DETROIT — The Detroit Tigers scored five unanswered runs as they overcame a 3-1 deficit to defeat the defending champion, San Francisco Giants in their final Interleague game of the season. Magglio Ordonez’s two-RBI single in the seventh with two-outs ensured a Tigers win, 6-3.
San Francisco is sending four pitchers to Phoenix for the 82nd All-Star Game. One of the four, Ryan Vogelsong, started for the Giants Sunday afternoon in Detroit, but the bullpen let the game slip away in the final innings.
Vogelsong went 6 2/3 innings, getting the first two Tigers in the seventh to fly out, but a walk issued to Brandon Inge ended Vogelsong’s day. The All-Star did not impress much on the score sheet, allowing three-runs on four-hits with just five strikeouts.
The Tigers also are sending four of their own to Arizona, which includes one of the best starters in the game this season, Justin Verlander, and whom is much deserving of starting for the American League in Phoenix.
However, on this affair, it was Rick Porcello who got the nod for the Tigers and earned his seventh win of the season. Porcello pitched seven-innings, striking out six, while surrendering three-runs on five-hits.
San Francisco got first blood, scoring in the fourth on Brandon Crawford’s RBI-groundout. Aubrey Huff walked to start the inning, advancing to third on Cody Ross’s groundball that was deflected by the Tigers shortstop, Ramon Santiago, allowing play to continue. Crawford brought Huff home following a Nate Schierholtz strikeout.
But the Tigers answered immediately in the bottom half as Brennan Boesch sent a solo homerun to tie the game at 1-all.
In the fifth, Porcello hit the Giants, Emmanuel Burriss, and surrendered a double to Pablo Sandoval which advanced Burriss to third. Porcello then threw a wild pitch with Huff at-bat to give the lead right back to the Giants. San Francisco increased their lead further as Sandoval scored their third run of the day from third on Ross’s grounder to left.
The Tigers though put up another run of their own in the sixth as Miguel Cabrera singled home Boesch who had doubled earlier in the inning; the Tigers still trailed 3-2.
In the seventh and eighth, the Tigers were able to jump out a head of the Giants as the Giants bullpen could not contain Detroit.
After the Giants were able to record the first two-outs in the seventh, Inge and Jhonny Peralta were each issued a walk, and Boesch kept the inning alive by reaching first on a throwing error by the Giants Miguel Tejada. Ordonez was due up next and singled to drive in two-runs to give the Tigers their first lead of the afternoon, 4-3.
Things were not getting much better for San Francisco in the eighth as the pitching woes continued. Again, the Tigers had two base-runners reach because of walks, and additional poor pitching prevented the Giants from escaping when they had two-outs in the inning.
Before anything further could be done, Inge tripled to drive in two more runs for the Tigers, who now led 6-3 and closed out the ninth for a victory that places them ½ game behind the division leading Cleveland Indians.
