ANAHEIM, CA – Detroit Tigers manager A.J. Hinch came out of his clubhouse and cracked a smile.
“Never a doubt,” Hinch said after the Tigers’ dramatic, come-from-behind, hold-on-for-dear-life 2-1 victory over the Los Angeles Angels on Friday, July 17.
As the Tigers fight for their playoff lives, trying to prove they should stick together at next month’s MLB trade deadline – or even, dare we say, become buyers at the deadline – every game grows in importance.
Every moment is magnified more than the last.
So even though it’s July, if you consider the situation, if you think about everything on the line, this win was absolutely critical for this team, at this moment.
“It’s a huge emotional shift from where we were, you know, 10 minutes ago,” Hinch said. “This clubhouse should be loud. They earned it.”
If the Tigers had lost, it would have been their third straight defeat – dating back before the All-Star break – to send them to nine games under .500. The situation would have felt dire.
But they didn’t lose. Nope. They flipped the script, like a plot twist you didn’t see coming until the very last moment.
So now, they stand 6½ back in the American League Central and 3½ back in the AL wild-card race.
A deep hole, sure. But still alive. Still fighting.
All because they started stacking amazing moments.
One clutch moment for Hao-Yu Lee
Here was Hao-Yu Lee coming up in the top of the ninth inning. The Tigers were down 1-0. Two on. Two outs.
After a quick talk with the hitting coaches, Lee was hunting a fastball and he got one, lacing a double off the wall in right field, driving in a pair of go-ahead runs. Standing on second, he started pumping his fist and screaming in joy.
“I was blacked out,” Lee said. “I wasn’t really thinking. I was feeling good.”
Oh, just wait – there were more moments to come.
In the bottom of the ninth, things reached a hold-your-breath moment.
Keider Montero, who had thrown 2⅓ brilliant innings in relief, got into a jam with no outs.
He hit Jorge Soler with a pitch. Then, Jose Siri singled to center.
Two guys on. Tigers up, 2-1.
And the tension was out of control.
But Montero got Jo Adell to pop out to second base.
Then Oswald Peraza grounded out to third, although that doesn’t do it justice.
It was a high hop behind the base to Kevin McGonigle, who leapt up to catch it. And then, he landed and fired a ball in the first-base dirt to Spencer Torkelson, who calmly scooped it.
Basically saving the game.
Which is what Torkelson did again on the final out, a grounder to short that he scooped out of the dirt on the throw from Zach McKinstry.
“Kevin had some hops at third base and was able to get the out,” Hinch said. “Tork with the two picks. I mean we kind of needed everybody in that inning but it starts with Keider and his ability to channel all his energy and attack the hitter.”
Troy Melton faces his hero, Mike Trout
There were other moments, of course. The moments that led to that wild finish.
Like the pitching of Troy Melton, the Southern California kid. Melton was born in Newport Beach but he was raised in Anaheim. In fact, he grew up rooting for the Angels.
His favorite player? Mike Trout.
I’m talking, this goes back years, back when Melton was in elementary school.
So, it was forgivable if he was filled with adrenaline pitching against his favorite team as a kid. Facing his idol.
“I definitely was thinking about it every time I faced him,” Melton said. “There’s a little extra to it. Was my favorite player growing up, so super-cool.”
Not just that – he was performing in front of 70 friends and relatives.
So, maybe it was not exactly surprising that he Melton struggled early. He was spraying the ball, with four early walks. But he settled down to record nine strikeouts, surrendering just one run in 5⅔ innings.
“You may come to a game and not see Troy Melton walk three hitters in three weeks,” Hinch said. “He didn’t have his best stuff, and yet he got to the sixth inning. What I told him on the mound is, I thought it was impressive for me to be coming out here in the sixth inning – that he lasted that long and gave us a chance to win.”
Yes – he gave the Tigers a chance to use Montero, who was brilliant once again.
Montero threw 3⅓ scoreless innings, striking out five and giving up just one hit.
“Well, we’re going to ask like five or six from him in a few days,” Hinch said. “You have to remember when he catches his rhythm and gets going like that, he has the starter package to get through any lineup for a long time. So given how he was pitching and his rhythm, he punches out everybody, and I felt he’d earned it. So I wasn’t a knock on anything going on in the ‘pen or the options that we do have but using his pitches at the right time when he’s feeling the way he’s feeling, I thought it was the right call for us.”
Translation: Are you crazy? Why in the world would I take him out?
So all in all, it was a huge night for the Tigers.
And this is the formula the Tigers need to use to win games.
Get great pitching from a starter.
Get great pitching from a reliever.
And just enough offense to win it.
So, yes, the Tigers were celebrating late Friday night.
Not a crazy celebration. It was more subdued satisfaction.
Because there is still lots of work to be done.
But in a game when their offense was stagnant through most of the night, in a game when their pitching set them up to win, in a moment when they absolutely had to win it, the Tigers did.
Never a doubt.
Contact Jeff Seidel: jseidel@freepress.com. Follow him on X @seideljeff.
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Backs against the wall, Tigers get all the right moves vs Angels
Reporting by Jeff Seidel, Detroit Free Press / Detroit Free Press
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By Jeff Seidel, Detroit Free Press | USA TODAY Network
