ARLINGTON, Texas — The Detroit Tigers were powered by two home runs.
Right fielder Andy Ibáñez hit a three-run homer against his former squad, the Texas Rangers, in the third inning. Catcher Jake Rogers followed with a two-run homer in his home state, roughly 350 miles from his hometown of Canyon, in the sixth.
Those homers, and a slew of relief pitchers, carried the Tigers in Monday’s 7-2 win over the Rangers — the best team in the American League West and the third-best team in the AL — in the series opener at Globe Life Field.
“We pitched aggressively to a very good offense,” said Tigers manager A.J. Hinch, who called on five relievers. “I mean, hats off to the bullpen again, in a month where we’ve really used them a ton. Tonight, they were awesome.”
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The Tigers (34-43), though, had two players suffer injuries in the victory: Starting pitcher Matthew Boyd departed after three batters with left elbow discomfort, and relief pitcher Will Vest departed soon after with right knee discomfort.
In the third inning, Ibáñez tagged a second-pitch changeup from left-hander Andrew Heaney for a three-run home run. Matt Vierling (single) and Spencer Torkelson (walk) scored on the big fly.
The ball carried 427 feet to center field.
“Obviously, it was pretty sad to see two of our guys going down this way, but we just had everybody’s back,” Ibáñez said, with Tigers bilingual media coordinator Carlos Guillen interpreting. “Fortunately, as a collective team, we gave them our support and won the game.”
Ibáñez played the first 116 games of his MLB career with the Rangers and served as the franchise’s Opening Day third baseman in 2022. He was placed on waivers by the Rangers in November.
“We call it ‘the revenge tour,’ whenever you play your former team and have a lot of fun with it,” Hinch said. “You don’t want these guys to try to do too much, but when they do a lot, it’s pretty sweet.”
Before Ibáñez’s homer, Jonathan Schoop evened the score, 1-1, with a sacrifice fly in the second inning.
A team effort
Boyd threw just 15 pitches in his 15th start of the season. His final pitch — a four-seam fastball — traveled to the backstop and sparked a visit from head athletic trainer Ryne Eubanks.
Before the injury, Marcus Semien cranked a solo home run off Boyd’s second pitch of the game. Boyd struck out the next two batters, Corey Seager and Josh Jung, but couldn’t continue because of his elbow.
“I haven’t really gotten to talk to him yet,” Rogers said. “I just gave him a hug and said that I hope he feels good.”
THE INJURY: Tigers’ Matthew Boyd exits game in first inning with left elbow discomfort
Replacing Boyd, Vest completed the matchup with Adolis Garcia by throwing three consecutive four-seam fastballs for a swinging strikeout to end the first inning. He struck out two more batters in the second inning, along with allowing a double, before an injury forced his departure.
He came down awkwardly on the mound while throwing his 17th pitch and couldn’t continue.
“It’s natural to be frustrated, and a lot of things start to spiral,” Hinch said. “I will go right to like, ‘Who’s up next and what do we need to do to get out of the situation?’ I’ll go into manager mode at that point, but then sitting over there asking (pitching coach Chris Fetter) like, ‘Not again.’ That’s the natural feeling, and then you got to pick yourself back up and get back to the game.”
Right-hander Mason Englert, a Rule 5 draft pick left off the 40-man roster by the Rangers in the offseason, replaced Vest and struck out Ezequiel Duran to conclude the second inning.
Three pitchers combined for six strikeouts through two innings.
“We didn’t back down when they hit the ball out of the ballpark,” Hinch said. “We continued to find some chase counts and get them outside of the zone and threw as many different looks as we could. We were about a pitcher or two away from being out of pitching, so everybody that was available pretty much pitched.”
Englert gave up a solo home run to Garcia in the fourth inning, which cut the Tigers’ lead to 4-2. For his 18th homer, Garcia grabbed ahold of a 91.5 mph four-seam fastball over the heart of the plate and sent the ball 424 feet to center.
The Rangers didn’t score again.
Left-hander Tyler Alexander worked around three hits to complete the next three innings with four strikeouts. He pitched out of trouble in the fifth and seventh innings. The Tigers finished the game with righty Jason Foley and lefty Tyler Holton in the eighth and ninth innings, respectively.
Six pitchers combined for 16 strikeouts.
“We know all those guys out there, and we know these hitters and how they do against righties and lefties,” Rogers said. “It was kind of a shock, but we got the plan pretty quick and had to roll with the punches.”
Jake rakes
The Tigers added to their lead in the sixth and seventh innings.
A two-out single from Miguel Cabrera set up Rogers, who drew a walk in the fourth inning, for his third matchup against Heaney. Rogers blasted a two-strike fastball at the top of the strike zone for a two-run home run.
Rogers’ 10th homer of the season put the Tigers ahead, 6-2.
“I knew it was a pop-up or a homer, so I kind of pimped it a little bit,” Rogers said.
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Heaney allowed six runs on six hits and three walks with five strikeouts, throwing 65 of 101 pitches for strikes. He generated 14 whiffs with 10 fastballs, three sliders and one changeup.
Facing left-handed reliever Brock Burke, singles from Matt and Ibáñez put runners on the corners. Javier Báez drove a two-strike fastball to right field for a sacrifice fly, making it 7-2.
The Tigers’ offense finished with 10 hits, three walks and eight strikeouts.
Contact Evan Petzold at epetzold@freepress.com or follow him on Twitter @EvanPetzold.