CLEVELAND — Dillon Dingler hit a tiebreaking home run in the sixth inning, Wenceel Pérez drove in a pair of runs in a four-run seventh and the Detroit Tigers defeated the Cleveland Guardians 6-3 on Thursday in the deciding Game 3 of their American League wild-card series.
It is the second straight season the Tigers have won a wild-card series on the road. They head to Seattle for the first two games of a best-of-five division series against the Mariners, with Game 1 on Saturday.
The AL West champion Mariners, the No. 2 seed, took four of the six regular-season meetings with the Tigers, who earned the third AL wild card.
José Ramírez drove in the Guardians’ first run. The AL Central champions were 15½ games back in early July before completing the biggest comeback in division or league play in baseball history.
However, they ran out of steam in the playoffs as the Tigers turned the page after posting the second-worst record in the majors in September (7-17).
The game was tied 1-all with two outs in the sixth when Dingler got an elevated changeup from Joey Cantillo on a 1-1 count and drove it 401 feet into the bleachers in left-center to put the Tigers on top.
It was also the first postseason hit and RBI for the Tigers catcher.
The Tigers then broke it open in the seventh by sending 10 batters to the plate and scoring four times to make it 6-1.
With one out and the bases loaded, Pérez lined a base hit to right off Erik Sabrowski to drive in Javier Báez and Parker Meadows. Hunter Gaddis came in and gave up RBI singles to Spencer Torkelson and Riley Greene, which brought in Kerry Carpenter and Pérez.
Kyle Finnegan got the win, retiring all four batters he faced in relief. Cantillo took the loss.
The Tigers opened the scoring in the third. With one out and runners on the corners, Carpenter hit a grounder down the first-base line that deflected off C.J. Kayfus’ glove when he tried to backhand it. The ball rolled into foul territory near the stands as Meadows scored. Carpenter went to second and Gleyber Torres advanced to third on what the official scorer ruled a double.
The Guardians tied it in the fourth. George Valera led off with a double to the right-field corner and scored on Ramírez’s base hit on a knuckle curve by starter Jack Flaherty on a full count.
The single was the 40th hit of Ramírez’s postseason career, making him the fifth player in franchise history to reach that mark.
In the eighth inning, Tigers reliever Will Vest dropped a throw while covering first base on Ramírez’s grounder for an error that allowed Brayan Rocchio and Steven Kwan to score. Vest quickly recovered the ball near the dugout, however, and threw out Ramírez trying to reach second on the play.