Detroit Tigers: J.D. Martinez makes up for lost time

Even though the Detroit Tigers lost on Tuesday night in a heartbreaker filled with bonus baseball, the game had a few winning moments.

The Detroit Tigers’ bats came alive and J.D. Martinez proved that he can be clutch when the game is on the line.

Since coming back to the team on May 12, he has already hit four home runs and scored eight RBIs. He has played in four games and has had 12 at-bats.

Compare that to Miguel Cabrera, who has 105 at-bats, has the same number of home runs, but has 15 RBIs. The odds are good that Martinez will not continue at this pace, but it is certainly welcome.

The New Memorable Moment

It is easy to remember last season’s most memorable moment: when Martinez returned from the disabled list only to hit a home run off of Chris Sale off of his first pitch. Martinez may have earned a second memorable moment when he hit the Grand Slam in the bottom of the 7th inning yesterday to give the Tigers the lead. Cabrera, Victor Martinez, and Justin Upton all were given walks prior to J.D. Martinez’s second home run of the game.

Unfortunately, J.D. Martinez only had the two home runs in him. In the 9th inning, he hit into a double play on his first pitch. Then, in the 11th he was intentionally walked. In total, J.D. Martinez had four walks (two were intentional), two hits (both were home runs), and the one out at first. He definitely had a day and he also took time to acknowledge the fans by raising his hat to them in the dugout after the Grand Slam.

Other Winning Moments

There were several other Tigers highlights in last night’s game. Chad Bell made his debut in the Majors and put up good numbers in four innings. The Orioles got three hits on him. He walked one batter and struck out three. Hopefully, this means he can stick around as a reliable bullpen guy.

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Victor Martinez also had a good day, going two for four and earning three RBIs. Unfortunately, Dixon Machado filled in on the base paths, so Martinez was unable to put his bat to work in the bonus innings. However, Alex Avila filled in rather nicely, going two for two with one RBI.

The up-and-down game can be attributed to a few unfortunate pitches. One by Justin Wilson in the top of the 9th. Only Mark Trumbo (and maybe Ryan Zimmerman) would hit a pitch at that height. Then, Blaine Hardy gave up a home run. We all knew that the game was over as soon as Francisco Rodriguez made his way to the mound. While K-Rod wasn’t the sole accomplice in the loss last night, he sub-par pitching didn’t help anything.

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Even though the loss was a horrible way to end a 13-inning game, there were a few positives. Hopefully, the rest of the series goes better.