Detroit Tigers’ Eugenio Suarez dives back to first during their game against Minnesota Twins at Comerica Park, Detroit, yesterday. (USA TODAY Sports)
By John Lowe/Detroit Free Press (MCT)
At last, the big inning.
Ignited by a leadoff home run from Eugenio Suarez and enhanced by a two-run homer by Victor Martinez, the Tigers scored seven runs in the third inning Saturday at Comerica Park and went on to a 12-9 win over the Minnesota Twins. It marked the first time in more than three weeks that the Tigers scored more than three runs in an inning.
The Tigers led, 11-1, entering the seventh. The Twins created squeamishness by scoring eight runs in the final three innings, six off a quartet of relievers who labored to finish the game. If Joe Mauer had reached base in the eighth inning, the Twins would have brought the potential tying run to the plate. Ian Krol entered and retired Mauer on a bases-loaded grounder.
“They got a couple of balls that weren’t exactly struck well to fall in, but we’ve got to find a way to get through that game with a 10-run lead and not have to burn all those guys in the bullpen,” manager Brad Ausmus said. “We don’t want to be giving up runs like that -- that just shouldn’t happen. And it’s happened in a number of games where we’ve had big leads where we’ve let the other team get back in the game.”
It was one of the few times Ausmus has spoken about how any part of the team disappointed him. Perhaps he learned from managing masters that the time to voice unhappiness is after a win, so that he doesn’t pile on in defeat.
Suarez lacked a single for the cycle; Martinez required his first triple of the season to get it. Martinez narrowly missed three other homers: his double went off the top of the leftfield fence, and he hit two outs to the warning track in right.
Martinez didn’t get a chance to complete the cycle. Suarez did and thereby exposed why it isn’t an ultimate offensive feat. If Suarez had gotten an extra-base hit in the eighth, he would have “missed” the cycle because he got a hit longer than the single he lacked for the cycle.
There have been nearly 250 major leaguers who hit for the cycle in the past 100 years. If Suarez had gotten an extra-base hit his last time up, he would have been — according to Baseball-Reference.com — only the 85th player since 1914 to have a game with four extra-base hits that included a triple and a homer.
As Magglio Ordoñez watched, Suarez became the first Tiger since Ordoñez in ‘07 to have two extra-base hits in an inning. Suarez, who like Ordoñez wears No. 30, added a bloop double to go with the homer in the third.
The third inning matched the Tigers’ largest inning of the season. It was the first time they’d scored at least four runs in an inning in their past 22 games. It was the first time they scored at least five in an inning in their past 32 games.
The lack of the big inning reflected how the Tigers had struggled for runs in the 7-17 streak they brought into Saturday.
The Tigers’ offense might have awoken just in time, because in more ways than one, here come the Royals.
Second-place Kansas City, which is 1 1/2 games behind the Tigers in the American League Central, has won six straight and arrives at Comerica Park on Monday for four games. The Royals’ offense has awoken for the first time this season, scoring at least seven runs in four of the six games in their winning streak.
Anibal Sanchez pitched 61/3 innings and allowed three runs for his third win. In his three previous starts, he had allowed three runs total, but the Tigers lost all three largely because of lack of offense.
In baseball, it’s often famine or feast.
