Cleveland – The beautiful thing about this sport is supposed to be the way it reflects life. There is always a new day. You never know what to expect. Just when you think you have understood, something happens that can change your beliefs, move your point of view. Nothing is the apocalypse to the apocalypse.
This is largely the mentality that the Tigers of Detroit took through what has become the worst collapse of the MLB divisional era. On July 8, they led the Cleveland Guardians by 15 1/2 games and held an advantage of 14 games in the Central. The idea of blowing up champagne at the end of August was not so unfathomable. Then the losses began to arrive in waves. After the Guardians beat the tigers 5-1 Wednesday evening at Progressive Field, the Tigers lost eight in a row, 11 out of 12 and 20 out of 27. They have been 26-39 since July 8. They led the division by 9 1/2 games entering in September. No team in the divisional era has ever exploded a September advance of more than 7 1/2 games.
Cleveland’s last victory gives the frenzied tutors possession of first place. After 184 days at the head of this division, the Tigers are in second place and fight to keep the last point of Joker of the American League.
It’s not just bad baseball.
It’s not just the breaks of the game.
It is an unprecedented, incredible monumental collapse.
“As a baseball person, I know exactly what’s going on and what happened,” said Tigers manager Aj Hinch. “I will have a lot of time to treat it all in due time. But I try to prepare these guys to play the next day because it is the day that we can control and the day we can straighten the ship and return to the Win column. At the end of the day, it will have an impact on many people, which means that the frustration and the extent of the way we arrived here. We have had too many people to focus on this right now. ”
Hinch succeeded every day with this kind of consistency. He made it his mark and led him into the minds of his players. Here at a time when the next day never seems to improve, he is seized for the right words in front of the cameras but knows nothing that he can say will not strike the right agreement.
Thanks to all these losers, the players still talked about the speed with which things can turn. They would know it. It is largely of the same group which organized a frantic race of 31-11 in the section last season to break a drought in the playoffs of a decade, but it is starting to feel a long time ago.
Last season, Parker Meadows stole a home run in Seattle to help this momentum. On Wednesday in Cleveland, Meadows jumped and reached and even obtained the tip of his glove on a borde by George Valera off Jack Flaherty. He couldn’t start it. This is how Cleveland took an advance of 2-1.
“In a way, summarizes how things have been going on lately,” said Meadows. “Honestly, a few centimeters.”
Last year – and even for a large part of this season – it seemed that the tigers so often had a timely time when they needed it most. Wednesday, Welfing Pérez struck a bouncer who left his bat at 106.5 mi / h in the second round. It turned into a double game 4-6-3.
Last season, the Tigers obtained a key double game ball to help seal a defeat of the Houston Astros in the playoffs. This year, the hard clove of the seventh round of José Ramírez escaped the reach of Gleyber Torres and bounced in the outside field for a double of two points.
“You don’t give it,” said Flaherty. “You are going on the next day. (The guards), it is among the best baseball that I saw in September. … They did their job. We did not do ours.”
This does not mean that all of this is as simple as not to get the right breaks. If the tigers do not reach the playoffs, it will be a long and complicated autopsy. The Tigers entered the game with an OPS that ranks 19th in September. Their time was 5.23 this month. All the season, only three teams have developed more than the tigers.
Along this losing section, they wasted with the bats, struggled to obtain significant departures outside Tarik Skubal, looked at an enclosure of survey and made their share of expensive errors, like Dillon Dingler Drop Fly in the seventh which led to two points on the double of Ramírez.
The stretch of bad game lasted so long that it is just to wonder if something is more fundamentally broken.
“I don’t think it’s resignation,” said Hinch. “I think these guys are pros, and they do their best.”
Try as they could, nothing works. When Steven Kwan chose a race at home in fifth round, Flaherty put her hands at the top of her head, the elbow elbows. He launched an exasperated look when the ball was falling and the race marked.
After the game, a manager who can no longer successfully hide all the anxiety examined the camera once again.
“I find it hard to find words, honestly, and I know it’s not always as acceptable or the norm,” said Hinch. “But what I see of our team is not normal. Unfortunately, it is our reality.”
With only four games to play in the regular season, the Tigers lack Tomorrows.
(Photo: Jason Miller / Getty Images)
