Detroit Tigers reliever Brayan Villarreal admitted that his arm felt weak after a tough stretch of outings that saw him allow the same number of runs as outs that he recorded. Because of that, he underwent an MRI, which showed no major damage to his pitching elbow, according to MLive.com's Chris Iott.
Villarreal does, however, have some minor elbow inflammation, and it will likely force him to miss the upcoming series against the Minnesota Twins, which starts Monday at 7:10 p.m. CT.
Aside from the recent bad outings, the 25-year-old Villarreal has been very good out of the Tigers' bullpen this season, posting a 2.41 ERA and 11.6 K/9 over the course of 35 relief appearances. In his absence, the Tigers will have to rely on their starters to go a little deeper into games. That won't include Justin Verlander, as Anibal Sanchez goes Monday night, with Doug Fister and Max Scherzer taking the hill in Games 2 and 3.
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