AJ Hinch must avoid lineup decision that nearly cost Tigers a playoff run

You'd be hard-pressed to find a Tigers fan who truly believed that Thursday's decisive Wild Card Game 3 would go in Detroit's way after the dual failures from their offense and bullpen on Wednesday. Fifteen runners left on base was close to an MLB postseason record, and the late-game power surge from the Guardians felt like a bad omen for the tiebreaker.

But the offense finally came through. Kerry Carpenter brought in the first run of the afternoon on an RBI double, Dillon Dingler hit a go-ahead home run, and then the Tigers made up for their RISP failures by capitalizing on a one-out, bases-loaded situation in the seventh and ended up bringing in four more runs.

Good night, Cleveland. Enjoy the couch.

That isn't to say everything was perfect. One of the biggest missed opportunities in Wednesday's game was when Wenceel Pérez struck out with men on the corners to end the seventh. He'd battled, fouling off six straight pitches before finally striking out, but three out of seven were clearly balls, and the pitch he ended up striking out on was far north of the zone.

Pérez went 0-for-8 with two strikeouts in Games 1 and 2, but in Game 3, he was ... batting third in AJ Hinch's lineup.

He ended up coming through as part of that four-run rally and scored two with the bases loaded, but he still struck out twice, popped out, and grounded into a double play in his four other at-bats of the day.

Wenceel Pérez might've come through in Wild Card Game 3 for Tigers, but he shouldn't be batting third

Pérez got 80 plate appearances batting third in the regular season, and he hit just .205 with a .591 OPS. His sweet spot was anywhere from the fifth to the eighth. Parker Meadows, who batted leadoff in the first two games, was cycled all the way down to ninth.

It's likely that Hinch wanted to give his only switch hitter as many opportunities as possible to fend off of manager Steven Vogt playing matchups. And he did manage to put it together eventually batting left against righty Hunter Gaddis (Pérez hits significantly better as a lefty), but that shouldn't mean Pérez gets more opportunities in that spot.

It probably won't be much of an issue in the ALDS; the Mariners have a rotation exclusively made of righties and only two lefty relievers. The experiment worked once, but it's still only a 20% success rate on the day and just one hit in 13 at-bats.