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The Guardians win Game 5, ending the Detroit Tigers' ALCS hopes

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The Guardians win Game 5, ending the Detroit Tigers' ALCS hopes

Cleveland — It will take some time. It will take a while for the sores to crust over and heal.

But eventually the pain will subside and the magnitude of what this young Tigers team has accomplished this season will sink in and heads will lift and chests will swell with pride.

Just not today.

This wonderfully improbable run ended on Saturday. Lane Thomas' grand slam home run off ace Tarik Skubal in the bottom of the fifth inning gave the Guardians a 7-3 victory over the Tigers in Game 5.

The Guardians, champions of the American League Central Division, advance to the AL Championship Series against the New York Yankees.

BOX score: Guardians 7, Tigers 3

But what a run it was for the Tigers. They were under .500 in eight games and were left for dead on August 10. They traded four veteran players at the trade deadline, designating Gio Urshela and Shelby Miller for assignment.

Then Kerry Carpenter, Riley Greene and Parker Meadows returned to the lineup healthy as manager AJ Hinch and pitching coach Chris Fetter creatively restructured the pitching staff by using openers and relievers as young players like Trey Sweeney, Wenceel Perez and Colt Keith started to gain a foothold and they started winning.

They started their first postseason in 10 years with a 31-13 record, then went to Houston and beat the playoff-experienced Astros back-to-back in the Wild Card Series to advance to the ALDS.

Then on Thursday, in Game 4, they were seven outs away from eliminating the Guardians at Comerica Park before David Fry turned the game with a late two-run home run.

It was a two-month joy ride that Detroit sports fans will be talking about long after the disappointment of Game 5 wears off.

And for a brief minute it looked as if the ride would continue on Saturday when they took a dramatic 1-0 lead at the start of the fifth period.

The pregame talk centered around Carpenter's injured left Achilles tendon. Could he play? Could he at least give the Tigers some impetus? Hinch kept his cards secret before the game, saying only that he hoped Carpenter would be available from the bench.

But the whole series played out like a Hollywood script, so of course Carpenter had his Kirk Gibson moment.

Against right-hander Andrew Walters, Hinch sent Carpenter up to score for Justyn-Henry Malloy. Trey Sweeney, who had walked, was first. Walters threw three balls in a row, but Carpenter made it 3-0 by fouling a fastball up the middle.

He got another fastball to make it 3-1, wiped it out, and landed at the base of the wall in right-center. Carpenter limped to first base and stood while Sweeney raced all the way home, slipping just shy of the relay throw.

Skubal was in complete control of the game for four innings. In the postseason, he had a streak of 17 consecutive scoreless innings. He had allowed two hits with five strikeouts and finally had a lead to work with.

But singles from No. 8 hitter Andres Gimenez and pesky leadoff hitter Steven Kwan put pressure on Skubal. An infield single by Fry loaded the bases with one out for Guardians superstar Jose Ramirez.

Skubal drilled Ramirez in the left arm with a 99 mph fastball and forced the equalizer. Ramirez stayed in the game after being looked after by the coach.

Thomas raided the next pitch from Skubal, a 97 mph center-cut sinker. The ball left his bat at 107.7 miles per hour and flew 396 feet over the high wall to the left.

It was a stab in the heart, but the Tigers didn't die immediately.

They scored a two-out run early in the sixth – a double by Spencer Torkelson (his second of the game) and a single by Jake Rogers – and loaded the bases with two outs.

For Carpenter, it was another Hollywood moment. But right-hander Hunter Gaddis changed the script. He knocked down Carpenter and made him chase a 96 mph heater at the top of the zone.

The Guardians leaned heavily on their bullpen in this series and cracks began to show. Manager Stephen Vogt used Cade Smith for the fifth time in the series in the third inning after former Tiger Matthew Boyd had five hits in two scoreless innings to start the game.

By the eighth inning, he had used six relievers, including Tim Herrin and Gaddis with the best leverage.

The Tigers grabbed Gaddis in the seventh. Greene singled and scored on a long double off Keith to center.

Vogt called on right-hander Eli Morgan to end the inning. He knocked out Keith and knocked out Perez and Torkelson.

The Guardians went on a run in the seventh and Kwan was at the center of the action. He got his third hit of the game — he had three hits in three games and had 11 hits in the series — scoring on an infield single by Thomas.

He added another in the eighth with an RBI single by Brayan Rocchio, another thorn in the side of the Tigers, who had at least one hit in every game.

It gave Guardians closer Emmanuel Clase a cushion to get the final six outs, which he did without stress.

Sometimes the better team wins.

Game over. Season over. Memories forever.

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@cmccosky

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