UPDATE:
Daniel Norris has nondisplaced fractures in spinous process, Brad Ausmus said. "It sounds worse than it is," head trainer Kevin Rand said.
— Jason Beck (@beckjason) March 24, 2016
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The Detroit Tigers have a number of options to choose from to determine who will round off their starting rotation heading into the 2016 MLB season. It's likely going to be a battle until the very end of spring training.
Daniel Norris, Matt Boyd, Shane Greene and Buck Farmer are among the pitchers manager Brad Ausmus will have to choose from as Opening Day rapidly approaches. However, Norris hit a bump in the road today and left his start with lower-back tightness for the second time in four days and it's unknown if he'll be able to build up his pitch count to be ready for Opening Day.
Tigers have 4 vying for No. 5 starter -- boyd, greene, norris and farmer. Boyd has come up with a new slider. Looks great.
— Jon Heyman (@JonHeyman) March 22, 2016
Ausmus indicated last week that Norris and Greene were the only two being considered for the No. 5 spot, but with Norris' injury and Greene's awful 2015 campaign, it's hard to believe Boyd (2-0, 3.29 ERA and 1.10 WHIP in four spring starts) and Farmer (1-0, 3.00 ERA and 1.33 WHIP in five appearances) aren't among the other possibilities.
Greene is 1-0 with a 2.63 ERA and 1.17 WHIP in four games (two starts), so it's doubtful Ausmus will merely hand the job to the right-hander at this juncture in spring training, assuming Norris won't be able to be ready for Opening Day.
Ausmus even gave Boyd a vote of confidence on Tuesday, but essentially said spring training performance is not indicative of who will earn the job.
"In terms of performance, it's probably been Boyd and Greene so far," he told Jason Beck of MLB.com when talking about overall spring training performance. "They're probably pretty close. But I didn't say who performed the best. I said who we thought could perform the best."
For the first time in a while it looks like the Tigers have formidable depth among their entire pitching staff. Ausmus seemingly wants to take advantage of that by not being hasty in his selection of the final starter, but if Norris is out of the mix, it's not going to be an easy choice.
