have bat to ball talent.
Riley has struck out 3 times tonight vs Pirates.
I think the Tigers can still win the division even if they win only 2 games/week for the rest of the season. 80-82 could still win this pathetic division..
To me, the Royals are the only team capable of catching them.
Ya SDSU ya!
They can limp in, but playoff run could be short.
Mauricio best tools , Baty most in need of self confidence, vientos in need of minor league stint for batting practice . One day all 3 will be stars but unfortunately not all with Mets.
Agree good move. Tigers have enough starting pitching to go deep in playoffs. Need a big bat. Everyone can use a high leverage reliever. Some of the better available ones are in tigers division so tigers would have to overpay .
This is will be interesting. Can’t wait to see how it goes in the next couple of weeks!
This sounds like an audition for the trade deadline sellers to me.
Can Melton bat 3rd too?
Rough outing for Melton: 5 IP, 7 h, 7 R, 2 BB, 7 K, 2 HR. Pirates jumped on him early. But it could have been worse. AJ left him in to log some more IPs, and he finished on positive note with 2 scoreless innings.
10.80 ERA