Tigers vs Yankees: Game 5 Long-Drawn Recap

The Tigers got after it early, with Don Kelly and Delmon Young both hitting solo home runs in the top of the first inning. After Don Kelly and Delmon Young hit home runs on back to back pitches, Miguel Cabrera and Victor Martinez both made quick outs by swinging at pitches out of the strike zone. Cabrera and Martinez are professional hitters, and I would have liked to see them be more patient and try to built Nova's pitch count, by seeing more than four total pitches. The Tigers tried to add on to their lead when Magglio Ordonez hit a leadoff double, and then advanced to third on a groundout to second by Alex Avila. He was stranded there after Jhonny Peralta grounded out to third and Ramon Santiago struck out. Both of Avila and Peralta's grounders were hit hard and could have easily been hits. Doug Fister on the other hand came out very strong. Through the first two innings, he only threw 26 pitches while striking out three, getting three ground ball outs, not walking any, and only allowing one hit.

Phil Hughes came in for the Yankees in the top of the third. Hughes came in throwing very well, sitting in the low nineties, and working mostly low in the zone. He struck out the first two he faced, although they were Austin Jackson and Don Kelly. Delmon young then hit a hard single off the right field wall, but Hughes then got Cabrera to gourd weakly to shortstop. Phil Hughes came in to start the top of the fourth, but was pulled after giving up a single to Magglio Ordonez. Boone Logan relieved Hughes and got out of the inning.

Fister got into a little trouble in the bottom of the third giving up a single to Brett Gardner and a walk to Curtis Granderson, but got Robinson Cano to fly out to Austin Jackson to get out of it. Fister started the fourth by allowing three of the first four to reach base, and load the bases. He got out of it though by getting two infield pop ups. Fister started out the fifth by getting two quick outs, but then Robinson Cano hit a solo home run to make the score 3-1 before Alex Rodriguez grounded out to end the inning.

After going with Jonny Wholestaff for the first four innings, CC Sabathia started the fifth for the Yankees. He started by giving up a cheap bloop double to Austin Jackson. After two ill advised bunt attempts, Don Kelly struck out. Sabathia then struck out Delmon Young before intentionally walking Miguel Cabrera. With runners on first and second, Victor Martinez singled to center, and scored Jackson. Magglio Ordonez then struck out to end the inning. Overall during the inning, Sabathia struggled with his command, and could have given up a much bigger inning if Leyland constructed his lineup a little better.

After throwing five good innings, Doug Fister came out of the game in the bottom of the sixth for Max Scherzer. Mark Teixeira started out the inning by hitting a loud flyout to center field. Scherzer then got Nick Swisher to groundout before giving up a two out single to Posada. Martin then struck out to end the inning. Scherzer threw first pitch change ups to three of the four hitters he faced, and I think that he's been using that more often of late. He appears to have more confidence in that than his slider over the past few months.

Sabathia came out for the sixth, and struck out the first batter of the inning, but then walked the second. That prompted Girardi to get out of the dugout again and bring in Rafael Soriano. Soriano got a ground ball double play on a hit and run to get out of the inning with only throwing three pitches. Soriano started out the seventh by striking out Austin Jackson and Don Kelly. Delmon Young then popped out to end the inning.

Scherzer came out in the bottom of the seventh and struck out the first batter he faced Brett Gardner. Derek Jeter then got an infield hit to shortstop, which prompted Leyland to take Scherzer out of the game. Joaquin Benoit came in i the top of the seventh with one out and a runner on first. Granderson then hit a single to bring Cano up with two runners on. Cano had in infield single to load the bases on a strange hit towards the pitcher. With the bases loaded, Benoit struck out Alex Rodriguez then walked Teixeira to force a run in. He came back to strikeout Swisher to strand the bases loaded and preserving the Tigers' 3-2 lead.

David Robertson was on the mound for the Yankees in the top of the eight inning. Miguel Cabrera was the first batter in the inning, and struck out after getting ahead in the count 2-0. He proceeded to get Victor Martinez and Brandon Inge in a quick and clean inning of work. Benoit stayed in the game to pitch the bottom of the eighth with 23 pitches. Benoit got the first two batters Posada and Martin fairly easily, and I was shocked that we didn't see Jesus Montero batting for Martin. After Brett Gardner again got on base with a single, before Jeter flew out to the warning track in right field.

Mariano Rivera came out in the top of the ninth, and made quick work of three hitters to take the game to the bottom of the ninth. Jose Valverde came in to the bottom of the ninth, amongst a sea of boos from comments that he made earlier in the week. Granderson started the inning by flying out to left field. The next batter, Robinson Cano flew out to Austin Jackson. Cano's bat broke and almost hit Valverde on the mound. Valverde struck out A-Rod to end the game and send the Tigers to the ALCS.

The game was exciting and suspenseful from the word go. I think Girardi and Leyland both did a little bit of over managing when they were pulling pitchers immediately after they let a baserunner on. Benoit in the seventh got two huge outs to preserve the lead, and Valverde came in and pitched much much much better than he had in his previous two outing during the series. The ALCS will start Saturday with Detroit traveling to Texas to start the seven game series.

Other Notes from the Game: 

There has been much ado about Jim Leyland batting Don Kelly second. I am of the viewpoint that a 31 year old journeyman with a career .240/.291/.381 shouldn't be batting at the top of the order. It's worse when it works because if gives Jim Leyland the mindset that even if Kelly goes zero for his next twenty, it's still ok to bat him second. Some say that they don't care about the process if the results are good, but a good process should lead to good results more often. While bad process with good results may work out once, it will hinder your chances of getting good results in the future if you don't see the error in your ways.

In the middle of the game, during a mid-game interview, Joe Girardi said that Ivan Nova was removed because he "tightened up." The commentators didn't ask him where he tightened up at the time, but it later came out to be in the forearm. Come on, does anyone believe that? He was pulled bc his curveball had no depth, and he was leaving things up in the zone.

The strike zone should be a major topic of discussion after this game. It started out big at the bottom, and tight at the top, but fluctuated throughout the game. As the night went on, it seemed to get smaller and smaller on the edges. It wasn't a big deal when the Tigers were at bat, because they were more aggressive, and didn't work the count that much. However I think it made Doug Fister's night tougher than it should have been.

Victor Martinez looked to me like he was pressing in tonight's game. He's been struggling in the series thus far. In his first at bat tonight, he only saw two pitches, which may have both been balls. In his second plate appearance, he took three pitches and got into a 3-0 count. He then fouled off the next fourth pitch of the at bat, and then fouled out on the fifth pitch of the at bat. The fourth pitch was clearly inside, and the fifth may have been high. He swung at a hanging breaking ball on the first pitch of his next at bat for an RBI single. In the eighth, after getting into a 3-1 count, V-Mart again swung at ball four, and popped out to the catcher.