In a rather unsurprising turn of events, the Detroit Tigers designated RHP Carlos Hernandez for assignment on Thursday. More notable was the promotion of righthanded reliever Geoff Hartlieb from TripleA Toledo in his Tigers just signed the 31yearold journeyman reliever to a minor league deal back on July 14. Hartlieb stands sixfootfive and weighing in at 240 pounds. At times hes touched triple digits in his career, so hes gotten plenty of chances despite never solving his control issues long enough to establish himself in the major leagues for long. He made just two appearances for the Mud Hens since the AllStar break, though both were perfect outings, over 2 1 frasl;3 innings before the throws with a pretty standard arm slot. Beyond the fastball, which has a bit of cut at its best, he packs a good slider which has been his bread and butter this season. Hes thrown the breaking ball of the time this year in the minor leagues. He mixes in his fourseamer at 9495 mph, topping at this year, and will use a sinker at times to jam righthanders inside. As recently as 2024 Tanner Rainey Jersey, Hartlieb was hitting 99100 mph at peak, but the extra heat hasnt been in evidence this is a tale as old as time, or at least baseball. Hartlieb has never been able to locate consistently enough to stick with a team after the team that drafted him, the Pittsburgh Pirates, released him back in 2020. Hes been with five other teams since then. The odds of things finally working out arent any better than they were with theres a glimmer of hope, its that Hartlieb has really cut down the walks this season, producing a walk rate against a strikeout rate of. He got a very brief look at the bigs again this year with the New York Yankees, but a disastrous outing made that a short stay and he only appeared twice before returning to their TripleA Johnny Pesky Jersey, this is just the Tigers continuing to hunt for what is essentially free relief help. Hartlieb has had a lot of opportunities to break through over the last 67 years and hasnt made it happen. Hes only been with the org for a minute, so its hard to expect any significant overhaul in his stuff, mechanics or Tigers need relief help badly, and theyre going to have to part with prospects to get it, but its still worth trying to find more arms who can contribute down the stretch. Well see if Hartlieb has anything to offer.