Detroit — Baseball is relentless.
That’s what Tigers’ catcher Eric Haase said after the Tigers took the series from the Kansas City Royals on Wednesday with a methodical 9-4 matinee win at Comerica Park.
He was talking about Royals’ second baseman Samad Taylor, who had a hellish inning and a half at the end of the game. In the bottom of the eighth, he was involved in a violent collision with his right fielder (Matt Beaty) and ended up getting charged with a three-base error when the ball was dislodged. Four batters later he got taken out at second base on a hard, clean slide by the Tigers’ Jake Marisnick, which prevented him from turning a double-play and extended the Tigers’ four-run inning.
And then in the top of the ninth he got smoked by a 94-mph fastball from Brendan White. Except replays showed the pitch hit his bat first. Foul ball. He struck out on the next pitch, frozen by a wicked slider.
“That’s tough,” Haase said. “This is grown man’s game.”
Nobody knows that better than Haase. He came into the game grinding through a 7-for-54 drought (.130) with 17 strikeouts in 58 plate appearances.
“He’s been grinding like nobody’s business,” second baseman Zack Short said. “For him to come through was huge.”
As manager AJ Hinch often says, Haase is usually just one good swing away from getting back on track.
His good swing came in the second inning Wednesday and it produced a two-out, two-run double that flipped the game.
“Just to contribute,” said Haase, who singled in another run in the eighth. “It’s been tough. I’ve been eating some 0-fors. Just talking to AJ, when I hit the ball hard, someone is standing right there. It’s just baseball. Being able to keep getting in there and getting these opportunities is big.”
They were down 2-0 when Haase, hit his double. Short followed with a two-strike, RBI single and the Tigers’ never looked back.
“That was probably the most important inning today,” Hinch said. “We got shutout last night but still came in with pretty good energy early. They put a couple of hits together and got the two runs. To answer back was nice. We did a good job of staying in there and continuing to tack on.”
They did it against one of their nemesis, too. It was the first time they beat right-hander Brady Singer in 12 starts. They’d beaten him up in Kansas City last month (five runs in 3.2 innings) but he didn’t get the decision. This one went on his ledger.
The Tigers did most of their damage against one of Singer’s top weapons — his slider.
“We faced him a month ago and there is no secret how he pitches,” Hinch said. “It’s a matter of his command. There’s a fine line. He works fast, he works toward the plate and he wants to get ahead. When he has his command, you have to be ready to swing. If he doesn’t, you have to be ready to take. We did a good mix of both.”
It certainly seemed like they were sitting on Singer’s slider.
“I think when his sinker is on, it’s a tough pitch to hit,” Haase said. “But if he goes to the slider a little bit early, I think we were ready for it. Up and down our lineup, it looked like the guys were picking it up a little bit better than usual today.”
Haase and Short both whacked his slider to produce the three runs in the second inning. In the third inning, Javier Báez slapped an RBI single to left off another Singer slider. It was Báez’s 1,000th career hit.
Then in the fifth, Short got him again. Driving a slider into the bullpen in left field for his fourth homer of the season. Short ended up with three hits and three RBIs.
“Our plan going into it was great,” Short said. “Coming off of yesterday, not doing anything at the plate, I think we all had a little edge to us. We saw him a few weeks ago and most of the guys have seem him over the last three years a bunch. When you can narrow somebody down to a two pitches — we just had a good plan and we put a lot of good swings on some balls.”
Nobody is standings-watching in June, but it doesn’t hurt to point out that the Tigers are 14-9 against teams in the Central Division and are just three losses behind division-leading Minnesota, who come to Comerica Park this weekend.
“If you focus on the end before you get there, you lose track of where you are,” said Tigers’ lefty starter Matthew Boyd, who allowed just two runs with seven strikeouts in six strong innings to post his first win against the Royals since 2020. “It’s just winning games we’re supposed to win. Going out there and handling whatever the task is at hand. If we do that, we will be where we want to be.
“Getting where we want to be is a symptom of doing things the right way today.”
With an off-day Thursday, Hinch said the finale against the Royals had the potential to be a trap game.
“If you are on your off-day before your off-day, you’re going to end up walking away with a loss,” he said. “Guys like Shorty and Haase really stepped up. Those guys don’t want things to slide the way they have. It’s good to see them smile at the end of the day.”
chris.mccosky@detroitnews.com
Twitter: @cmccosky
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