Mother Nature prevailed again as the Cleveland Indians suffered their second rain out of the season on Thursday when the fourth and final game of their series in Detroit with the Tigers was washed away.

Rain was in the forecast all day long in Detroit, leading to the early cancellation of the scheduled 1:10 PM ET game. No makeup date has been announced for the game.

Logical open dates exist on the Indians schedule either just after or just before each of the club’s remaining two series at Comerica Park this season, but in both circumstances would force the Tribe into playing a significant number of consecutive games, something frowned upon in the game today. A doubleheader during one of those trips may be the likely alternative scenario.

Without a chance to potentially even the four-game series on Thursday, the Indians’ stretch of four consecutive series wins came to an end. The team will now head to Kansas City for three games this weekend against the Royals in its first action against a key American League Central Division rival. The KC club was 9-17 heading into play on Thursday, taking two of its first three in May after being losers of nine in a row to end April and ten of the last eleven.

While not confirmed at the time of this story, it is believed that the Indians rotation would be bumped back a day with the unexpected extra off day early in the team’s ten-game road trip. That would align right-hander Danny Salazar (2-2, 4.34 ERA) against Royals right-hander Jason Hammel (0-3, 6.65) in the opener on Friday, with Josh Tomlin and Trevor Bauer potentially in line to pitch in the final two games of the series. The Indians could skip over one of the struggling starters and proceed with calling up right-hander Mike Clevinger for Sunday’s game instead, as he was expected to get the nod for the injured Corey Kluber in the series finale.

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