Jake Rogers has a way of making an entrance, and Friday night gave him another one.
With the game tied in the bottom of the ninth, a runner on third and two outs, Rogers launched a two-run walk-off homer off viral Mets pitcher Jefry Yan. Yan had pointed skyward after the contact, apparently thinking it was just a harmless pop-up, only to watch the ball leave the yard. The White Sox had already clawed back from a four-run hole with a tying rally in the sixth, and Rogers’ blast finished the job.
That win pushed Chicago to 68-62, the fourth-best record in the American League and the best mark outside the AL East. They’re also sitting as the No. 2 seed in the AL, 3.5 games ahead of the second-place Guardians.
For Tigers fans, the sting goes beyond one loud swing. Rogers has been on this kind of run before - first as “Rake Rogers” in Detroit, then for a brief but productive stop in Boston that had Red Sox fans wishing he’d stayed after he was DFA'ed. Now he’s doing it for a division rival.
Detroit’s decision to move on from him still makes sense on paper. His playing time had nearly disappeared, and he wasn’t producing when he did get in the lineup.
But that doesn’t make what he’s done since leaving any easier to watch, whether that’s because he found something with these other teams or they found something in him. And even if this stretch probably won’t last forever, it’s still painful in the moment.
The bigger frustration in Detroit isn’t Rogers himself. It’s what his success - along with Tarik Skubal’s elsewhere - keeps pointing back to: the Tigers didn’t do enough at the trade deadline.
Their need was clear, and the front office was said to be looking for a late-inning reliever. Instead, they ended up settling for released Braves pitcher Tyler Kinley.
That leaves the bullpen as the most obvious problem, and August is starting to look a lot like May for Detroit. In that light, Rogers’ walk-off for a winning team lands like another reminder of what the Tigers left on the table.
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Detroit has stumbled to a losing record and has been under its own share of scrutiny, but the front office has remained intact for now. With Houston choosing to reset at the top despite being in a better position in the standings, the contrast only sharpens the questions around what standards are being applied in Detroit and how long ownership is willing to wait before demanding a different direction. [Read more 🡒]
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For a Tigers club always looking to build around young, dependable pieces, McGonigles emergence is hard to ignore. The defensive confidence, the contact at the plate and the consistency behind those results all point in the same direction, even if the bigger question is how much more he can still add before the season is over. [Read more 🡒]