Tigers’ Spencer Turnbull no-hits Mariners

Seattle — You wondered what it would look like. Just how dominant could he be, with that arsenal, with that freakish movement and velocity, if he could just harness it and command it.

It might just look like this. Spencer Turnbull, in his 50th bigleague start, pitched the eighth nohitter in Tigers history in a 5-0 win over the Seattle Mariners at T-Mobile Park Tuesday night.

He took the mound in the ninth inning at 100 pitches. He walked lefthanded hitting Jose Marmolejos, losing him after getting ahead 0-2. He struck out Sam Haggerty, another left-handed hitter, for the first out.

He got Jarred Kelenic to ground into a fielder's choice, which brought up Mitch Haniger. Haniger hit two of the hardest balls off Turnbull in the game. Turnbull struck him out on three pitches.

No-hitter. He was mobbed in the middle of the diamond by his teammates.

The 28-year-old Turnbull in his third full season, is the first Tigers pitcher to throw a no-hitter since Justin Verlander's second career nohitter on May 7, 2011.

The only blemishes on his night were the lead-off walk to Marmolejos in the ninth, and a lead-off walk in the fourth inning to the rookie Kelenic. He struck out nine and induced 12 groundball outs.

Turnbull was spotting his fourseam fastball expertly. He got 10 swings and misses with it. His slider was slow to come around, but it was darting and diving to both sides of the plate by the end.

Jeimer Candelario, who knocked in two runs and scored the third, also made a sterling defensive play to help keep Turnbull’s no-no intact in the seventh inning. Mitch Haniger, who in his career had reached base in all 12 games he’s played against the Tigers, hit a shot just to the right of Candelario toward the third base line.

The ball left his bat with an exit velocity of 108.4 mph. Statcast estimated a .660 hit probability. But Candelario made a quick sliding move to his right, backhanded a high hop and threw Haniger out at first.