Um…ridiculous?

Rangers 11, Tigers 8

Entering the bottom of the 5th inning, the Tigers lead the Rangers 4-1 behind two Miguel Cabrera (.387/.457/.659, 1998 wRC+, 2.8 WAR) homeruns and solid pitching from Doug Fister (5-2, 54.2 IP, 3.62 ERA, 2.74 FIP, 1.7 WAR). Then things just went indiscriminately crazy. I mean it. The Rangers got 4. The Tigers got 3. The Rangers got 4. That was three consecutive half innings. It was 9-7 at that point. Then 11-7, then 11-8 on Cabrera’s third homer. I don’t think it’s necessary to rehash exactly how it happened at each interval other than to say that the offense did its job, but the pitching and defense struggled in different ways at different times. I’m really not even sure if the Tigers were giving the game away or the Rangers were trying to give the game away. There were many runs and Miguel Cabrera did something that has happened just a couple times in history. He hit 3 HR in a game and lost…for a second time. The Tigers drop to 23-19 after dropping 3 of 4 from Texas this weekend after Verlander, Sanchez, and Fister all struggled. The Rangers are a good team and you’d be plenty happy with a split on the road and that just escaped their grasp. The Tigers will get Monday off to reset the bullpen and will turn to Max Scherzer (5-0, 54.1 IP, 3.98 ERA, 2.44 FIP, 1.9 WAR) to get the team on track Tuesday in Cleveland.

The Moment: Cabrera homers…three times.