Dillon Dingler hit a tiebreaking homer in the sixth inning, Wenceel Pérez drove in a pair of runs in a four-run seventh and the Detroit Tigers defeated the Cleveland Guardians 6-3 on Thursday in the deciding Game 3 of their AL Wild Card Series.
It is the second straight season the Tigers have won a Wild Card Series on the road. Detroit heads to Seattle for the first two games of a best-of-five Division Series, with Game 1 on Saturday.
It was also a little bit of sweet revenge for the Tigers after their season ended in Cleveland last year with a loss in Game 5 of the ALDS.
“I don’t think it needs to be any sweeter than what it feels like right now because you have to earn these wins,” manager A.J. Hinch said. “You have to earn the opportunity to play in October. You’ve got to earn a full-series win over a good team, a hot team, a team that we know well.”
The AL West champion Mariners, the second seed, took four of six regular-season meetings with the Tigers, who are the third AL wild card.
José Ramírez drove in Cleveland’s first run with a single. The AL Central champion Guardians were 15 1/2 games back in early July before completing the biggest comeback in division or league play in baseball history.
However, they ran out of steam in the playoffs as Detroit turned the page after posting the second-worst record in the majors in September (7-17).
“It stinks for it to end that way. I couldn’t be more proud of them, of what we accomplished,” Cleveland manager Stephen Vogt said. “It’s not enough. We want more. And I think that’s really the message, is let this sting. We’re close. We are really close. We’re not quite there yet.”
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