[ad_1]
In a playoff game full of missed chances, the moment that stood out came in the seventh inning when Detroit Tigers manager A.J. Hinch made a bold call: he pulled Riley Greene back and sent up Jahmai Jones to pinch hit.
The Tigers had runners on the corners with one out in a 1-1 game. Cleveland had just gone to lefty reliever Tim Herrin to face Greene, a move designed to exploit the young outfielder’s struggles against left-handers.
“I didn’t think anything,” Greene said afterward via the Detroit News. “I trust (Hinch). I trust his judgment. We are all in all the time. That’s all of us. AJ thought that was the right call and I didn’t think twice about it.”
Hinch’s Calculated Gamble
For Hinch, it wasn’t about Greene as much as it was about Jones. The manager has said all year he wouldn’t hesitate to make a tough decision in the right spot, and this was the first time he acted on it.
“We had to take the shot,” Hinch explained. “You saw the same game I did. Up to that point, I think we’d left double-digit guys on base and almost all of them in scoring position. So I didn’t think that he (Guardians manager Stephen Vogt) thought I was going to hit for Greeney. They’d brought the lefty in for him in that spot. We needed the ball in play.
“We didn’t get it, but we’re taking our shot with Jahmai to get the ball to the outfield.”
Jones, who earned the nickname “lefty killer” in the clubhouse, had a .970 OPS against left-handers during the regular season. On paper, it made sense. But Herrin buried six straight curveballs, Jones struck out, and the Tigers came up empty again.
Not a Knock on Greene
Hinch made sure to emphasize afterward that the move wasn’t about a lack of faith in Greene.
“Obviously, contact is the biggest issue with guys on base today,” Hinch said. “A lot of at-bats we had ended with their ability to miss bats. And it’s not easy. You can’t just touch it. It’s a tough game.
“But I think the pinch-hit was really more about Jahmai Jones. This guy has been good, including the last series where he almost single handedly won the game for us when we clinched. Not a knock on Riley. Not a knock on all the at-bats we had with runners in scoring position. It’s a competition, one on one, and they won a lot of them.”
Greene himself backed up his manager’s explanation. “We are all in all the time,” he said. “That’s all of us.”
The Bottom Line
The decision didn’t pay off, but it underscored Hinch’s willingness to go against the grain in October. Greene is one of Detroit’s cornerstone players, yet when the matchup dictated a change, Hinch made it without hesitation, and Greene accepted it without complaint.
In the playoffs, those razor-thin calls define games. For the Tigers, this one just happened to go Cleveland’s way.
[ad_2]
Don Drysdale
Source link