


ANAHEIM, Calif. >> AJ Hinch wasn’t accepting any bonus points for enduring a rugged patch of the schedule.
“There is no conceding to the schedule or the rigors or the grind or whatever,” he said before the Tigers took the finale and the series from the Angels with a 13-1 victory Sunday. “Our guys are built to handle it.”
It sure seems that way. Despite a list of double-digit injured players, the Tigers have come through a 23-game, 24-day stretch with a 15-8 record and an American League-best 22-13 record overall.
It was also just the third series win by the Tigers in Anaheim, covering 13 series dating to 2011.
“We’re a tough team,” Hinch said after the game. “And we’re going to have to deal with stuff. We’re going to be tested a lot with travel as we get into the summer. You’ve got to play the game.”
The Tigers slugged three home runs Sunday and have 20 in the first seven games of this road trip, the most in any seven-game stretch since 2004. Not bad for a team built create pressure and havoc on the bases.
“We can do it all,” said Kerry Carpenter, who had a career-best five-RBI day Sunday. “I think there’s a lot of guys coming into their own. Trey Sweeney had two homers in this series. Riley (Greene) hit two homers in the same inning against a Hall-of-Famer (Kenley Jansen). Colt (Keith) has hit a couple.
“Every game we play I feel like guys are getting more mature and coming into their own. It’s a testament to how hard everyone is working and the adjustments everyone is making.”
Carpenter had the game-changing knocks, with a two-run double in the second inning and a three-run, game-sealing home run in the sixth. Both hits coming with two outs.“I like to be locked in every at-bat but the fact I got to come through with two outs and runners in scoring position a couple of times, that’s really fun,” Carpenter said. “Because those guys work so hard to get on base before me. Today was awesome in that regard.”
Carpenter’s home run, off right-handed reliever Michael Darrell-Hicks, was his eighth and traveled 413 feet to dead center. The ball left his bat with an exit velocity of 106.8 mph. He also had two singles and had two cracks at getting a triple for the cycle.
“Honestly, I felt locked in for a long time now, since the first game in Houston,” he said. “It’s been a lot of hard-hit balls. Some at-bats I haven’t stuck to my plan. But today was kind of both, I was hitting balls hard and I stuck to my plan and the results were good.”
Colt Keith had a big swing, too. He blasted a two-run home run to right-center against starter Jack Kochanowicz in the third inning, making it a 5-0 game. It was Keith’s third home run in the last five games.
Sweeney one-upped Carpenter, producing a career-best six RBIs. He singled in a run in the second inning, slugged a three-run home run (third) in the seventh off reliever Jose Fermin and in the ninth poked a two-run single off reliever Touki Toussaint, capping the Tigers’ season-high 13-run output.
“We have a pretty good offense and it comes from different places,” Hinch said. “Today Trey Sweeney was an incredible boost from the bottom of the order. Other days it’s Riley or Tork (Spencer Torkelson) or Carp. Today it was a little bit of everybody.
“We don’t care who is going to get the biggest at-bat or the biggest hit. It feels like the type of offense where somebody is going to step up.”
Reese Olson gladly accepted the run support, though he didn’t need much. He shut the Angels down on three hits over 5.2 scoreless innings with eight strikeouts.
Over his last four starts, he’s allowed three runs with 27 strikeouts in 23.2 innings. He improves to 4-2 and dropped his ERA to 3.03.
Olson strangled the Angels’ offense by mixing high-spin sliders (2,800-3,000 rmp) and changeups off sinkers and four-seam fastballs. He got eight swings and misses on 14 swings with the changeup, seven whiffs on 10 swings at the slider.
The Tigers are off Monday before finishing the trip with three games in Colorado. It will complete their time-zone cycle, having played in all four time zones over the last four series..
“Just get on to the next one,” Hinch said. “We will get on a plane, head to a new time zone, a new city, a team we haven’t played a ton and we will flip the page.”
The Tigers have hit 20 homers playing in hitter-friendly Daikin Park and not so hittter-friendly Angels Stadium in these last two series. Now they go to the Mile High City where baseballs and pitchers often go to die. Buckle up.
“I told Dillon (Dingler), if you hit one ball on the ground, I’m going to kill you,” said Carpenter, laughing.