The Tigers will call it a win. And, because it came at home, a very rare one, indeed.
The Tigers pulled away from a 3-3 tie and held off the Oakland A's, 7-5, today at Tiger Stadium.
It was just the ninth home win for the Bengals (22-33) in 29 games.
Willie Horton struck the biggest blow---a three-run homer, his ninth, in the seventh to put the Tigers up, 7-3.
The win gave the Tigers three victories over the A's in the five games they played this week against the three-time defending World Champs.
"We needed this badly," manager Ralph Houk understated.
What he needed wasn't only a win, but for the Tigers to score more than three runs, which has been so very difficult for them to do in recent weeks.
The team finally did that in the seventh, when they rallied against reliever Glenn Abbott, who took over from starter Sonny Siebert.
Horton's big day helped carry the Tigers, breaking a six-game home losing skid
John Wockenfuss walked and moved to second on a two-out walk issued to fellow rookie John Knox. Dan Meyer singled, scoring Wockenfuss and sending Knox to third. Horton then drove an Abbott fastball deep into the upper deck in left, making the score 7-3.
Naturally, the A's didn't go down easily.
They added two runs in the eighth on two doubles and a single, but fireman John Hiller relieved Bob Reynolds with two outs and induced a pop out from Phil Garner, then pitched a mostly uneventful ninth for the save.
Reynolds got the win in relief of starter Tom Walker, who turned in another impressive effort in a spot role (6 IP, 5 H, 2 R, 1 ER).
Ron LeFlore had three singles and a stolen base (and one caught stealing).
Horton, who had four RBI on the afternoon, said that the feeling of relief has to be followed with determination.
"This is nice, but it doesn't mean anything if we don't score runs tomorrow," he said.
The whole blind nut/broken clock thing.
Notes: Soon everyone will know whether Nate Colbert will be an ex-Tiger. The interleague trading deadline is tomorrow, and reports have the struggling first baseman going to several teams: Montreal, Atlanta and Texas among them...The bad news is that Jack Pierce, who seemingly would be Colbert's replacement at first base, is hitting .111 (3-for-27)...Leon Roberts, who hit into three double plays last night, was 2-for-3 today.
***********************************************
Tigers record: 22-33 (actual 25-30)
Home: 9-20
Away: 13-13
Last 10: 4-6
No comments:
Post a Comment