By Kaitlyn McGrath, Zack Meisel and Cody Stavenhagen
In a battle of the American League Central, the Cleveland Guardians struck first, using a five-run first inning to defeat the Detroit Tigers 7-0 in Game 1 of the AL Division Series at Progressive Field.
The Tigers’ unconventional pitching plan blew up immediately when the Guardians’ lineup pounced on opener Tyler Holton and bulk pitcher Reese Olson, who combined to allow five runs before recording a single out.
Up 2-0 with two on and no one out, Guardians center-fielder Lane Thomas provided the game-tilting blow in the first with a three-run home run. The Guardians’ offensive outburst in the opening frame made them the first American League team to score five runs before recording an out to start a playoff game, per Stats Perform.
GO DEEPER
Guardians erupt for five runs in first inning of ALDS
Guardians starter Tanner Bibee pitched 4 2/3 scoreless innings, allowing four hits with a walk and six strikeouts. Cleveland’s elite bullpen took over and pitched 4 1/3 scoreless innings. The team padded their lead in the sixth thanks to a two-RBI double from designated hitter David Fry.
Game 2 of the series is scheduled for Monday at 4:08 p.m. ET at Progressive Field. The Tigers will try to rebound with lefty ace Tarik Skubal on the mound, while the Guardians will start left-hander Matthew Boyd. — Kaitlyn McGrath
The Lane Thomas trade is paying dividends
The Guardians traded for Thomas on the evening of July 29. He hopped on a red-eye flight from Phoenix to Detroit, took a catnap at a hotel and then joined his new teammates for a day game at Comerica Park, in which he started in right field and batted second. The Tigers were a different team then. This is a different Thomas, too. He’d like to forget about his first month with his new club. For four weeks in August, he went 9-for-73 with no home runs.
He hit seven homers in September. And then Saturday afternoon, he blasted the first postseason pitch he ever saw into the left-field bleachers at Progressive Field. Thomas has historically crushed left-handed pitching (.880 OPS), and Tigers manager A.J. Hinch yanked Holton, a lefty, in favor of Olson, a righty. But Thomas pounced on a hanging slider to fuel Cleveland’s five-run frame.
LANE THOMAS THREE-RUN BLAST 🚀 pic.twitter.com/PMgBFt9vVa
— MLB (@MLB) October 5, 2024
“There have been a lot of curveballs this year,” Thomas said this week, “but you learn how to adjust.” — Zack Meisel
This was the exact pitching plan Cleveland had scripted
What Matthew Boyd and Alex Cobb, the Guardians’ scheduled starters for Games 2 and 3, can offer the Guardians is a mystery. Neither entered the club’s pitching plans until the height of summer. But for Game 1, this was what manager Stephen Vogt and pitching coach Carl Willis had dreamed of for weeks. Aside from a minor Tigers threat in the first, Bibee cruised through his 4 2/3 innings, then handed the ball to Cleveland’s vaunted bullpen. As Bibee walked off the mound in the fifth, he looked up at the crowd supplying him a standing ovation and shouted “Let’s f—ing go” as he raised his arms.
Cleveland’s ever-steady relievers took it from there. During the regular season, the Guardians were 71-2 when leading after six innings, 77-2 when leading after seven and 82-0 when leading after eight. Those numbers are a bit easier to fathom when considering the Guardians’ bullpen led the league with a 2.57 ERA, more than a half-run better than the second-ranked Milwaukee Brewers (3.11). — Meisel
After Tyler Holton’s outing went awry, pitching chaos took on a new meaning
For so long, the Tigers’ chaotic pitching plans have followed the script almost every time. That magic ended on Saturday. Holton, who also opened Game 2 of the AL Wild Card Series against the Houston Astros, got ambushed via a leadoff double from Steven Kwan, and the circumstances never improved.
Holton has been one of the best pitchers — starter or reliever, opener or closer — in baseball over the past two seasons. He pitched 66 times in the regular season and surrendered more than one run on only five occasions. But each of Cleveland’s first four batters reached against Holton. After a borderline 2-2 pitch to José Ramírez was called a ball, Zach McKinstry botched a Ramírez grounder down the third-base line. After Josh Naylor punched a grounder through the right side of the infield, manager A.J. Hinch turned to right-hander Olson, who hung his first-pitch slider and yanked his head around to watch Thomas’ three-run homer bury the Tigers alive.
The historically brutal start left the Tigers’ mix-and-match pitching strategy blown apart before things really got started. Olson recovered from the homer to give the Tigers five solid innings. Ty Madden took over in a mop-up role for the sixth, but the score only got messier from there. If you’re looking for a silver lining, it’s the fact that Sunday and Tuesday are both off days in this series. The turbulence should have minimal impact on the bullpen for Games 2 and 3. — Cody Stavenhagen
Strikeouts could be the Tigers’ fatal flaw
The Tigers’ strikeout rate of 24.3 percent was the eighth worst in MLB this season and the worst mark of any remaining playoff team. The fact reared its ugly head Saturday as the Tigers struck out 13 times. It was a problem in Game 1 and could be an issue going forward, particularly against a Guardians bullpen that ranked third with a 26 K% this season. The pitching blow-up gets plenty of attention, but after so many hard-fought games over the past seven weeks, the Tigers mounted zero resistance this time.
Detroit could use production from Spencer Torkelson in particular. Torkelson, who grounded into a fourth-inning double play, is 0-for-8 with three walks and five strikeouts this postseason. He has stranded seven runners on base through three games. — Stavenhagen
(Top photo of Tyler Holton: Jason Miller / Getty Images)
