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The Tigers have a plan for Jose Ramirez, and it's working; He fell silent in ALDS

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The Tigers have a plan for Jose Ramirez, and it's working; He fell silent in ALDS

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Detroit – Not today, Jose.

The Tigers entered this American League Division Series determined not to be beaten by Cleveland Guardians star slugger Jose Ramirez – and so far, so good, as Detroit is just one win away from advancing to the next round to move in after the offseason.

Ramirez was 0-for-3 in the Tigers' 3-0 Game 3 win at Comerica Park on Wednesday. All four of his plate appearances came against four different Detroit pitchers, including his intentional walk, his second of the series.

“I mean, with this type of strategy, we can obviously give different players different looks,” Tigers manager AJ Hinch said after the Game 3 win. “You know, you have a 6-6 left-hander (Brant) all the time Hurter), some fireball righties, (Tyler) Holton throwing backdoor cutters, and (Beau) Brieske throwing turbo sinkers and change-ups. Part of it. “The way our squad is built and the reason we maximize our strengths is that we can do a lot of different things to the hitters. It's not easy going against four different players… but you need the (pitchers) to do it, to throw strikes and attack the strike zone, go after guys directly and get big outs. And we did all of that.

In the series, Ramirez is just 1-for-9 with two strikeouts. The one-hit is even controversial. He hit the ball in Game 1 that ate up Zach McKinstry at third base, leading to the Guardians' 7-0 five-run inning win. This play was originally ruled a mistake by McKinstry, but was converted into a double after the game.

The 32-year-old Ramirez entered the series with a career OPS of .966 against the Tigers. In 155 games against Detroit, Ramirez hit 33 home runs and 122 RBIs, leading all his opponents.

This season, his OPS against the Tigers was 1.163 in 13 games, with five home runs and 12 RBIs.

It's no surprise that he was the focus for Hinch and pitching coach Chris Fetter as they sat down before this best-of-five series to come up with the best plan of attack. The plan was clearly to give Ramirez as many different looks as possible from as many different pitchers as possible, without anyone on base, and simply accompany him with first base open.

Ramirez was intentionally hit in the third inning with one on and two out. Josh Naylor came off to end the Guardians' goal threat. It was quite a funny scene. Naylor entered the box while Ramirez was still there, knowing beyond a shadow of a doubt that Hinch wouldn't throw to Ramirez before Ramirez even realized it.

“I don’t like doing that,” Hinch said of the deliberate walk. Hinch issued just 11 intentional walks during the regular season, more than just three teams in the AL. “He has my respect on so many levels. And it's not easy to go against him or (the batsman) behind him. Naylor is not an easy guy. He made the All-Star team.”

In Game 3, Ramirez struck out the first against Tigers opener Keider Montero, who needed just six pitches to get through his inning. Ramirez was then intentionally passed over by Hurter. With two ons and two outs in the fifth, the Guardians opted to pitch to Ramirez rather than put the potential starter at first base at that point, and Brieske, Detroit's resident wizard, was convinced to bring in the bullpen him to fly into the middle to end the threat. Ramirez flied out to right field against Will Vest in the eighth inning.

Ramirez officially faced eight pitchers in three games of this series, although two of them only walked him intentionally (Hurter and Ty Madden). Of the six pitchers he had at-bats against, he only faced two more than once: Reese Olson in the laughs of Game 1 and Game 2, when Tarik Skubal faced him three times and caught him all three times.

In 35 career postseason games, Ramirez is now batting .233 with two home runs, 13 RBIs and an OPS of .495 — although he's hardly alone this time of year when, as October after October has proven, hitting is tough. For example, Yankees star Aaron Judge, probably the most valuable player, is just 1-for-11 in the ALDS against the Kansas City Royals. The Tigers are batting just .194 as a team in this ALDS. The entire Guardians team is hitting just .183 with an OPS of .534 through the first three games of this year's ALDS. Only Steven Kwan scores for the Guardians (5 out of 11).

“I will never question what our guys do. It's their attack. We don’t tell people how to carry out an attack,” said Guardians manager Stephen Vogt. “They’re big leaguers. They’re really good hitters.”

“We just didn’t manage to get a big hit,” Vogt said after Game 3, the Guardians’ second 3-0 loss in a row. Since Game 1, they haven't scored in 20 innings.

Game 4, a potential tiebreaker for the Tigers, is Thursday night at Comerica Park.

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