The Detroit Tigers have advanced to the American League Division Series. The team and fans alike are seeing their dreams slowly come to fruition.
On Thursday Oct. 2, the Detroit Tigers clinched their spot in the ALDS by defeating the Cleveland Guardians in the best-of-three Wildcard Series.
The Tigers won Game 1 2-1, fell to the Guardians 6-1 in Game 2, and clinched the series with a 6-3 win in Game 3.
This series started Tuesday, Sept. 30 in Cleveland. The ballpark was electric, filled almost exclusively with Cleveland fans. The pitchers for this game were the Tigers’ Tarik Skubal and the Guardians’ Gaven Williams. Skubal dominated this game with 7 ⅔ innings pitched, three hits, three walks and 14 strikeouts.
On the hitting side, Spencer Torkelson drove in an RBI to give the Tigers the first run of the game. In the 7th inning, with the game tied 1-1, Zach McKinstry laid down a sacrifice bunt to give the Tigers the game-winning score.
The win gave the Tigers a 1-0 lead in the series.
Game 2 was a day later on Wednesday, Oct. 1. The game was disappointing for the Tigers.
The Tigers’ starting pitcher, Casey Mize, only pitched three innings with only one strikeout. Cleveland’s pitcher, Tanner Bibee pitched 4 ⅔, allowing five hits, three walks and six strikeouts in his outing.
The eighth inning started tied at 1-1, and then the Guardians started hitting — it became a blowout.
Bryan Rocchio hit a go-ahead home run to start the inning. Next, Daniel Schneeman hit an RBI double. Finally, Bo Naylor launched a three-run home run to establish a Game 2 domination and win 6-1.
The Tigers couldn’t afford another outing like this if they wanted to keep their season alive.
Game 3, on Thursday Oct. 2, was win or go home — winner moves on to face the Seattle Mariners in the Divisional Series, and loser settles in for the offseason.
The Tigers’ pitching staff played lights out — Starter Jack Flaherty pitched 4 ⅔ innings allowing three hits, two walks and four strikeouts. The relievers were Kyle Finnegan, Tyler Horton and Tommy Kahnle.
Finnegan pitched 1 ⅓ inning allowing zero hits and runs. Horton pitched one inning, allowing one hit and zero runs. Kahnle, however, gave up two hits and two runs to the Guardians.
Will Vest closed, pitching 1 ⅔ innings, allowing zero hits and runs.
On the hitting side, the bats were hot. The Tigers nabbed 10 hits on the day.
All of their runs came in the sixth and seventh innings of play.
Dillon Dingler started the scoring streak with a solo home run to tie the game 1-1 in the sixth inning. In the seventh inning, Wenceel Pérez drove in two runs with a single and Spencer Torkelson and Riley Greene both had RBI singles.
The offensive spark led the Tigers to a 6-3 victory in the game and a 2-1 victory in the series.
The Tigers are set to match up with a tough Seattle Mariners team led by MVP candidate Cal Raleigh. The Tigers are an underdog, given a 43% chance of winning and betting odds of +185.
The Tigers have a chance, but it is going to be a challenge. If we learned anything about the Tigers this season, they know how to fight. They’ll look to challenge the Mariners with the same resilience that carried them through the regular season and the Wild Card.