Tigers can't capitalize on opportunities but still top Orioles in Game 1

Chris McCosky, The Detroit News on Apr 26, 2025

Published in Baseball

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DETROIT — The Tigers don’t rate wins. Any win is a good win.

But even they would agree, the 4-3 win over the Baltimore Orioles in the front end of a doubleheader Saturday was a little tougher than it needed to be.

They had ample opportunity to blow the game open instead of biting nails down the stretch.

The Orioles nipped at starter Casey Mize throughout his 5 1/3 innings. The only damage was a solo homer by Ryan O’Hearn, but he had to work out of trouble in the second and fourth, and he got help from reliever Brenan Hanifee to get through the sixth.

The Orioles, down 3-1 in the sixth, put runners at the corners with back-to-back singles off Mize. First baseman Spencer Torkelson made a bold play to erase the lead runner.

Positioned in on the grass, he fielded a ground ball by Heston Kjerstad and fired home without hesitation. Catcher Dillon Dingler applied a firm tag to get Jordan Westburg.

Hanifee replaced Mize at that point and retired Ramon Urias and Jackson Holliday to escape the inning.

Hanifee got two outs in the seventh, too, with a lot of help from left fielder Riley Greene.

Greene raced back to the wall to rob Ramon Laureano of a potential home run ball. It was his second run-saving catch of the game. He got Mize out of the second inning with a leaping grab at the wall on a drive by Holliday.

The Orioles didn’t leave the seventh empty, though. With two lefties coming up, manager AJ Hinch summoned lefty Tyler Holton. Walking Cedric Mullins wasn’t part of the script.

Gunnar Henderson followed, dropping a blooper in front of a diving Greene. Greene, who hit the wall awkwardly on the Laureano blast, was shaken up, though he stayed in the game.

Holton got two strikes on righty-swinging Westburg, but he let him back in the count. Westburg brought Mullins home with an infield single behind the bag at third.

Torkelson temporarily restored the two-run lead in the bottom of the seventh. He barreled up a first-pitch sinker from lefty Cionel Perez and drove it 387 feet over the wall in right-center.

The opposite-field blast was Torkelson’s team-leading eighth homer.

Urias answered back in the top of the eighth. He lined a cutter from Holton into the left-field seats. Holton allowed only seven homers in 94 1/3 innings last season. Urias’ blast was his second allowed in less than 13 innings so far this year.

Will Vest got the final four outs, impressively working through the top of Orioles' order in the ninth, to earn his third save.

It could have been so much more comfortable.

The Tigers were in position to score an early KO against Orioles right-handed starter Brendon Young, who walked five batters in the first two innings, four in the second. Two runs were all that came of it.

After Greene doubled Zach McKinstry to third with two outs in the first, Young got Torkelson to ground out.

In the second, after Javier Baez doubled in one run and a sacrifice fly by Gleyber Torres plated another, Young struck out Greene to strand the bases loaded.

Give Dingler an assist for keeping that inning alive. First he legged out a potential double-play ball after Jace Jung led off the inning with a walk.

Then he avoided getting back-picked off first with a deft slide away from tag of first baseman O’Hearn. The throw from catcher Gary Sanchez beat him to the base.

Dingler also erased an Oriole base runner, gunning down Westburg trying to steal in the first inning. His pop time to second base was a season-best 1.86 seconds.

The Tigers added a third run in the fifth on a two-out RBI single by Jung. It was his first hit of the season. But again, the Tigers left the bases loaded.